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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/care-orgs-report-variable-experience-with-ehr-vendor-cerner
Care Orgs Report Variable Experience with EHR Vendor Cerner
Within the past few months, EHR vendor Cerner announced its acquisition by Oracle and brought on David Feinberg as the new CEO.
February 11, 2022 - Cerner health IT customers and the healthcare industry at large believe the EHR vendor is at a crossroads, according to a KLAS report.
The report outlines customer perceptions from 26 healthcare organizations, as well as Cerner’s performance data from the past five years. It is the first of several Cerner-specific reports KLAS intends to publish this year as customers seek to understand how the vendor’s recent changes may impact their organizations.
In the past few months, the vendor has announced its acquisition by Oracle and brought on David Feinberg as the new CEO, making him the third person to fill the role in the past five years. Additionally, an increasing number of long-time Cerner executives have left the company over the past two years.
The vendor’s KLAS performance scores have remained stable over the past five years. Most of the EHR vendor’s products score in the mid-70s (on a 100-point scale). Only a few offerings score in the 80s, while others, including Cerner’s revenue cycle solution, score in the 60s.
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https://www.digitalhealth.net/2022/02/nhs-england-trial-ai-biases-healthcare/
NHS in England to trial new approach to AI biases in healthcare
The NHS in England is to trial a new approach to the ethical adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare with the aim of eradicating biases.
Hanna Crouch – 8 Feb, 2022
Designed by the Ada Lovelace Institute, the Algorithmic Impact Assessment (AIA) will mean researchers and developers will have to assess the possible risks and biases of AI systems to patients and the public before they can access NHS data.
Part of the trial will also involve researchers and developers being encouraged to engage patients and healthcare professionals at an early stage of AI development when there is greater flexibility to make adjustments and respond to concerns.
It is hoped this will lead to improvements in patient experience and the clinical integration of AI.
It is also anticipated that in the future, AIA could increase the transparency, accountability and legitimacy for the use of AI in healthcare.
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https://www.healthleadersmedia.com/technology/bulk-fhir-will-change-what-payers-expect-providers
Bulk FHIR Will Change What Payers Expect From Providers
Analysis | By Scott Mace | February 09, 2022
Former ONC chief Don Rucker and HL7 are championing a new form of healthcare IT interoperability.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
· Data sharing via Bulk FHIR will allow payers to judge health of populations more effectively than traditional quality standards, Rucker says.
· Standards work follows a spring 2020 ONC rulemaking to implement population-friendly FHIR interoperability.
· Failure of traditional quality measures stored in CDC data silos during the COVID-19 pandemic is further evidence that a new interoperability approach is necessary.
Newly maturing standards for healthcare data interoperability will make providers more accountable to payers for the overall quality of care they provide.
So says Donald Rucker, MD, former national coordinator at the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC).
"When we look at the big problems in American healthcare, we want value," says Rucker, now the chief strategy officer of healthcare IT company 1UpHealth.
After what he describes as a 20-year-long search for value via quality measures defined by the federal government, Rucker believes the current system is "heavily gamed" and will be replaced by a new system of bulk data sharing of patient information via the new Bulk FHIR interoperability standard.
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https://www.who.int/news/item/11-02-2022-icd-11-2022-release
ICD-11 2022 release
ICD-11 is now officially in effect for the national and international recording and reporting of causes of illness, death - and more.
The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) provides a common language that allows health professionals to share standardized information across the world. The eleventh revision contains around 17 000 unique codes, more than 120 000 codable terms and is now entirely digital.
All Member States are encouraged to follow their commitment to move on to ICD-11 documented with their approval of ICD-11 at the 72nd meeting of the World Health Assembly in 2019, and use the most current version of ICD for recording and reporting mortality and morbidity statistics both nationally and internationally.
New in ICD-11 2022
- 35 countries are using ICD-11.
- Current implemented uses of ICD-11 include causes of death, primary care, cancer registration, patient safety, dermatology, pain documentation, allergology, reimbursement, clinical documentation, data dictionaries for WHO guidelines*, digital documentation of COVID-19 vaccination status and test results, and more.
- French language is now available alongside Arabic, Chinese, English, & Spanish. Russian and 20 more languages are underway.
- Integration in DHIS2.
- Terminology coding with the coding tool and API.
- Rare diseases coding.
- Support for perinatal and maternal coding.
- 900 proposals were processed based on input from early adopters, translators, scientists, clinicians and partners.
- Grade and stage coding for cancers.
