Here are a few I came across last week.
Note: Each link is followed by a title and few paragraphs. For the full article click on the link above title of the article. Note also that full access to some links may require site registration or subscription payment.
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JD Power Survey Sees Telehealth Falling Back Into the Same Old Rut
The consumer satisfaction company's third annual survey finds that telehealth has surged during the pandemic, but satisfaction rates are dropping as patients have problems understanding or using it.
October 01, 2021 - A new study finds that while telehealth has surged during the pandemic, providers haven’t solved many of the issues that kept adoption low prior to COVID-19.
J.D. Power’s 2021 US Telehealth Satisfaction Survey, released this week, saw a surge in telehealth use from 7 percent in 2019 and 9 percent in 2020 to 36 percent in 2021, reflecting the shift to virtual care as the nation grappled with COVID-19. But the consumer advisory company’s third annual survey also saw a decrease in patient satisfaction, driven by complains over limited services (24 percent), lack of awareness on costs, confusing technology requirements and lack of information about care providers (all at 15 percent).
“It’s impossible to ignore that 36 percent of the healthcare customers we measure within our research have used telehealth services this year—which is four times higher than a year ago,” James Beem, the firm’s managing director of global healthcare intelligence, said in a press release. “However, digging deeper into the research, it’s clear that customer satisfaction has declined during the same period, with many users citing limited access to the services they need and inconsistencies in the care they receive. As the industry grows, it is critical to address these challenges.”
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Can Remote Patient Monitoring Improve Post-Surgical Care and Recovery?
A study conducted in Canada has found that a remote patient monitoring platform can be used to facilitate care for patients who've been discharged from a hospital after non-elective surgery.
October 01, 2021 - A recent study conducted at several Canadian hospitals finds that remote patient monitoring can be used to help patients recover at home after non-elective surgery.
The study, led by researchers at McMaster University and the Population Health Research Institute, both in Hamilton, Ontario, and published last month in the British Medical Association trade journal, focused on some 900 patients who’d needed surgery during the pandemic. Roughly half were treated with traditional follow-up care, including in-person services, and half were treated via remote automated monitoring (RAM) services, which include mHealth devices and a telehealth tablet.
Researchers found that the RPM platform didn’t significantly affect the mortality rate or the rehospitalization rate, but it did significantly reduce pain – and it was associated with a significant increase in detection and correction of medication errors.
The study adds a new dimension to the viability of RPM platforms, which have so far focused mainly on treatment of COVID-19 patients and for chronic care management. Some feel the platform could be used to improve care for people recently discharged from a hospital and needing rehabilitation at home, including recovery from surgery.
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https://healthitsecurity.com/news/lawsuit-links-baby-death-to-al-healthcare-ransomware-attack
Lawsuit Links Baby Death to AL Healthcare Ransomware Attack
The lawsuit marks the first public allegation of a healthcare ransomware attack directly resulting in a patient's death.
By Jill McKeon
October 01, 2021 - A baby born at Springhill Medical Center in Alabama later died due to diminished care that resulted from a 2019 healthcare ransomware attack, a lawsuit alleged. The case marks the first public claim that a patient death was directly tied to a ransomware attack.
Teiranni Kidd, the baby’s mother, filed the lawsuit on behalf of her daughter, The Wall Street Journal first reported. According to the lawsuit, Kidd was not aware that Springhill Medical Center was in the middle of a ransomware attack when she arrived at the hospital to deliver her daughter.
The lawsuit alleged that doctors and nurses failed to conduct multiple tests that would have revealed that the umbilical cord was wrapped around her daughter’s neck due to the distraction of the ongoing ransomware attack. The baby was born with severe brain damage and passed away nine months later.
On July 16, 2019, Springhill released a statement regarding the attack and stated that the incident had no impact on patient care
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https://www.digitalhealth.net/2021/09/lessons-learned-from-the-welsh-clinical-portal/
Lessons learned from the Welsh Clinical Portal
Digital Health and Care Wales (DHCW) – previously the NHS Wales Informatics Service – is at the centre of NHS Wales’ digital transformation, collating healthcare data to develop new programmes and interfaces, improving outcomes for staff and patients. One of these programmes is the Welsh Clinical Portal (WCP), and product manager, Griff Williams, considers the role that this technology has played throughout Covid-19 pandemic, including the successes, lessons learned and the next steps for digital healthcare in the future.
