When I read in the Premier healthcare alliance's recent spring 2013 Economic Outlook that 43% of survey respondents indicated that their organization will make its biggest capital investment in healthcare information technology and telecommunications in 2013, up 21% from two years ago, I wasn't surprised. Read More »

Admissions will shift significantly from the inpatient to the outpatient setting in 2013 as providers transition to new care delivery models, says a Premier healthcare alliance survey. It also indicates that hospitals will make their biggest capital investments this year in information technology. Read More »

Patient Privacy Rights in Austin, Texas, added Dr. Adrian Gropper last month as its chief technology officer. Read More »

Today marks the launch of the third Google Code-in, an international contest introducing 13-17 year old pre-university students to the world of open source software development. The goal of the contest is to give students the opportunity to explore the many types of projects and tasks involved in open source software development... Read More »

Veteran physician informaticist Dr. Robert Kolodner, the former head of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology at HHS, has been named VP and chief medical officer at ViTel Net, McLean, Va., a provider of telehealth software and services, the company has announced. Read More »

Although Meaningful Use payments will dry up when the incentive program ends, the benefits of electronic health records systems--including quality and efficiency gains--will mitigate the loss, according to global ratings agency Fitch. But the fact that the funds are non-recurring makes makes it tricky to predict the financial impact of EHRs. Read More »

Physician adoption of ambulatory electronic health records is increasing in the North Carolina Triangle area--Duke University, UNC Health Care and WakeMed--but not all physicians are embracing the technology with open arms, according to an article in the News & Observer. Read More »

Adoption of expensive electronic health record systems may hurt a hospital's bottom line, despite promises that the new systems will increase efficiencies and lower costs. Read More »

Thanks to government incentives, more healthcare organizations in the United States are implementing Electronic Health Record systems than ever before. But EHR implementation isn't the same as EHR adoption, which requires significant investment in planning, training and personnel. Read More »

A percolating problem is beginning to boil over: doctors and nurses really don’t like their new electronic health records systems. And, as EHR implementations increase ahead of government deadlines for incentive dollars, dissatisfaction among clinicians is growing. Read More »