- Clinical Descriptions and Diagnostic Requirements for mental health.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/emea/eu-unveils-43-billion-plan-address-semiconductor-shortage
EU unveils €43 billion plan to address semiconductor shortage
European Chips Act aims to boost share of global production to 20%.
By Tammy Lovell
February 11, 2022 10:36 AM
A €43 billion plan to secure the EU’s semiconductor supply has been outlined by the European Commission.
The European Chips Act sets out measures to prevent, prepare, anticipate and respond to future supply chain disruption, and enable the EU’s ambition to double its current market share of semiconductor production to 20% by 2030.
It aims to bring about a thriving semiconductor sector from research to production, create a resilient supply chain and develop new markets for European tech.
Also this week, the Commission adopted implementing decisions to ensure the EU's radio spectrum policy meets growing demand for broadband and innovative digital applications.
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https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2788984
February 7, 2022
Guidelines for US Hospitals and Clinicians on Assessment of Electronic Health Record Safety Using SAFER Guides
Dean F. Sittig, PhD1Patricia Sengstack, DNP, RN-BC2Hardeep Singh, MD, MPH3
Author Affiliations Article Information
On August 13, 2021, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a final rule requiring eligible hospitals to attest annually that they performed a safety assessment of their electronic health record (EHR) system using SAFER (Safety Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience) Guides.1 This milestone affects virtually all US hospitals, but there is no specific guidance on how hospitals should perform a self-assessment of these recommended practices. To address this gap, pragmatic guidelines were developed to provide a streamlined, stepwise approach for conducting a systematic EHR safety assessment that optimizes organizational resources, minimizes process inefficiencies, and maximizes EHR vendor involvement.
Context for Hospitals and Clinicians
The SAFER Guides are proactive, checklist-based, risk-assessment tools with 146 recommended practices to help clinicians, hospitals, and EHR vendors understand how to design, develop, configure, implement, use, and monitor EHRs in a safe and effective manner.2 SAFER practices assess health information technology (IT), its governance, and the way clinicians use it to create and maintain patients’ health records. The guides focus on the EHR, along with hardware, software, networking equipment, and ancillary systems that facilitate data management or exchange patient data with the EHR (eg, clinical laboratory, radiology, or pharmacy systems).
SAFER assessment requires extensive knowledge and experience with the EHR’s governance, configuration, workflow customizations, implementation, and use. For organizations with multiple CMS certification numbers that use the same instance of an EHR (ie, a single patient database and the same EHR application), it is more efficient for a multidisciplinary group representing these sites to conduct a preliminary assessment. Due to variations in local control, site representatives must then review the larger group’s preliminary assessment before making the final attestation to CMS.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/how-hospitals-should-approach-cms-safer-assessment-of-ehr-systems
How Hospitals Should Approach EHR Self-Assessment, ONC SAFER Guides
Hospitals should take a multidisciplinary approach when using the ONC SAFER Guides for EHR self-assessment, an article published in JAMA noted.
February 10, 2022 - Hospitals should form multidisciplinary teams to complete EHR self-assessment using ONC SAFER (Safety Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience) guides, according to an article published in JAMA.
In August 2021, CMS published new rules that require eligible hospitals to attest to having completed an annual self-assessment of their EHR systems using SAFER guides.
The authors outlined five steps that hospitals should consider for EHR self-assessment.
Identify the SAFER Assessment Team
Hospitals should assemble a multidisciplinary team of eight to 15 people, including clinical, administrative, and health IT representatives, to complete the assessment.
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https://healthitanalytics.com/news/who-its-time-to-eliminate-ageism-in-artificial-intelligence
WHO: It’s Time to Eliminate Ageism in Artificial Intelligence
AI-driven healthcare resources for older people are often rife with ageism, but there are several ways to combat this, including involving seniors in the design of technology, a new report shows.
February 10, 2022 - As caregivers examine how artificial intelligence (AI) can improve healthcare for seniors, a policy brief by the World Health Organization shows that potential issues can be eliminated by taking various steps, including optimal design and data collection, providing resources, and maintaining good moral codes.
The most common uses of healthcare-focused AI for seniors are remote patient monitoring, which is used as a method of community care, and the production of drugs for aging patients. The report, released Wednesday, also stated that optimizing AI capabilities can increase hospital capacity, as beds can be reserved for cases requiring hands-on care.
The risks associated with AI-driven healthcare revolve mainly around ageism, which is discrimination based on one’s age that can affect how useful a resource is.
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Importance of API Security in Healthcare Grows as Cyberattacks Increase
As more organizations rely on APIs to run critical functions, ensuring API security in healthcare is crucial to preventing cyberattacks.
