value-based care

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Are Smartwatches Being Over-Hyped as Health Trackers?

I don't get smartwatches. Yes, I know; they're all the rage.  Apple unveiled its Apple Watch earlier this month, to generally good if not entirely ecstatic reviews.  Not to be outdone, Google announced a collaboration with TAG Heuer and Intel for a "Swiss Smartwatch."...I have to wonder why the focus on the wrist.  It isn't the ideal place to track, say, your heartbeat, your sleep, or your steps, and as a result fitness trackers have been faulted about their accuracy.  Cramming features into a smartphone makes some sense, because they have become so ubiquitous, but I'm not sure who is clamoring to add more features to a watch...

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Can Open Source EHRs Offer a New Path for Health IT Usability?

Jennifer Bresnick | Health IT Analytics | March 28, 2017

In an article published in JMIR Medical Informatics, researchers from the University of California-Davis decided to explore the small but intriguing world of open source EHRs, which may fit very neatly into the growing interest in application programming interfaces, FHIR, and other open data standards that encourage customized mix-and-match health IT development without the historical pitfalls of proprietary systems. Using data from 2014, the researchers identified 54 open source projects that met the HHS definition of an electronic health record.  At the time, four of those packages had achieved Certified EHR Technology status from the ONC.

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Can the Healthcare System Change Its Spots?

Just a few years ago, things were looking up for the American health care system. We were going to start finding better ways to pay for care: call it pay-for-performance (P4P), value-based purchasing (VBP), or similar terms. We were going to nudge -- or, rather, push -- providers into more clinically integrated systems (e.g., ACOs) to help improve outcomes and to control costs. And, of course, with wider use of electronic health records (EHR), we'd be able to better coordinate care and make decisions based on actual data. It all sounded very promising. Now, though -- what's that old expression about the leopard not being able to change its spots?...

Change Healthcare Introduces Enterprise Blockchain for Healthcare

Press Release | Change Healthcare | September 25, 2017

Change Healthcare today announced the launch of the first blockchain solution for enterprise-scale use in healthcare, enabling payers and providers to boost revenue cycle efficiency, improve real-time analytics, cut costs, and create innovative new services. As one of the largest independent healthcare IT companies in the United States, Change Healthcare services customers across the continuum of care, using its Intelligent Healthcare Network™ to process 12 billion healthcare-related transactions covering over $2.0 trillion in claims annually...

EHRs, IoT, Revenue Cycle Bring Opportunities for Healthcare APIs

Jennifer Bresnick | Health IT Analytics | January 4, 2017

Application programming interfaces (APIs) are quickly becoming a critical tool for healthcare organizations looking to build interoperable connections, and it is likely that this new standard for health data exchange will keep growing in importance during the next few years. A new report from Market Research Engine (MRE) predicts healthy growth for the nascent healthcare API ecosystem, forecasting a 4 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) that will produce a $234 million market by 2024....

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EMR and EHR Buyers Beware Deceptive Sales

Howard Green, MD | LinkedIn | December 9, 2016

The study was recently published in a prestigious academic journal shortly after we started using an EMR in our Dermatology practice. It revealed that on average, your physicians spend 2 hours inputting data and clicking through their Electronic Medical Records (EMR) for every hour of direct care with patients. http://www.healthcare-informatics.com/news-item/ehr/study-ambulatory-physicians-spend-half-their-time-ehrs-desk-work..

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Health IT Task Force Synthesizes Open API Themes

Frank Irving | HealthIT Interoperability | February 11, 2016

Health IT integration will reach a significant threshold when, as specified under 2015 Edition criteria, electronic health records systems and related tools must provide consumer-facing access to the Common Clinical Data Set via an application programming interface (API). Hard at work deciphering how consumers could leverage API technology to access patient data is the Joint API Privacy and Security Task Force...

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Healthcare Technology Costs Top $32,500 per Physician

Press Release | Medical Group Management Association | August 10, 2016

As they move to digitize their practices and patient medical records, healthcare organizations across the country continue to grapple with significant increases in information technology costs. According to new data from Medical Group Management Association, physician-owned multispecialty practices spent more than $32,500 per full-time physician on information technology equipment, staff, maintenance, and other related expenses in 2015...

