June 2008

CCHIT on PHRs

CCHIT, the Certification Commission for Health Information Technology, will be certifying personal health records (PHRs) next year. Criteria will be proposed in April, 2009, along with a comment period. Certification will officially start in July 2009.

CCHIT’s certification of EMRs met with mixed reactions early on, with smaller vendors crying foul over the $20,000 fee. Since then, it’s become a somewhat important stamp of approval in large enterprise purchasing decisions.  This will likely happen with PHR certification as well.

PHR vendors should watch criteria development and participate in the comment period to provide your view.

Continue reading "CCHIT on PHRs" »

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 28, 2008 at 12:45 PM
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AHIP Pix

And speaking of payor technology vendors, last week’s AHIP conference was considerably smaller than 2007.  Our intrepid Account Executive Melissa Bruno provided a pictorial report:

Getting priorities straight - the busiest booth of the conference.
 

The second busiest booth of the conference.
 

Make sure your health plan covers Wii wrist sprains before visiting Portico’s booth.
 

This boat manufacturer was selling new technology paradigms. Fish love them.

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 26, 2008 at 12:54 PM
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Med Students Speak

The results of the third annual Future Physicians of America survey were released today, capturing the opinions of more than 900 medical students. Following are some of the key survey findings according to the press release:

Technology adoption grows — Year over year, medical students overwhelmingly agree technology improves patient safety and care. Today, more than one in three medical students use software solutions on their mobile devices, often at the encouragement of their medical school. The majority of respondents also report experience with electronic medical record (EMR) systems during rotations, yet less than 20 percent see wide-spread adoption in the U.S. within the next five years.

Preparing for practice — Nearly 70 percent of medical students do not feel adequately prepared for managing or owning a practice in the future. However, they give schools' clinical training programs top marks, showing improvements since 2006. Likely a result of early exposure in training, the availability of an EMR system will be a significant deciding factor in where 60 percent of students choose to practice (nearly a 20 percent increase over the previous year).

Assessing the healthcare system — Forty percent of survey respondents, increasing from 29 percent in 2006, give the U.S. healthcare system an unsatisfactory grade (D or F). Students cited insurance coverage issues as the system's main challenge in 2007. Approximately 35 percent of this year's respondents predict healthcare system reform within the next five years.
 
Students get personal — Students go online for more than clinical answers, with 75 percent spending time on popular networking sites - primarily Facebook – for a reprieve and social interaction. While most spend less than five hours a week, six percent of medical students spend between 24 - 40 hours a month on Facebook.

The Future Physicians of America survey is conducted on an annual basis. Survey participants are opted-in to participate in market research surveys through the Epocrates Honors Panel.

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 25, 2008 at 10:01 AM
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Your Premiums at Work

It seems that health plans have a little money left after paying all those healthcare costs. The trend of health plans acquiring technology vendors continues.  Care management vendor MEDecision is to be acquired by Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC), which operates Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans in Illinois, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.  HCSC paid $121 million and will keep MEDecision independent.

BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee and The Regence Group Blue are taking a minority ownership in TriZetto Group, which will be going private.  Others include UnitedHealth’s Ingenix , Aetna’s ActiveHealth Management, and Independence Blue Cross’ AllOne Health Management Solutions.

As I’ve written before, payors will be the major players in pushing technology adoption in healthcare, be it provider side with EHRs or consumer side with PHRs.

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 23, 2008 at 8:47 AM
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Great Expectations

A survey by HealthNewsReview.org published in the current issue of PLoS Medicine shows that the media could do a better job at covering medical news.

An analysis of 500 stories on medical topics by U.S. consumer print and broadcast media showed that “journalists usually fail to discuss costs, the quality of the evidence, the existence of alternative options, and the absolute magnitude of potential benefits and harms.”