By Jill McKeon
February 10, 2022 - API security is essential to healthcare cybersecurity as threat actors increasingly turn to APIs as an easy network entry point. In 2019, Gartner predicted that API attacks would become the most common attack vector by 2022. New research from Cequence confirmed that Gartner’s prediction might become a reality this year.
Cequence’s analysis of API usage patterns from June to December 2021 found that health monitoring API usage rose by a staggering 941 percent. Developers are also increasingly favoring APIs to improve user experience.
“As the digitization of commerce happened, we started to see APIs utilized in new ways. Data is moved around allowing for additional analytics and trends to be realized. The same thing is happening in healthcare,” Jason Kent, hacker in residence at Cequence, told HealthITSecurity.
“Patients wanted real-time, hands-on data, so healthcare organizations began making things more connected.”
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‘Best in KLAS’ report recognizes high performers among HIT vendors
In 2022 results, Epic wins again for its suite of products, while Nordic, Galen Healthcare and The Chartis Group are lauded for consulting services.
Feb 10 2022
Some familiar names as well as lesser-known companies achieved recognition for technology and customer service levels in the latest "Best in KLAS awards" announced this week.
KLAS, a Salt Lake City-based consultancy, named Epic as the top overall software suite in the U.S. market for the twelfth consecutive year. The Verona, Wis.-based company also was rated as the top overall physician practice management vendor, and it also won nine other Best in KLAS awards for solutions in other product segments measured in the Best in KLAS report.
Some new names also graced KLAS’s list of top providers of consulting and other services in the U.S.:
- Nordic was named the top overall IT services firm, scoring above 90 (on a scale where 100 is a perfect score) in six different services segments and won Best in KLAS for HIT Implementation Leadership for large organizations.
- Galen Healthcare was recognized as the top Overall Implementation Services Firm – a new category in this year’s KLAS ratings. Galen also won Best in KLAS in HIT Staffing and Clinical Optimization, while also excelling in HIT Implementation Leadership for small organizations, as well as for Technical Services.
- The Chartis Group was recognized as the winner of the top overall healthcare management consulting firm for the second year in a row. The Chartis Group won four Best in KLAS awards and achieved high customer satisfaction scores in several additional professional services areas.
The Best in KLAS 2022 - Software and Services report recognizes the leading vendors for solutions, services and management consulting. The 2022 Best in KLAS - Global Software awards – report released concurrently, recognizes the leading software and service organizations that serve the global healthcare market outside the United States.
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https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/doctor-will-see-now-paperwork-rcna14934
The doctor will see you now — without the paperwork
Federal authorities who oversee health technology have set a deadline of December for the health care industry to support apps that store records electronically.
Feb. 10, 2022, 7:07 AM AEDT / Updated Feb. 10, 2022, 1:19 PM AEDT
By David Ingram
The clipboard of paper forms that for decades has been a standard part of Americans’ doctor visits may soon be a thing of the past.
Federal authorities who oversee health technology have set a deadline for December for the health care industry to support smartphone apps, like Apple Health, that store records electronically.
Their goal is to have patients use their phones to electronically share records with a doctor’s office or hospital — without a pen and paper, if they choose.
“Patients ought to be able to use the app of their choice,” said Micky Tripathi, who’s helping to put the federal rules in place as the Biden administration’s national coordinator for health information technology.
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Patient-Centered Care
Teledermatology: Tech Tips for a Better Virtual Visit
Telehealth visits make dermatology more accessible to patients, but additional technology implementations can support success.
Jordan Scott is the web editor for HealthTech. She is a multimedia journalist with experience in B2B publishing. 09 Feb, 2022
Not all specialties are well suited for telehealth, but dermatology is one that works with the right technology in place.
According to a survey conducted by the American Academy of Dermatology’s Teledermatology Task Force, 14 percent of responding dermatologists reported that they used teledermatology prior to the pandemic; 97 percent reported they used it during the pandemic.
The survey was conducted in May and June 2020, early in the pandemic. At that time, more than half of responding dermatologists expected to continue teledermatology use after the pandemic.
However, Dr. George Han, director of teledermatology at Northwell Health, says the survey doesn’t capture all of the barriers to telehealth in the field: Some patients get frustrated with the technology, and in other situations, telehealth falls by the wayside as patients return to in-person visits.
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Some Vyaire ventilators no longer working: 4 things to know
Some ventilators from Imtmedical, a subsidiary of Vyaire Medical, have unintentionally stopped ventilation during use and require rebooting to resume ventilation because of a software issue, according to a Feb. 4 news release from the FDA.
