One of the ways that HITECH Answers is different from other media sites is the sense of community. The thought leaders in our community are good about sharing their thoughts on the issues of today. We publish at least eleven guest posts a week now, on our three sites. In case you missed some, here are the top ten read and shared guest posts of the month. You can also read previous month’s Top Ten Lists. Thank you for contributing and reading.
The Beginners Quick Start Guide to Text Messaging Patients
By Kaitlyn Houseman, Marketing Specialist, GroupOne Health Source Inc.
Twitter: @GroupOne_Health
Text messaging is fully integrated into millions of people’s lives and is a convenient, less obtrusive alternative to the phone call. With 97% of Americans using their phones to text, many physicians are wondering how to incorporate text message communication into their practices. Continue reading on HIEAnswers.net…
The 7 HIPAA Audit Items the Feds Selected
By Mike Semel
Twitter: @SemelConsulting
HIPAA Audits Have Begun. Will Your Business Associates Cause You to Fail? The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced that the new permanent audit program has started. On July 11 letters were sent BY E-MAIL (check your junk mail folders!) to 167 health plans, health care providers, and health care clearing houses (all HIPAA Covered Entities) notifying them that they have to send in documentation for a ‘desk audit.’ Continue reading on HITECHAnswers.net…
Medical Assistants, Credentialing and Meaningful Use: What You Need to Know
By Elizabeth Lauzon, Public Relations Coordinator, SCG Health
Twitter: @SCGhealth
There’s a great deal of focus being spent on a national standard for credentialing of medical assistants and or certification for scribes. And when it comes to Meaningful Use and certified electronic health records (EHRs), there are lots of questions surrounding the topic. So let’s work on clearing up a few of them. Continue reading on HITECHAnswers.net…
New HIPAA Guidance on Ransomware Attacks and ePHI Security
By Bob Grant, Chief Strategy Officer, Compliancy Group
Twitter: @compliancygroup
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has released new guidance about how HIPAA-beholden entities can better equip themselves to deal with ransomware attacks. Ransomware is a targeted kind of malware attack that takes data ‘hostage.’ The attackers responsible then give the organization a countdown to a time at which they expect to receive a ‘ransom’ in exchange for restored access to the withheld data. Continue reading on HITECHAnswers.net…
AMIA Unveils Advanced Health Informatics Certification for Broader Health Professions
By William Hersh, MD, Professor and Chair, OHSU
Twitter: @williamhersh
While the clinical informatics physician subspecialty has been an excellent way to recognize the value of the informatics profession [1], there are clearly many important other professionals in the informatics field who deserve the same professional recognition for their knowledge and skills in using data and information to improve health and healthcare. A further step in that evolution took place recently with the unveiling of the Advanced Health Information Certification (AHIC) by the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA). Continue reading on HITECHAnswers.net…
Great CIOs Need “WOW” Service Desks That Go Beyond ITIL
By D’Arcy Gue, VP, Industry Relations, Phoenix Health Systems
Twitter: @DarcyGue
Given the IT revolution within hospitals today, how your Service Desk analysts handle physicians and other users is more critical than ever. Disruptive trends such as sophisticated new EHRs, widespread use of devices and apps, and the growth of cloud-based services should not equate to disrupted customer service. Yet this often happens, as over-stressed CIOs with tight budgets overlook or delay upgrading user support in the heat of implementations and more “executive level” responsibilities. Continue reading on HITECHAnswers.net…
Best EHR Checklist
By Alex Tate, Health IT Consultant, CureMD
Twitter: @alextate07
Choosing the right Electronic Health Record (EHR) is a crucial decision for any practice. It carries equivalent weight to making the right diagnosis of a patient. If you are a healthcare provider, consider your practice to be a patient, and an EHR the medicine for your practice. There are hundreds and thousands of EHRs available in the market, like there are thousands of medicines for any particular disease or illness. But which one is right for your practice? Continue reading on HITECHAnswers.net…
As Healthcare Digitizes, Medical Referrals Fall Far Behind
By Jeremy Guttman, Researcher and Content Developer, Treatspace
Twitter: @Treatspace
Entirely paper-based healthcare is going the way of the dodo bird. Since 2008, the number of office-based physicians who have adopted electronic healthcare records (EHRs) has doubled from 40% to over 80%. In fact, the number of physicians using EHRs has actually quadrupled in the past 12 years. Poorly handwritten prescriptions are no longer a problem for the 70% of physicians who now prescribe medications for their patients electronically. The advancement of e-prescribing has led to a reduction in medical errors and prevents fraud, such as opioid abuse. Continue reading on HIEAnswers.net…
The Impact of MACRA on Your Practice
By Jeff Jones, Business Project Analyst, GroupOne Health Source Inc.
Twitter: @GroupOne_Health
Encouraging physicians to switch to electronic health records (EHR) has been a long term effort from CMS ever since the January 2009 passage of the HITECH act. Over three-quarters of physicians and nearly all hospitals are using an EHR but the incentivizing structure has been hard to wade through, at best. Now healthcare professionals and physicians alike must focus their efforts on understanding the end of the SGR formula and the beginning of The Merit Based Incentive Payment System and Alternative Payment Models. Continue reading on RCMAnswers.net…
Patient Engagement: A Digital Divide in Health Technology Accessibility
By Sarianne Gruber
Twitter: @subtleimpact
Hallmarked as a solution to improve healthcare quality, cost and safety, studies are showing health technology is up against a “digital divide” when it comes to patient engagement. At the Internet Governance Forum, Pew Research Center’s Lee Rainie, Director of Internet, Science and Technology Research presented the Fact Tank Report discussing the “digital divide” that exists in 2016. The report documents that lower income, less educated, non-white, seniors and rural communities are the least likely to have home internet, home broadband, mobile connectors and smartphones. Continue reading on RCMAnswers.net…
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