| Arkansas Office of Health Information Technology Selects OptumInsight for Statewide Health Informati - Thursday, February 09, 2012Axolotl HIE facilitates sharing of electronic health information among health care providers across Arkansas
LITTLE ROCK, ARK. Feb. 9, 2012 – The Arkansas Office of Health Information Technology (OHIT) today announced that OptumInsight’s health information exchange (HIE) technology has been selected to build the infrastructure for the State Health Alliance for Records Exchange (SHARE), Arkansas’s statewide health information exchange.
Ray Scott, who was appointed by Governor Mike Beebe to serve as the state coordinator for health information technology and directs the activities of the OHIT said; “The selection of OptumInsight and their Axolotl HIE solution represents a major milestone in Arkansas’s efforts to expand the use of electronic health information that will benefit patients, care providers and payers. OptumInsight’s extensive experience in enabling the exchange of medical information about patients, who are treated by multiple unaffiliated health care providers, means better coordinated care and ultimately better health for Arkansans.” read more ... |
| Health IT Policy Committee Moves Forward on 2012 Activities - Friday, February 03, 2012HIMSS News: The Health IT Policy Committee held its monthly meeting on Wednesday, February 1. National Coordinator for Health IT, Dr. Farzad Mostashari, provided opening remarks, highlighting the progress of the Health IT Policy and Standards Committees, and reminding members of the vast amount of work yet to be done. Specifically, he said, the next year should focus on interoperability, information exchange and care and quality improvement.
Claudia Williams and Dr. Doug Fridsma then provided an in-depth update on health information exchange, including the state HIE program, Direct Project and NwHIN. Of note is that in the month of November, 800,000 documents were exchanged and ONC has been notified than many of those exchanges provided lifesaving information. The committee also reviewed the 2012 work plan, received a briefing on the progress of the Million Hearts Campaign, and heard from the Quality Measures Workgroup. read more ... |
| EHR vendor contracts becoming less provider-friendly - Friday, January 20, 2012
Warning: Be careful before you sign that contract for an electronic health record system. Vendor contracts are becoming more one-sided and difficult, according to EHR consultant Ron Sterling in a blog post on HITECH Answers this week.
Most vendors, according to Sterling, are much larger and more sophisticated than their provider customers; as a result, their contracts are all about protecting the vendors, not the products' users.
"EHR contracts contain an increasing array of complicating structures and dense terms that offer fewer and fewer commitments to your practice," Sterling said.
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| Racial disparities reduced through EHR use - Wednesday, January 18, 2012The use of electronic health records may help to reduce racial disparities in healthcare, according to a study published this week in the Archives of Internal Medicine. According to researchers, EHRs with clinical decision support are associated with improved blood pressure control both for whites and blacks, and appear to close the gap between the two. The study involved a survey of physicians throughout the country who had examined more than 17,000 patient visits where blood pressure was taken, according to Reuters Health. When physicians used paper records, 69 percent of blacks and 75 percent of whites were estimated to have their blood pressure under control. When EHRs were used, however, the disparity decreased, with 75 percent of blacks and 78 percent of whites reporting their blood pressure to be under control. read more ... |
| HIPAA Audits Move Forward - Tuesday, January 10, 2012First 20 Organizations Getting Site Visits It's official: The new HIPAA compliance audit program has begun. The 20 organizations selected for the initial test phase of the program are preparing for site visits in the coming weeks, federal regulators confirm. After that, about 130 more organizations will face audits later this year. For those who believed that the audits would focus only on larger organizations, security consultant Mac McMillan has some news: That's not the case. McMillan is advising a small Texas hospital that is preparing for a site visit by auditors later this month. "So they're not just going after the big guys," stresses McMillan, CEO of CynergisTek HITECH Act Mandate The Department of Health and Human Services' Office for Civil Rights announced the audit program last year. The HITECH Act, part of the economic stimulus package passed in 2009, mandated the audit program to improve compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act's privacy and security rules read more ... |
| Why Technology in Health Care - Tuesday, January 10, 2012Health care is behind other industries by 20 years in utilizing technology to improve quality. read more ... |
| Todd Park: More can, should be done to capture unique EHR safety issues - Monday, January 09, 2012As Chief Technology Officer at the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, it's Todd Park's job to be excited about innovation. And, as anyone who's seen him speak live can attest, he takes his job very seriously. "There has never been a better time to be an innovator at the intersection of IT, data, and health care improvement," Park tells FierceHealthIT in an exclusive interview. "Market incentives are beginning to change in the direction of rewarding innovations that improve health, quality, and efficiency, and information is being liberated at multiple levels to help power these innovations. read more ... |
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