Four things to know:
1. Vyaire Medical said users should disable Bellavista 1000 and 1000e ventilators that have software version 6.0.1600.0 or higher installed and also have the data communication port set to "HL7." Customers with software version 6.0.1600.0 or higher installed have been notified to immediately disable the HL7 data communication.
2. The company is developing a software update to address the issue, but advises customers to follow instructions provided in its correction notice to disable the HL7 data communication if activated.
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Senators intro bipartisan effort toward modernizing health privacy laws
Teladoc Health, IBM, Epic and athenahealth all signed on to support the proposed legislation.
By Kat Jercich
February 10, 2022 11:27 AM
Senators Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisconsin, and Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, introduced the Health Data Use and Privacy Commission Act this week, aimed at starting the process of modernizing health data use and privacy policies.
The legislation, which is supported by several industry representatives including athenahealth, Epic, IBM and Teladoc Health, would establish a commission tasked with providing recommendations to Congress about updates to health information privacy laws.
"As a doctor, the potential of new technology to improve patient care seems limitless. But Americans must be able to trust that their personal health data is protected if this technology can meet its full potential," said Cassidy in a statement.
WHY IT MATTERS
Broadly popular technologies such as apps and wearables were barely conceivable at the time of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act's passage in 1996.
As the senators noted in press statements, at more than 25 years old, HIPAA covers patient-doctor interactions but does not typically protect health data patients record on those tools – potentially putting the information at risk.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/how-onc-ensures-certified-health-it-conformance-post-lab-testing
How ONC Ensures Certified Health IT Conformance Post Lab-Testing
Since 2017, ONC and ONC-Authorized Certification Bodies have reviewed and acted on 383 complaints regarding certified health IT products.
February 09, 2022 - ONC aims to help ensure certified health IT remains compliant with program requirements after certification testing through a conformance review process.
When end-users report suspected issues with certified health IT – sometimes called “non-conformities” – a developer can demonstrate commitment to the end-user experience and patient safety through a corrective action plan (CAP), ONC officials Pablo Ardaya, Laura Urioste, and Christopher Monk noted in a HealthITBuzz blog post.
CAP documents highlight developer efforts to notify affected end users and remedy any technological problems.
End-users have reported 993 certified health IT non-conformities to ONC since 2016, and two certified health IT products currently have open non-conformities. These open non-conformities and some associated information related to compliance activities can be found on the CHPL’s Corrective Action Status page.
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Remote Monitoring, Telehealth Use Linked to Tighter Blood Pressure Control
An enhanced telehealth program, which included remote patient monitoring, helped under-resourced groups gain better control over their blood pressure, a new study shows.
By Anuja Vaidya
February 09, 2022 - Telehealth services, combined with remote patient monitoring, helped boost engagement and blood pressure control among stroke survivors living in under-resourced communities, according to new research.
The research, which will be presented at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2022, to be held Feb. 8 to 11, examined the impact of a new strategy, called Telehealth After Stroke Care, to manage stroke patients after they are discharged from a healthcare facility.
For the study, researchers from New York City-based Columbia University examined data from people who received post-stroke care after being discharged from NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center.
Study participants included 50 stroke survivors, of which 44 percent were Hispanic, 32 percent were Black, and 20 percent were white, with an average age of 64. Further, 54 percent of the participants had a high-school or lower level of education, and only 30 percent had private health insurance.
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Amazon Care expands telehealth and in-home healthcare services
Experts weigh in on whether the e-commerce giant’s offering will be formidable competition for primary care providers.
Feb 10 2022
Amazon has expanded nationally its Amazon Care telehealth services, Amazon Care, which now also offers in-home visits by healthcare professionals in eight cities, and it plans to add those services in 20 more cities this year.
The hybrid program, which launched with a pilot project for Amazon employees in September 2019, gives Amazon the potential to tie care services to its Amazon Pharmacy and Pillpack mail-order business lines.
Amazon Care will enable users to receive follow-up tests, lab work and treatment in their homes in certain cities, Amazon says.
The move represents another step into healthcare for Amazon, one of the tech giants that has taken several years to intertwine some services that match up with consumers’ changing preferences for care delivery – particularly in light of the pandemic, which fueled demand for telehealth.
