Edition Sixty-Five (3/9/11)

Majority of Patients Want On-line Access to Doctors
InformationWeek, 3/4/11
Nearly three-quarters of people want to be able to get lab results, request appointments, pay medical bills, and communicate with their doctor's office through secure on-line portals, finds a study. 

'Physician Champions' Help Other Docs with EHR Adoption
Government Health IT, 3/4/11
Through its RECs, ONC has started recruiting “physician champions” who are well on their way to becoming Meaningful Users of EHR to help others in their area get over the hurdles of digitizing their medical records. Meaningful Use Vanguard (MUV) participants work with their area extension center to assist providers who are struggling to deploy EHRs and become Meaningful Users, so they can qualify for incentive payments from the CMS.

CCHIT Survey: Stage 2 Too Aggressive
Health Data Management, 3/4/11
A survey from CCHIT shows large numbers of the 468 respondents find proposed Stage 2 Meaningful Use criteria which expands nine existing objectives and measures in Stage 1 are too aggressive. 36% of respondents were providers and 29% were EHR vendors, with the remaining respondents representing other stakeholders.

Not So Fast—Why it Pays to Wait until FY 2012 on Meaningful Use
iHealthBeat, 3/3/11
More than 21,000 health care providers have registered to date and many more are ramping up efforts to meet Meaningful Use criteria and collect federal incentives in fiscal year 2011. However, rushing out the gates in fiscal year 2011 is extremely risky and not advisable. In fact, the Advisory Board Company strongly recommends waiting until fiscal year 2012 to first demonstrate Meaningful Use.

Vendors: Stage 2 Timeline is Worrisome
Health Data Management, 3/2/11
Members of HIMSS call for a period of at least 18 months between a final rule on the criteria and the beginning of Stage 2 of Meaningful Use. The association also asks for consideration of delays in starting Stage 2, or shifting from three two-year stages for the program to two three-year stages.

AMA to ONC: EHR Program Doesn't Work for Docs
Modern Healthcare, subscription required 3/2/11
Many physicians—specialists in particular—will not participate in the federal EHR adoption incentive program because it requires them to include patient data which they do not otherwise collect, according to a letter from 39 medical organizations to ONC.

One Year Since Health Care Reform: Five Thoughts from Health Care Leaders
Becker's Hospital Review, 3/1/11
In the wake of the Health Reform bill's passage, hospitals and health systems are struggling to adapt to a variety of changes: planned Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement cuts, additional requirements and regulations, the beginnings of ACO development, and a move from fee-for-service to pay-for-performance for providers nationwide. To mark the anniversary of the passage of reform, four health care leaders discuss the state of the health care industry one year later. 

Report: EHR Growth is Spiking
Health Data Management, 3/1/11
A new report estimates the U.S. EHR market is at nearly $15.8 billion and predicts it will rise to $31.9 billion in 2015. The report estimates the EHR market grew 10.5 percent in 2009 and 13.6 percent in 2010, down from its previous estimates of 15 percent for both years. The firm attributes the lower growth to initial confusion over Meaningful Use requirements, and some market uncertainty around certification of EHR products.

Consumer Groups: Hold Strong on Meaningful Use
Health Data Management, 2/28/11
A coalition of 25 consumer groups and unions is asking federal officials to hold firm on more stringent criteria for Stage 2 of EHR Meaningful Use, and expressing support for going further. Because patients still trust their providers more than other information sources, holding providers accountable for actual usage of a patient Web portal is entirely appropriate, and they strongly urge ONC to resist pressure from the provider community to absolve them from responsibility for making these services available and useful to their patients, according to a comment letter to ONC.

GAO: Cut Duplicate Meaningful Use, e-Script Reporting
Health Data Management, 2/28/11
A new report from the Government Accountability Office examines inconsistencies in the technology and reporting requirements for Medicare's e-Prescribing incentive program and the EHR Meaningful Use incentive program. Both programs require providers to use technology which performs similar e-Prescribing functions, the congressional investigatory agency concludes.

CDC Will Link Public Health EHRs with Immunization Tracking System
Government Health IT, 2/28/11
The CDC plans to enable the EHRs of state and local health departments to share data with immunization information systems and to integrate the immunization systems with CDC’s vaccine tracking system. All state health departments have some type of immunization information system, but they have a variety of functionality. CDC wants to assure interoperability between these systems and EHRs.

Carrots, Sticks, and Digital Health Records
The New York Times, 2/26/11
The U.S. is embarking this year on a grand experiment in the government-driven adoption of technology—ambitious, costly, and potentially far-reaching in impact. The goal is to improve health care and to reduce its long-term expense by moving the doctors and hospitals from ink and paper into the computer age—through a shift to digital patient records.

AHIMA Comments on Stage 2
Health Data Management, 2/25/11
Providers choosing not to adhere to clinical decision support information during treatment should document the reason why under Stage 2 Meaningful Use criteria, according to comments from AHIMA. When the treatment of care deviates from the direction guided by the CDS, this should be captured and included in the reporting for Meaningful Use, the association recommends.