These observations may be right, but what do you expect from the media, particularly consumer outlets? Space and time is money, all information is dumbed down, long form pieces don’t sell ads and eyeballs, and there will never be this level of desired accuracy. That’s what blogs, Web sites and peer-reviewed academic journals are for.

Some findings:

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 20, 2008 at 12:27 PM
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CBO: What Savings?

A recent report from the Congressional Budget Office joins several other reports in asserting that the health IT won’t deliver significant cost savings. The report specifically attacked the often-cited RAND report number of $77 billion in annual cost savings.

According to the report, health IT will only yield cost savings if implemented with broader healthcare reform measures. Also, government-mandated technologies such as e-presecribing could generate savings.

Coming from the Congressional Budget Office, many pundits have said that the report could effect prospects for legislation to boost the use of health IT. I don’t think so, given the number of reports that claim otherwise and the growing political importance of healthcare to the new administration soon to be in power.

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 16, 2008 at 7:16 AM
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Plans and Progress

Last week at a conference I heard doc Kolodner, head of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (his business card is extra long), talk all about the federal government’s health IT five-year strategic plan for 2008-2012. Kolodner was refreshingly frank about the level of progress given government bureaucracies, but at the same time optimistic.

The plan lays out a road map and milestones in more than 40 areas, including interoperability, security, privacy and IT adoption.  In this last area, the government would like to see PHRs linked to EMRs by 2010.  The full strategic plan is available here.

PR pros should review the plan to see what aspects are applicable to your products and services. Then position yourself with media as helping with the government's efforts by offering solutions today to enable the healthcare future of tomorrow.  Media who write about HHS and government health IT efforts would be good to target.

For those interested in looking back over the last four years since the Office was founded, please hit the “continue to read” link below.

•    2004: Laying the Foundation
•    2005: Initial Steps and Progress
•    2006: Major Accomplishments
•    2007/8: Major Accomplishments/Next Steps

Continue reading "Plans and Progress" »

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 11, 2008 at 3:15 PM
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Rated PG: Physician Good

CIGNA announced a national website ranking doctors and hospitals by cost and quality measures. As I’ve written before on doctor ratings, this movement is inevitable despite all the my-patients-are-sicker claims by doctors, or the efforts of various Attorney Generals.  Such watchdogs efforts are important though to see that health plans don’t skew the data for their own financial goals.

Cigna’s site names hospitals in specific regions with the lowest death and complication rates. It also offers lists of questions patients can ask their doctor about specific conditions and tools to help patients locate pharmacies with the lowest prices.

In New York, Cigna was one of many plans who pledged in writing to detail its ranking criteria. They’ve also tapped the National Committee for Quality Assurance to guide their ranking program.

Meanwhile in Massachusetts the MA Medical Society is up in arms about the state’s doc rankings. They sued the Group Insurance Commission to stop the rankings, claiming low-ranking doctors will be defamed and those patients who have to pay higher copayments based on their doctor’s ranking have been defrauded.

And last but not least, though most confusing to Joe Smith consumer, will be Consumer Reports new hospital rating service for 3,000 organizations. Their “intensity of care” index of 1 to 100 will rate how intensely a hospital treats patients, based on time spent in the hospital and number of doctor visits for nine serious conditions. This strikes me as a controversial and incomplete criteria compared to other methods.

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 6, 2008 at 10:51 AM
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Ring the Bell

A quick plug for Schwartz Communications' award winning night at the Publicity Club's Bell Ringer Award ceremony. Among the 12 Bell Ringers and 15 Awards of Merit that we won were six for healthcare.  These include:

- Feature or Commentary Placement: Online—ResMed/Respironics
- New Media: Epocrates
- Print Feature or Commentary Placement - Regional Business Publication: Spring Medical Systems
- Print Feature or Commentary Placement - Regional General Interest Publication: Hologic/MammoSite 
- Product/Service Publicity: Healthcare: Cyberonics and Epocrates

Posted by Shawn Whalen on June 2, 2008 at 10:23 PM
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