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https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/08/amazon-care-telehealth-service-launches-nationwide.html
Amazon rolls out its telehealth service nationwide
Published Tue, Feb 8 202210:05 AM ESTUpdated Wed, Feb 9 20228:56 AM EST
Annie Palmer@annierpalmer Bertha Coombs@BerthaCoombs
Key Points
- Amazon is launching its telehealth program, known as Amazon Care, nationwide and has signed up a handful of new companies to use its services.
- Amazon Care launched in 2019 as a pilot program for employees in and around its Seattle headquarters.
- The program provides a suite of in-person and virtual-care services.
Amazon is rolling out its telehealth service, known as Amazon Care, nationwide, the company announced Tuesday.
Amazon Care launched in 2019 as a pilot program for employees in and around the company’s Seattle headquarters. The program provides virtual-care visits, as well as free telehealth consultations and in-home visits for a fee from nurses for testing and vaccinations. It has since expanded into more of a primary care service.
Shares of Teladoc, a provider of virtual doctor visits, fell 6% Tuesday on Amazon’s news.
In addition, the e-commerce giant is expanding in-person care to more cities across the U.S. Later this year, it plans to launch that side of the business in 20 cities, including New York City, San Francisco, Miami and Chicago. Amazon Care’s in-person services are currently available in eight cities.
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NHS to launch new digital platform for patients awaiting treatment
The move is part of elective recovery plan to tackle COVID backlogs.
By Tammy Lovell
February 09, 2022 11:57 AM
A new digital service forms part of the long-awaited NHS recovery plan to address backlogs from the pandemic, unveiled by UK health secretary Sajid Javid on Tuesday (8 Jan).
The Delivery plan for tackling the COVID-19 backlog of elective care, developed with Royal colleges, patient groups and health charities, sets out plans to use digital tools and data to manage waiting lists more efficiently.
It includes roll-out of a new web-based platform called My Planned Care, which aims to increase transparency on waiting times and provide support while patients await treatment.
The recovery blueprint also includes plans for more than 100 community diagnostic centres, new surgical hubs, and increased capacity to offer tests, checks and treatments.
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Studies Identify Cost Savings, Racial Equity Benefits From Virtual Care
February 9, 2022
A new pair of studies suggests that virtual care is demonstrating some attractive long-term benefits, including lower costs and improved health access for underserved populations
One such study comes from Cigna, whose Evernorth health services division recently closed on its acquisition of virtual care vendor MDLIVE.
As part of the study report, Cigna notes that less than 2 percent of outpatient behavioral health and medical claims were for virtual claims before the pandemic. Today, virtual visits account for almost 25% of all visits, Evernorth’s research found. According to estimates by Accenture cited in the report, one of every three visits will eventually be virtual.
Part of what makes this important is that the increasing use of virtual care stands to subtract costs from the healthcare system, according to Cigna research. The health plan’s data shows that the average cost of a non-urgent virtual care visit is $93 less than the average cost for an in-person visit. Meanwhile, the cost of seeing a specialist averages $120 less for virtual care than in-person encounters and a virtual urgent-care visit averages $141 less than being seen in an urgent care clinic.
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https://www.healthleadersmedia.com/technology/flat-fhir-will-change-what-payers-expect-providers
Flat FHIR Will Change What Payers Expect From Providers
Analysis | By Scott Mace | February 09, 2022
Former ONC chief Don Rucker and HL7 are championing a new form of healthcare IT interoperability.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
· Bulk data sharing via Flat FHIR will allow payers to judge health of populations more effectively than traditional quality standards, Rucker says.
· Standards work follows a spring 2020 ONC rulemaking to implement population-friendly FHIR interoperability.
· Failure of traditional quality measures stored in CDC data silos during the COVID-19 pandemic is further evidence that a new interoperability approach is necessary.
Newly maturing standards for healthcare data interoperability will make providers more accountable to payers for the overall quality of care they provide.
So says Donald Rucker, MD, former national coordinator at the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC).
"When we look at the big problems in American healthcare, we want value," says Rucker, now the chief strategy officer of healthcare IT company 1UpHealth.
After what he describes as a 20-year-long search for value via quality measures defined by the federal government, Rucker believes the current system is "heavily gamed" and will be replaced by a new system of bulk data sharing of patient information via the new Flat FHIR interoperability standard.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/how-hybrid-future-telemedicine-may-play-out
How the hybrid future of telemedicine may play out
An expert from Philips goes in-depth into the combination of in-person and virtual care, and how that could lead to a better experience and decreased costs.
By Bill Siwicki
February 08, 2022 10:52 AM
In the last few years, care delivery has undergone a major transformation – from nearly 100% in-person to nearly 100% virtual during the lockdowns of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Today, the healthcare industry has started to reach a consensus that the future of telemedicine will be a hybrid of virtual and in-person care.
