News

Summaries of open source, health care, or health IT news and information from various sources on the web selected by Open Health News (OHNews) staff. Links are provided to the original news or information source, e.g. news article, web site, journal,blog, video, etc.

See the following -

Bloated Healthcare Costs Raise EHR Concerns

Patrick Quellette | EHR Intelligence | September 25, 2012

By all accounts, money is being made in the healthcare industry off of EHR adoption. But who’s really saving cash and benefiting from these systems? Read More »

Blockchain's Potential Use Cases for Healthcare: Hype or Reality?

Mike Miliard | Healthcare IT News | February 22, 2017

At HIMSS17 on Wednesday, IEEE Computer Society and the Personal Connected Health Alliance hosted a day-long event focused on the potentially transformative promise of an intriguing innovation: Blockchain. Kicking off the symposium, "Blockchain in Healthcare: A Rock Stars of Technology Event," Tamara StClaire, previous chief innovation officer at Conduent Health (formerly known as Xerox Healthcare), made the case that the bitcoin-derived secure digital ledger technology could just maybe offer the answer to an array of vexing healthcare challenges – not least of which is interoperability...

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Blockchain, APIs Take a Stab at the Healthcare Revenue Cycle

Jennifer Bresnick | Health IT Analytics | October 27, 2016

Capital One is hoping to bring the blockchain and API tools to the healthcare industry by proving their value in the revenue cycle management arena. A pair of new partnerships between the financial services company and healthcare-focused startups aim to “reconceptualize” the claims management and patient payment processes, using blockchain and API technologies to reduce the time between service and collection...

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Blood Infections Play Role In Up To Half Of Hospital Deaths: Study

Robert Preidt | MedlinePlus | May 19, 2014

Bloodstream infections -- also known as sepsis -- occur in about 10 percent of hospital patients in the United States but contribute to as many as half of all hospital deaths, a new study says. Read More »

Blue Button Challenge Winners Offer Some Clues To Future Of Personal Health Record Access

Stephanie Baum | MedCity News | September 17, 2013

Combining patient data from multiple providers and personal records that can be accessed by emergency staff when users are unconscious were among the winners of the Blue Button Plus challenge. The innovation competition held by the Office of National Coordinator for Health IT is part of a drive to help consumers gain online access to their health records. Read More »

Blue Button Codeathon: Unlocking Data And Empowering Patients

Maya Uppaluru | Health IT Buzz | November 8, 2013

Anyone who has struggled to remember the name of their medication or the date of their child’s vaccination, while juggling multiple doctor appointments for family members, knows firsthand how important it is that patients have access to their health information. We think our Blue Button initiative can help. Read More »

Blue Button Expands Access To Include CCDs, OpenNotes

Jennifer Bresnick | EHR Intelligence | January 30, 2013

The Department of Veterans Affairs [...] has just announced the addition of several new features to the patient portal [Blue Button]. In addition to overhauling its user interface and expanding its technical development, the VA is giving its patients access to continuity of care documents (CCD), as well as integrating an OpenNotes feature, which allows patients to view physician documentation. Read More »

Blue Button For America

Matthew McCall and Henry Wei | VAntage Point | February 5, 2013

In August 2010, President Obama announced the Blue Button in a speech to the national convention of Disabled American Veterans.  In his remarks, he said that “for the first time ever Veterans will be able to go to the VA website, click a simple Blue Button, and download or print your personal health records so you have that when you need them and can share that with your doctors outside of the VA.” Read More »

Blue Button Goes Viral: UnitedHealthcare Promotes Importance of Personal Health Records to Millions of Enrollees

Press Release | UnitedHealthcare | July 5, 2012

UnitedHealthcare has launched its Blue Button, implementing a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services program that enables millions of plan participants to access and print their personal health records with the simple click of a blue button. Read More »

Blue Button Initiative Presents Issues For EHR Compatibility

Jennifer Bresnick | EHR Intelligence | October 24, 2012

The Automated Blue Button Initiative (ABBI), backed by the Department of Veterans Affairs and increasingly adopted by smaller providers, has been lauded for giving patients easy access to their electronic health records (EHRs) and fostering collaborative treatment... Read More »

Blue Button Is Powerful Tool For Patients

Press Release | PinsYourWay.com | November 8, 2012

The Blue Button program is more than just a VA initiative – it is a new way of thinking, writes a blogger dedicated to sharing the patient story. Read More »

Blue Button Plus may make its way into MU Stage 3

Jonah Comstock | mobihealthnews | January 17, 2013

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) is working to promote more patient engagement and access with their own records...working with data holders and app developers to encourage the development of a patient health data ecosystem through an update and an expansion of the Blue Button program that’s being called Blue Button Plus, the ONC announced in a recent webinar, hosted by the National eHealth Collaborative.

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Blue Button Plus, Other Identifiers Can Reverse 'Information Asymmetry'

Susan D. Hall | FierceHealthIT | November 11, 2013

Providing patients with access to their own information and reasserting the primacy of the physician-patient relationship can reverse the "information asymmetry" that favors big healthcare corporations at the expense of patients and individual physicians, according to a post at The Health Care Blog. Read More »

Blue Button Reaches One Million Registered Patients

Press Release | Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) | August 31, 2012

The Department of Veterans Affairs announced today that, during the month of August, the one millionth patient has registered for Blue Button to access and download their Personal Health Record (PHR) information. “Since President Obama announced the availability of Blue Button two years ago, VA has worked tirelessly with our sister agencies to make online access to personal health records convenient, reliable, and safe.  I am very pleased with our progress,” said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki. Read More »

Blue Button Set For Improvements

David Perera | FierceGovernmentIT | January 17, 2013

Federal health information technology officials highlighted Jan. 16 efforts to give patients the ability to download personal health record data via the Blue Button initiative. Read More »