By Robert Rowley & David Harlow – The lack of coordinated delivery of healthcare is widespread in this country. It might even be called the norm. Most people in the U.S. receive their care in a disjointed way, where each clinician, and each facility, has her/his own system.
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By John Halamka MD – The use of the term interoperability is being tossed around in ways that makes it seem like the test for obscenity used by Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart in 1964.
By William Hyman – The premise of Clinical Decision Support (CDS) is that automated patient specific “advice” can guide clinician practice toward improved patient care and ultimately better outcomes. A related value is better utilization of resources by avoiding unnecessary clinical activities that are potentially harmful, and/or expensive.
The Coalition for ICD-10 congratulates CMS on the success of its April end-to-end testing, which demonstrated that CMS systems are ready to accept ICD-10 claims.
By Edmund Billings MD – I could understand completely if many behavioral health providers and facilities feel like the proverbial red headed stepchild. All this energy and money poured into improving healthcare through comprehensive information technology (IT) systems and behavioral health is left holding an empty basket.
By William Hersh MD – One of the aspects of medicine that struck me as a medical student was its imprecision. I was surprised, sometimes shocked, at decisions that were made based on vague symptoms reported by patients, ambiguous findings detected on physical examination, and even variation in “hard” measurements such as laboratory results.
By Karen B. DeSalvo & Brandon McBride – In late 2011, the President announced a White House Rural Council initiative lead by the HHS and USDA to invest in rural health and link rural doctors and hospitals to financing for health IT. The initiative was designed to address the need for financing to support the adoption of health IT systems in rural communities.
By John Halamka MD – Every technology has an adoption journey. The classic Gartner hype curve travels from a Technology Trigger to the Peak of Inflated Expectations followed by the Trough of Disillusionment. It often takes years before organizations reach the Slope of Enlightenment and finally achieve a Plateau of Productivity.
By Jon White MD & Steven Posnack – Spring has arrived in Washington and it is the season of change. In our ongoing pursuit of agile and effective public service, we turn our attention today to how we get timely and effective public input.