While virtual care's widespread adoption will certainly help providers offer more proactive care in lower cost settings and decrease the need for regular in-person visits, it is not an end-all-be-all solution.
In the year to come, there will be more training to define at what point a patient needs to be seen in person to not only provide effective care, but to keep them engaged in their own care journey, contends Kristin Molina, business leader for patient engagement and healthcare analytics at Philips.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/surescripts-reports-boost-in-medication-history-health-it-use
Surescripts Reports Boost in Medication History Health IT Use
Surescripts experienced a significant increase in the use of its medication history health IT for care coordination and population health initiatives.
February 08, 2022 - In 2021, Surescripts saw a 53 percent increase in the use of its medication history health IT by providers in population health programs.
Surescripts also reported a 21 percent increase in the utilization of its medication history services for patient intake, hospital admission, and care coordination.
Throughout the year, the vendor introduced new health IT features that aim to help providers fill data gaps and remove duplicate medications for a more complete and accurate view of a patient’s medication history.
Officials noted that the health IT filled data gaps in 86 percent of medication histories, helping to reduce the risk of adverse drug events (ADE) and readmissions. The health IT also removed duplicate medications in 62 percent of medication histories.
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Artificial Intelligence Can Help Free Up Anesthesiologists’ Time in OR
Researchers found that using artificial intelligence to administer drugs during surgery allows anesthesiologists to carry out their other responsibilities in the operating room.
February 08, 2022 - Artificial intelligence systems may be able to assist anesthesiologists in the operating room, according to MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers.
In a special edition of Artificial Intelligence in Medicine, a team of neuroscientists, engineers, and physicians demonstrated how a machine-learning algorithm could continuously automate the dosing of the anesthetic drug propofol.
With, the algorithm outperformed traditional methods in patient simulations. It also closely matched the performance of real anesthesiologists with regard to maintaining unconsciousness using recorded data from nine actual surgeries.
The algorithm’s advances increase the possibility of using computers to maintain patient unconsciousness, freeing up anesthesiologists for all the other responsibilities they have in the operating room, such as making sure patients remain immobile, experience no pain, remain physiologically stable, and receive sufficient oxygen.
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https://www.wired.com/story/health-site-ad-tracking/
Feb 6, 2022 7:00 AM
Health Sites Let Ads Track Visitors Without Telling Them
Privacy policies didn't tell the whole story about third-party tools gathering personal information from the sites of medical and genetic-testing companies.
All too often, digital ads wind up improperly targeting the most vulnerable people online, including abuse victims and kids. Add to that list the customers of several digital-medicine and genetic-testing companies, whose sites used ad-tracking tools that could have exposed information about people's health status.
In a recent study from researchers at Duke University and the patient privacy-focused group the Light Collective, 10 patient advocates who are active in the hereditary cancer community and cancer support groups on Facebook—including three who are Facebook group admins—downloaded and analyzed their data from the platform's “Off Facebook Activity” feature in September and October. The tool shows what information third parties are sharing with Facebook, and its parent company Meta, about your activity on other apps and websites. Along with the retail and media sites that typically show up in these reports, the researchers found that several genetic-testing and digital-medicine companies had shared customer information with the social media giant for ad targeting.
Further analysis of those websites—using tracker identification tools like the Electronic Frontier Foundation's Privacy Badger and The Markup's Blacklight—revealed which ad tech modules the companies had embedded on their sites. The researchers then checked the companies' privacy policies to see whether they permitted and disclosed this type of cross-site tracking and the flow of data to Facebook that can result. In three of the five cases, the companies' policies did not have clear language about third-party tools that might be used to retarget or reidentify users across the web for marketing.
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Organizations prioritize reaching out to sick babies’ families
Technology is part of a growing strategy of incorporating families’ input and reactions to care, paving the way for improvement.
Feb 08 2022
The birth of a child is often idealized. Reality can be jarring and traumatizing – premature births, emergency C-sections, unforeseen complications can find a tiny life in a neonatal intensive care unit, with anxious parents and family members on an emotional roller coaster.
Hospitals can bring cutting-edge medicine to the bedside, but more facilities are also focusing in on the need to take care of the families that surround sick babies in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs).
But the multiplicity of little patients and their families make this caregiving task complex. This communication challenge is prompting organizations to bring specialized technology to support efforts to minister to the emotional and information needs of these families.