DHI News Team 28 September, 2021
The first iteration of the Welsh Clinical portal (WCP) was created in 2011 with a vision of bringing together patient health care information into one common user interface. By 2016, the ministerial objective of ‘Once for Wales’ was realised through WCP users in all of Wales’ seven health boards. Currently over 29,000 healthcare professionals across Wales use the platform, with a repository of more than 36 million care documents, over 2001 million tests results and access to 3.1 million GP summary care records. The platform enables information sharing across care organisational boundaries, with 1 in 10 results being viewed from a different health board to that in which the test was performed.
Delivered benefits include visibility of all radiology imaging, reducing repetition of test, reducing medicines reconciliation times, improving safety and speed of services and releasing more time to health care professionals to care. The service has evolved with an award winning mobile app version improving accessibility on the move. The DHCW team are delivering e-learning programmes to upskill clinicians to use the system effectively and WCP is used by hospital staff, GP practices, pharmacies, emergency services and even in the helicopters of the Welsh Air Ambulance.
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https://www.business.com/insurance/cybersecurity-risk-management/
Cybersecurity and Risk Management
Shannon Flynn
business.com Contributing Writer
Sep 24, 2021
Cybersecurity risk management helps companies see which steps are the most important for their companies, leading to more effective security strategies.
Few things are as crucial to a small business as cybersecurity. Data breaches exposed 155.8 million sensitive records in 2020, and as companies rely more heavily on digital technologies, these breaches become more likely. In the face of these threats, cybersecurity risk management is a must.
What is cybersecurity risk management?
Cybersecurity risk management is the practice of identifying risks and planning defenses. While virtually every business faces cybersecurity threats, what exactly they are and how relevant each type is can vary. This process aims to help your company tailor its cybersecurity strategies to best fit your unique situation.
What are the benefits of cybersecurity risk management?
There are several benefits to cybersecurity risk management. Since recent data shows 43% of cyberattacks target small businesses, it's hard to overlook the advantages.
Having a more reliable cybersecurity strategy in place can also improve your business's reputation. Potential partners and customers will appreciate the emphasis on security, leading to higher loyalty and, thus, revenue.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/provider-encouragement-fuels-ehr-patient-portal-use-messaging
Provider Encouragement Fuels EHR Patient Portal Use, Messaging
Patients encouraged by their providers to access their EHR patient portal reported significantly higher rates of direct secure messaging.
September 30, 2021 - When providers encourage patients to access their EHR patient portal, the latter are much more likely to access their personal health information, according to an ONC data brief based on results from a national survey of adults between January 2020 through April 2020.
Patients who were encouraged by their healthcare provider to use their patient portal also reported significantly higher rates of viewing clinical notes and exchanging direct secure messages with their provider than those who were not encouraged.
“This illustrates the influence providers have with respect to educating patients about the benefits of having access and the value proposition for doing so,” the brief authors emphasized.
While individuals’ rates of being offered and subsequently accessing their patient portal rose significantly between 2018 and 2019, there was no increase from 2019 to 2020.
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Roundup: Apollo Hospitals demonstrate use of latest RAS system, Fujitsu appoints new health business heads in ANZ, and more briefs
Also, more pathology labs have connected to the Australian government's My Health Record platform.
By Adam Ang
October 01, 2021 01:08 AM
Apollo Hospitals demonstrates use of Medtronic's RAS system in surgery
Apollo Hospitals, one of the biggest hospital chains in India, and Irish medical device maker Medtronic has partnered to demonstrate the first use case of the latter's robotics-assisted surgery system in Asia-Pacific.
Medtronic's Hugo RAS system is a modular, multi-quadrant platform for soft-tissue procedures. It features wristed instruments, 3D visualisation and a cloud-based surgical video capture and management solution called Touch Surgery Enterprise, combined with dedicated support teams specialising in robotics programme optimisation, service and training.
RAS, a form of minimally invasive surgery, can potentially contribute to reducing patient's hospital stay, minimising surgery complications and scars.
Dr N Ragavan, who recently conducted a robotic prostatectomy using the Medtronic device, noted that nearly 70% of surgeries in India are performed as open procedures. "We feel confident that the Hugo RAS system will enable us to change that statistic and bring the benefits of minimally invasive surgery to more patients than ever before," the consultant urologist, uro-oncologist and robotic surgeon at Apollo Hospitals added.