Patient Engagement Key to EMR Success
HealthLeaders, 2/24/11
Hospitals are spending billions of dollars to achieve Meaningful Use of EHRs, but if patients don't use the new technology, hospitals may not reap the federal stimulus payments which await. This is the conclusion of a report—Putting Patients into Meaningful Use—which found 14% of 1,000 consumers surveyed said they get their medical records electronically from their physicians, and 30% of patients said they didn't know why they would need to.

ONC Will Test Specifications for Improved Exchange by Fall
Government Health IT, 2/23/11
ONC hopes to demonstrate and test tools which will make it easier to share patient data, and to include them in the next stage of Meaningful Use criteria. The tools are the result of projects to simplify and make consistent the technical descriptions for deploying standards for sharing patient data. ONC wants those tools and specifications in the proposed rule for Stage 2 of Meaningful Use standards and certification criteria, due by year-end.

Show Me the EMR
H&HN, 2/23/11
Speaking to a packed room, Sebelius called on attendees to become more vocal advocates—and partners—in making sure health I.T. truly transforms care delivery. She called on the health I.T. community to actively promote I.T. solutions not as just I.T., but as tools to improve workflow, patient safety, and quality of care. She also urged larger providers and vendors to reach out to smaller physician practices and hospitals to help them become Meaningful Users.

CMS Counts 21,000-Plus Providers Registering for EHR Incentives
Healthcare IT News, 2/22/11 
More than 21,000 providers have registered to participate in the EHR incentive program, and about two-thirds are ready to confirm they have met the Meaningful Use requirements. The attestation module on the CMS Web site will launch in April and will walk providers through the core and menu measures, describing them on a display screen with boxes to check or show calculations.

Meaningful Use a Top Goal 
Modern Healthcare, subscription required, 2/22/11 
In an on-line survey of I.T. executives and information officers at hospitals across the country, half named meeting Meaningful Use requirements for electronic health-record systems as their top I.T. priority for the next two years. This is an increase of 8% from last year, when 42% of respondents in the HIMSS Leadership Survey identified Meaningful User status as their first priority.

IOM Wants to Use EHRs, Community Data to Keep People Healthy
Government Health IT, 2/21/11
The Institute of Medicine is exploring the role of EMRs, health insurance information, and other data systems to gauge the activities and habits in communities in order to focus efforts to keep people healthier instead of waiting until they are sick. An IOM committee on public health strategies to improve health has begun considering how to use various sources of data to measure population health performance and drive accountability for levels of health.

Drummond Group Introduces EHR Certification for Hospitals
Market Wire, 2/21/11
The Drummond Group has introduced its "EHR Certification Roadmap for Hospitals." Several hospitals provided Drummond with input into the development of the program—making it possible to design a unique testing experience which meets the specific needs of provider organizations.

EMRs, Quality Efforts Key to Viability of Practices, Obama Officials Advise
American Medical News, 2/21/11
Physicians who fail to tackle quality improvement, adopt EMRs, and embrace teamwork, risk being at a competitive disadvantage with doctors who join the modern era of health care, federal officials warned physicians at the AMA National Advocacy Conference. CMS Administrator Donald M. Berwick, MD, told physicians the national health system reform law is encouraging doctors and hospitals to embrace quality improvement the way other businesses already have.

ONC: Providers Will See Value in 2011 from Information Exchange
Government Health IT, 2/21/11
Health care providers will start to see value for their practices from EHRs and Meaningful Use this year, particularly in the area of HIE, says ONC. The Direct Project makes it easier for physicians to deploy the standards and services to share summary patient data with other providers through a version of secure e-mail.

Bills Push Medicare Data Access 
Wall Street Journal, 3/3/11
Senators Chuck Grassley and Ron Wyden are pushing for legislation which would require the federal government to provide public access to a Medicare claims database. The senators said public access to the database would help improve government transparency and accountability, while serving as a tool for detecting Medicare fraud.

iPad: The New Stethoscope?
Fortune Tech, 3/4/11
Steve Jobs showed a video testimonial of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center CIO John Halamka, who claimed the iPad will "change the way doctors practice medicine."

Study: Hospitals' Facebook Use is Poor
Healthcare IT News, 2/28/11
U.S. hospitals are not taking advantage of the opportunities Facebook creates to better engage patients, build health care communities, or develop their hospital brands, according to a new study. According to the study, only a few hospitals across the country are really using social media to their advantage, and are doing it very well. 

World Economic Forum Drives Health Data Initiative
InformationWeek, 2/28/11 
The World Economic Forum has launched the Global Health Data Charter, an initiative to advance global health through the management and collection of data. The charter aims to enable individuals and patients, health professionals, and policymakers to make more informed decisions through secure access to comprehensive health data.

Berwick Lauds Health Reform, Says ACO Rule is Imminent
Health Data Management, 2/24/11
CMS Administrator Donald Berwick, M.D. says health reform at its heart addresses three pillars of the new care model—making a plan, acting as a team, and putting the patient in charge. The tectonic plates of health care are shifting, he said, and while this is creating a great deal of anxiety and confusion in the health industry and general population, don’t blame the legislation.

Report Details Health Care Data Theft
South Florida Business Journal, 2/23/11
As the nation moves toward growing use of EMRs, data vulnerability becomes increasingly evident. A new report showed 4.9 million patients had their personal health information compromised as a result of 166 data breaches which occurred during the first year of the HITECH Act.

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