The use of this niche technology enables better communication, offers tools to monitor families’ perception of care and clinical interactions, and reveals important insights into ways to better engage family members. The research around NICUs also provides insight into other patient and family engagement efforts, leading organizations contend.
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Epic Systems Affirms Market Dominance with Best in KLAS Patient Portal
This is the fifth year in a row Epic Systems has won the Best in KLAS for the patient portal market segment, and 12th year in a row for overall software suite.
By Sara Heath
February 08, 2022 - EHR vendor giant Epic Systems has come in yet again as the top patient portal in the 2022 Best in KLAS rankings, asserting the health IT company’s dominance in the sector.
Epic was also awarded the best overall software suite in this year’s KLAS rankings, coming in at the top for the 12th year in a row, KLAS said. This is the fifth year in a row Epic Systems has hauled in the Best in KLAS title for the patient portal category.
“Each year, thousands of healthcare professionals across the globe take the time to share their voice with KLAS. They know that sharing their perspective helps vendors to improve and helps their peers make better decisions,” David Gale, the president of KLAS Research, said in a statement emailed to journalists.
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Epic tops Best in KLAS overall software suite list for 12th year running
Nordic, Galen Healthcare and Chartis Group also dominated the research and insights firm's awards list this year.
By Kat Jercich
February 08, 2022 10:40 AM
Epic, Nordic, Galen Healthcare and Chartis Group won big in the 2022 Best in KLAS Awards, the research and insights firm announced Tuesday.
"The 2022 Best in KLAS report covers over 1,000 solutions. And the technology itself has advanced by leaps and bounds," said Adam Gale, CEO of KLAS Research, in the 2022 Best in KLAS Software and Services report.
"The pandemic has been anything but linear, and we know that across the world, 2021 was a slog," said Gale. "It's no wonder the research shows healthcare workers are more burned out than ever. And still, the market has grown and changed in surprising, positive ways."
For each market segment in its report, KLAS ranks eligible software and service tools by their overall performance score on a 100-point scale.
Software product scores are based on equally weighted customer responses to 16 numeric ratings questions and four yes-or-no questions, while service firm client feedback comprises nine numeric ratings questions and three yes-or-no questions.
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Lawmaker Urges VA EHR Implementation Delay Amid Patient Safety Concerns
The VA’s EHR Implementation received critiques regarding cases of delayed and inaccurate prescription data. Despite patient safety concerns, the system is still scheduled to go live.
February 07, 2022 - Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA-05) has called on the Department of Veterans Affairs to delay its forthcoming EHR implementation at Walla Walla VA Medical Center due to patient safety concerns.
The congresswoman stated that the Cerner Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) system is faulty, and the VA must make critical improvements regarding productivity, patient safety, and morale impact prior to its rollout.
“More than a year after Mann-Grandstaff went live on the system, most of the productivity, patient safety, and morale impacts still have not been resolved. While the system outages have somewhat improved, fundamental problems, especially in pharmacy, have not been addressed,” said McMorris Rodgers in a letter to VA Secretary Denis R. McDonough.
“Veterans in my district continue to struggle with delayed and erroneous prescriptions, as well as bottlenecks in referrals to specialists or community care.”
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Ireland HSE Cyberattack is a Cautionary Tale For US Healthcare Orgs
HC3 urged US healthcare organizations to learn from the May 2021 Conti cyberattack attack against the Ireland HSE that led to a nationwide IT outage.
By Jill McKeon
February 07, 2022 - The Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center (HC3) encouraged US healthcare organizations to learn from the large-scale May 2021 cyberattack against the Ireland Health Service Executive (HSE) that immobilized the country’s health IT systems and cost hundreds of millions of dollars in recovery efforts.
In a recent brief, HC3 took stock of the numerous lessons learned from the HSE cyberattack that began on May 14, 2021. It continued to cause nationwide IT outages, EHR downtime, health data exposure, and appointment cancellations across Ireland’s publicly funded healthcare system for more than four months.
Conti ransomware claimed responsibility for the attack against the HSE. HC3 tracked at least 40 ransomware incidents involving Conti in 2021 and noted that the group regularly targets the healthcare sector.
The HSE attack was the largest attack against any health service computer system in history. The attack impacted the HSE’s 54 public hospitals along with other hospitals that depended on the HSE’s IT infrastructure.
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https://www.statnews.com/2022/02/03/telehealth-visits-health-insurance-internet/
As internet access limits telehealth’s reach, insurers are starting to cover the bill
By Katie Palmer Feb. 3, 2022
Billions of dollars have been poured into telehealth during the pandemic: Insurers loosened the purse strings on virtual appointments, digital health companies pulled in astronomical investments, and the public markets minted multiple unicorns.