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https://www.healthcareittoday.com/2021/10/01/walmart-chooses-epic-ehr/
Walmart Chooses Epic EHR
October 1, 2021
When you have 220 million customers and members visit approximately 10,500 locations, you have a lot of opportunities before you. I think this is what Walmart is looking at as they’ve begun opening Walmart clinics. Plus, Walmart also has 2.2 million employees which need healthcare as well. In many cases, Walmart is the largest employer in rural towns and needs to provide the best care possible to their employees. In a lot of ways, it makes sense that Walmart would open medical clinics in their stores. It’s convenient for their customers and their employees.
While we won’t dive into the full Walmart healthcare strategy in this article, needless to say they are making a big investment in healthcare. It’s still early, but they’re someone that everyone in healthcare is watching.
This week Walmart announced what amounts to a key indicator that their vision for healthcare is long term. Walmart announced that they’d be using the Epic EHR in their “health and wellness” lines of businesses starting with their “four new Walmart Health Centers opening in Florida in early 2022”.
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https://healthitanalytics.com/news/predictive-analytics-detects-covid-19-infection
Predictive Analytics Detects COVID-19 Infection
Predictive analytics indicates that seven joint symptoms could determine COVID-19 infection in a community.
September 30, 2021 - Using predictive analytics, a set of seven symptoms together can be used to maximize the detection of COVID-19 in a community. The paper was published in PLOS Medicine by Elliott of Imperial College London's Marc Chadeau-Hyam, Paul Elliott, and colleagues.
Although the research was conducted in England, information regarding the spread of COVID-19 can provide critical insights for public health officials worldwide.
The rapid detection of COVID-19 infection in a community is key in slowing the spread and controlling the transmission. When testing capacity is limited, tests must be used as efficiently as possible, including using the most informative symptoms for test allocation.
In the study, researchers obtained throat and nose swabs with valid COVID-19 PCR test results from 1,147,345 volunteers in England aged 5 years and older.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/emea/matthew-gould-calls-nhs-data-sharing-system-be-simplified
Matthew Gould calls for NHS data-sharing system to be simplified
The opt out process is ‘overly complicated’ said NHSX chief executive.
By Tammy Lovell
September 30, 2021 07:35 AM
NHSX chief executive Matthew Gould has called for an easier system for NHS patients to opt out of having their health data shared.
His comments come after the proposed GP data-sharing programme was postponed indefinitely earlier this month, due to opposition from the public, campaigners, and GPs.
Speaking at the Healthcare Excellence Through Technology (HETT) conference, Gould called the current data sharing system “overly complicated” and said NHSX was looking to “radically simplify” it.
He added that the NHS would not proceed with the GP data-sharing scheme until technology is in place to delete data already collected before a person chooses to opt out.
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Machine Learning, AI, and Sepsis Prediction in Healthcare
September 30, 2021
Everyone knows that sepsis is a big problem in healthcare.
Everyone wants to find the right algorithms to identify sepsis risk to allow for early intervention.
Not all sepsis algorithms are created equal.
These are some of the lessons we’ve learned as even some of the top EHR companies have tried to address this problem and ran into trouble. The question remains on whether EHR data is sufficient to identify sepsis risk or whether something more is needed.
In
a recent video interview I did with Prashant Natarajan, VP of Strategy and
Products, H2O.ai,
Niki Athanasiadou, Data Scientist and Healthcare AI Product Manager at H2O.ai, and Ljubomir Buturovic, VP, Machine
Learning at Inflammatix, we dive into
this topic and a diagnostic approach to sepsis prediction paired with machine
learning and AI.
It’s fascinating to see Inflammatix and H2O.ai cooperate in analyzing different RNA gene expression profiles using state-of-the-art machine learning. Inflammatix is developing a 30 minute point-of-care test that goes from blood sample to an AI analyzed result that determines a patient’s risk for infection, cause (bacterial or viral), and level of severity.
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EHR Tech Tailored to Primary Care Physicians Makes Its Move
Analysis | By Scott Mace | September 29, 2021
One innovator cites 2021 NASEM study: Primary care supply growth equals improved population health.
Kyna Fong, PhD, is the CEO and co-founder of Elation Health, a platform for independent primary care practices that strengthens the relationship between patients and physicians.
Fong's expertise as a health economist and digital health leader has been featured in publications including Forbes and Fast Company, and she is the recipient of several awards, including The Top 100 Harvard Alumni In Technology Of 2021. She holds a PhD in economics from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business.
In a recent interview, Fong spoke with HealthLeaders about the continuing woes of electronic health record (EHR) technology, and other obstacles keeping healthcare from becoming more seamless through digital technology.
HealthLeaders: What is the biggest challenge with electronic health record (EHR) technology?