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HIMSS13: A Fork in the Road - How Patients & Payment Are Forcing 'Open' Health IT

Jane Sarasohn-Kahn | iHealthBeat | March 11, 2013

This year feels like a fork in the road at HIMSS13, with disruptive forces of patients, digital health, mobility and open standards driving innovation and renewed energy at the annual conference...Without transparency (in health IT and health finance) and data liquidity, bending the cost curve will continue to elude the U.S. health system. At the recently concluded annual Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society conference in New Orleans, 34,696 got to experience a yin and yang vibe that embodies the disruption that the health care IT industry is undergoing. That is, the full-on face-off between developers of health IT that have been long-closed to data liquidity and those vendors innovating on open standards and cloud-based platforms. Read More »

HIMSS18: Seema Verma - Making the patient the center of our health care system

Press Release | CMS | March 6, 2018

I’ve always been struck by how seldom the patient is mentioned in discussions around value-based care. Let me be clear, we will not achieve value-based care until we put the patient at the center of our healthcare system. Until patients can make their own decisions based on quality and value health care costs will continue to grow at an unsustainable rate. This administration is dedicated to putting patients first, to be empowered consumers of health care that have the information they need to be engaged and active decision-makers in their care. Through this empowerment, there will be a competitive advantage for providers that deliver coordinated, quality care, at the best value, to attract patients who are shopping for value.

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Hospitals Remain Underinvested in Costing Technologies, Black Book ERP Survey Results

Press Release | Black Book Market Research | December 13, 2016

An inert healthcare enterprise resource planning software sector grew less than 2 percent in 2015 as hospitals turned available technology funding to conflicting priorities such as ICD 10 conversions, cybersecurity, population health and analytics, with less than 29 percent of all US hospitals having implemented any ERP product. As provider executives face compounding value-based risk decisions, recent interest in ERP has climbed sharply according to a recent Black Book survey of 1,158 health system procurement and technology leaders in the fourth quarter of 2016....

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How Does the ONC Define HIE, Value-Based Care, Population Health?

Jennifer Bresnick | HealthIT Analytics | September 29, 2016

The new ONC Health IT Playbook contains a wealth of resources and information for healthcare organizations in various stages of reform. From the very beginning stages of negotiating an EHR purchase to the complex integration of multiple care sites into a risk-based financial arrangement, there’s something for everyone at every level in this interactive, online compendium of knowledge...

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How MACRA Will Decimate the Private Practice Physician

Niran S. Al-Agba, MD | KevinMD.com | July 20, 2016

Small, independent private practices are closing, increasing numbers of physicians are retiring, and fewer medical school graduates are choosing primary care.  The old-fashioned practice my father and I have built is a dying entity.  Parents say coming to see us for an appointment feels more like a visit with a friend than a medical encounter.  I am fighting for the survival of primary care practices.  MACRA proposed reimbursement will decimate rural care as we know it...

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How to Develop Community Health, Patient Outreach Efforts

Sara Heath | Patient Engagement HIT | July 31, 2017

The AHA has published a toolkit to help drive community health and improve patient outreach efforts in rural regions and vulnerable urban communities. As healthcare becomes increasingly value-based, hospitals are working to use their resources in the most efficient way possible to meet the needs of their individual communities. This means putting a larger focus on community health, which can help serve patients outside the four walls of the hospital. This will improve the health of the population at a lower healthcare cost...

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Many Healthcare Technologies Are Married to the Fee-for-Service Model

Juliet Preston | MedCity News | January 10, 2017

Monday’s 5 p.m. digital health panel at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference happened to coincide with a presentation given by the popular U.S. Vice President Joe Biden. Some attendees were torn. For those that did make it, panel moderator Bob Kocher promised some topical debates far more interesting than that “moon-thing” Biden has been up to. It was all of the fun, without the metal detectors. A partner at Venrock Ventures, Bob Kocher set the stage with some fundamental observations about how technology can help enhance healthcare for all stakeholders...

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