But while virtual care’s proponents are fighting to cement its future, many Americans still can’t sign on at all.
Nearly a quarter of adults in the U.S. don’t have broadband at home, network speeds are insufficient for video calls in much of rural America, and 15% struggle to pay for internet. It’s a persistent issue that threatens to hamper the lofty promises made by telehealth startups and policymakers — that virtual care can chip away at long-running inequities in health care, especially those that impact low-income, rural, and Black and Hispanic patients, who are also less likely to have broadband. And while the value and effectiveness of telehealth is still being determined, it’s clear that the gaping disparities in access to health care will only grow wider if the problem isn’t fixed.
“All of the potential good things that come from this move to virtual care are put at risk if we don’t solve this broadband problem,” said Abner Mason, founder and CEO of SameSky Health, a Medicare and Medicaid navigation company formerly known as ConsejoSano.
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https://www.medpagetoday.com/gastroenterology/coloncancer/97039
Two Reminders Better Than One for FIT Screening Completion
— When it comes to CRC screening, the more reminders the merrier
by Zaina Hamza, Staff Writer, MedPage Today February 4, 2022
A heads up from the electronic patient portal that a fecal immunochemical test (FIT) was arriving in the mail resulted in higher colorectal cancer (CRC) screening completion rates and shorter time to screening, a randomized trial found.
Among more than 2,000 individuals eligible for screening at a single institution, completion rates at 6 months were higher for those who received an electronic message 1 to 2 weeks prior alerting them the test would be arriving to their home compared to those who did not (37.6% vs 32.1%, P=0.005), reported Daniel Croymans, MD, MBA, of the University of California Los Angeles, and colleagues.
Time to screening was also shorter among those who received the electronic message (35 vs 38 days), the authors wrote in JAMA Network Open.
In a subgroup analysis of 900 individuals who actually opened the electronic message, they found a 7.3 percentage-point increase in CRC screening (95% CI 2.3-12.4).
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https://www.medpagetoday.com/cardiology/prevention/97021
Promising Heart-Focused CDS Tool Falls Flat in Community Health Centers
— Why was success in large health systems not replicated in poorer settings?
by Nicole Lou, Staff Writer, MedPage Today February 4, 2022
A previously validated clinical decision support (CDS) tool was modestly helpful at best for lowering cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk in under-resourced settings, a cluster randomized trial showed.
The CV Wizard program, alerting clinicians when patients have uncontrolled CVD risks and suggesting treatment options, was used in just 19.8% of index and follow-up patient encounters, despite being embedded in the shared electronic health record (EHR) of participating community health centers (CHCs), reported Rachel Gold, PhD, MPH, of Kaiser Permanente Northwest in Portland, Oregon.
Neither control nor intervention clinics saw population-level reductions in CVD risk over more than a year, and in fact, patients at centers not using the CDS tool even had mean reversible risk improve significantly more (-0.1% vs 0.4%, P<0.001).
The CDS intervention was only associated with a risk reduction in cases in which CV Wizard was actually used and patients had a baseline 10-year atherosclerotic CVD (ASCVD) risk exceeding 20%. "Although this risk reduction was modest (absolute improvement of 4.4% vs 2.7%, [P=0.001]), if maintained over time it could represent a population-level reduction in cardiovascular events," Gold's group wrote in JAMA Network Open.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/emea/nhs-england-moves-ahead-tech-restructure
NHS England moves ahead with tech restructure
The NHSX brand will ‘retire very soon’ under new interim arrangements.
By Tammy Lovell
February 07, 2022 05:51 AM
Interim arrangements have been revealed for the NHS England’s new transformational directorate, which will incorporate tech bodies NHSX and NHS Digital.
In guidance, seen by Healthcare IT News, NHS England (NHSE) director of transformation, Tim Ferris says they will be “retiring the NHSX brand very soon.”
NHSX chief executive officer (CEO) Matthew Gould will remain national director for digital transformation and as a director general within Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) with oversight of the joint digital policy and strategy team.
Meanwhile, interim NHS Digital CEO Simon Bolton will take the role of interim NHS chief information officer (CIO). Bolton will work with NHS Digital and NHSX’s chief technology officer (CTO) Dave Turner and CIO Sonia Patel, whose functions will come together.
Teams across NHS Improvement, Innovation, Research, and Life Sciences (IRLS), NHS Digital and NHSX will be brought together where staff are working on the same projects or there are clear synergies between portfolios.
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Enjoy!
David.
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