Kyna Fong: The greatest challenge with most EHR technology today is that it wasn't built for physicians. These companies have built EHRs for billing and coding compliance, to then sell to administrators. How doctors feel about using the technology, how it impacts their relationship with their patients, how it drives them to serious burnout—it's just not part of the traditional EHR business today.
At Elation, however, we have always put the clinician first. For the last decade, we've been designing technology to recognize the sanctity of the provider-patient relationship, and to drive human interaction to support health that cares—to make it more personal, not less.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/cures-act-ehi-definition-needs-clarification-health-it-orgs-say
Cures Act EHI Definition Needs Clarification, Health IT Orgs Say
The definition of electronic health information in the Cures Act presents health IT compliance challenges, according to a new report.
September 29, 2021 - ONC must standardize the definition of electronic health information (EHI) for the successful operationalization of the 21st Century Cures Act final rule’s interoperability goals, according to a report from three major health IT organizations.
The American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA), the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA), and the HIMSS Electronic Health Record Association (EHRA) formed a task force to create the Defining EHI and the Designated Record Set in an Electronic World report.
Compliance with the ONC Cures Act Final Rule requires a deep understanding of the HIPAA Privacy Rule’s definition of designated record set (DRS), the authors noted.
The ONC Cures Act Final Rule defined electronic health information (EHI) as: “electronic protected health information (ePHI) as the term is defined for HIPAA in 45 CFR 160.103 to the extent that ePHI would be included in a designated record set as defined in 45 CFR 164.501, regardless of whether the group of records are used or maintained by or for a covered entity as defined in 45 CFR 160.103 but EHI shall not include (1) psychotherapy notes as defined in 45 CFR 164.501; or (2) information compiled in reasonable anticipation of, or for use in, a civil, criminal, or administrative action or proceeding.”
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Apple’s iOS 15 Has a Fall-Prevention Feature Everyone Should Use
An update for iPhone’s iOS 15 determines your walking steadiness and offers insight into your risk of a fall—but it’s what you do with the information that’s important
By Julie Jargon
Sept. 25, 2021 9:00 am ET
Wearable devices are good at detecting if you’ve fallen down, but now it’s possible to figure out if your walking is unsteady, well before you take a tumble.
Apple’s AAPL 0.65% latest iPhone operating system, iOS 15, takes the walking metrics previously rolled out in the Health app—walking asymmetry, double support time, step length and walking speed—and assesses them to rate a person’s overall walking steadiness. After a few days of collecting data as you walk around, preferably carrying or wearing your iPhone at hip level, you’ll receive a notification that your walking steadiness is OK, low or very low.
That doesn’t mean it knows if you’re in imminent danger of falling—the app can’t tell what hazards may lurk in your home—but it provides an idea of your fall risk in the next 12 months. A low score can mean that you could benefit from strength- and balance-building exercises. Apple offers five short videos in the Health app with simple exercises people can do at home.
So why should you pay attention to your walking steadiness? Similar to hearing loss, your mobility gradually deteriorates over time. Problems aren’t obvious until they suddenly are. Whether you’re a fit 70-year-old, a young athlete or a middle-aged hiker like me, paying attention to subtle changes in your movement can help you ward off problems later.
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Nurx, Amazon Alexa roll out voice-activated birth control reminders, sex education
Sep 29, 2021 10:25am
Women's health startup Nurx has tapped Amazon Alexa to provide sexual and reproductive health information as well as birth control pill reminders.
The startup teamed up with Amazon to launch the Nurx Birth Control and Sexual Health Knowledge Skill for Alexa to support medication adherence and to help prevent unplanned pregnancies, company executives said.
“Our medical team hears almost daily from patients who have forgotten to take one or more pills and are concerned about pregnancy, and in some cases, we need to prescribe emergency contraception for them,” said Jennifer Peña, M.D., chief medical officer at Nurx, in a statement. “We want to give people on the pill new ways to remember and stay on top of their health.”
Along with pill reminders, the Nurx skill will answer patients’ most common questions about birth control and sexual health. The free skill does not require a Nurx account and can be activated by saying, “Alexa, launch Nurx” to any Alexa-enabled device or by visiting the Skills Store in the Alexa app. Once enabled, users can give commands like “Alexa, ask Nurx to remind me to take my birth control at 9 AM” or “Alexa, ask Nurx how the birth control pill works.”
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Sep 29, 2021
Healthcare workers' data sold on dark web, reports IntSights
The private data of healthcare workers and patients is being sold on the dark web, a new report by IntSights has found
The personal data of thousands of healthcare workers is being sold on the dark web, a new report has found.
IntSights, a network security company owned by software firm Rapid7, has released a report detailing the security risks in the healthcare sector, including finding the information of multiple healthcare workers being sold on the dark web.
The research found that in February 2021 the username “cesarbsfilho" offered to sell access to a Mongo database from a Brazilian hospital. The database included records for 198,926 patients and 4,646 employees - along with their names, dates of birth, Brazilian taxpayer numbers, identity document numbers, and job descriptions.
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September 27, 2021
Four tips for combating online harassment, false information
An organization is helping physicians fight online harassment and false information regarding COVID-19, a speaker at the Women in Medicine Summit said.
Jack Dokhanchi, a medical and digital content intern with the Illinois Medical Professionals Action Collaborative Team (IMPACT) told attendees that “many health care workers, especially women, are reluctant to tackle misinformation on social media, even though they may be compelled to do it.”
A previous survey may shed some light on the reason for the reluctancy, according to Dokhanchi. The results, published in JAMA Internal Medicine in January 2021, revealed that nearly 25% of 464 physicians who were surveyed said they were personally attacked on social media, and 16% of the 268 female or nonbinary respondents were sexually harassed.
IMPACT — which Dokhanci said consists of about 40 physicians, medical students, nurses, pharmacists, social workers and others in similar professions — has written advocacy letters and blog posts and developed a podcast and infographics to combat negative and false information about COVID-19 that has appeared online over the past 18 months.
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Hospital websites with robust digital health libraries get up to 100x more traffic than other systems
– 28 September, 2021
Hospitals can get up to 100 times more website traffic if they have robust online health libraries, according to a Boston Digital report.
For its study, Boston Digital examined the search traffic of the top 20 U.S. hospitals, as ranked by U.S. News & World Report, according to a Sept. 28 news release. Researchers compared the website traffic of hospitals that offer robust libraries for health content with hospitals with smaller libraries.
Google Search's algorithm is more likely to suggest content from hospitals than healthcare content providers, according to the report. Among the top 20 hospitals, 68 percent of all traffic from search engines comes from health content.
Seven study insights:
- Hospitals whose health information content earns 70 percent or more of their total search traffic also get 10 times as much search traffic as hospitals where health content is a smaller percentage.
- Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic and Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins Medicine have the highest amount of search traffic, according to the report. Mayo has received 208.2 million health library searches, Cleveland Clinic has received 36.8 million and Johns Hopkins has received 27.5 million. Mayo, Cleveland Clinic and Johns Hopkins all have comprehensive health library content; the content is original to the site and is highly accessible to readers.
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Ransomware is leading hospital boards to pour more money into cybersecurity
A CISO talks with Healthcare IT News about boards' changing views of security, how hospitals are adapting to ransomware strikes and how infosec professionals' priorities are shifting along with the threat landscape.
By Bill Siwicki
September 29, 2021 11:38 AM
Ransomware has been plaguing healthcare provider organizations for some time now. The onset of the COVID-19, in fact, brought even more attacks.
Steve Smerz is chief information security officer at Halo Health, vendor of a clinical collaboration platform that includes secure messaging, video, voice, alarms and alerts designed to enable clinicians to connect easily.
He says he's seeing a drive for hospital and health system boards to increase resources to cybersecurity teams as ransomware continues to nail healthcare organizations in the second half of 2021.
According to Smerz, hospitals are the perfect targets for ransomware threat actors. They have large amounts of data that can be encrypted and impact the hospitals' ability to operate, dollars in the bank to pay the ransom, and a board that is not as tech-savvy as those in other industries.
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Varied Uses for Artificial Intelligence in Health Care Show AI’s Riches
September 29, 2021
Industries, researchers, and governments have only scratched the surface of what they can do with artificial intelligence. Recently I spoke with three companies using AI in creative and unexpected ways in health care. Here are their stories.
Personalized Medication Administration by Dosis
Over-the-counter cough medicines and aspirins make dosage sound simple: a teaspoon of liquid or two tablets every four hours. Most people don’t realize that finding the right doses for many medications is very difficult, with proper dosage varying a good deal from one person to another. According to Shivrat Chhabra, CEO of Dosis, some medications, such as erythropoietin stimulating agents (ESAs) needed by people with chronic anemia, can vary by a multiple of 30.
Figure 1 shows a chart that compares the doses and hemoglobin levels for a patient with anemia.
Dosis determines the right dose for each individual iteratively. When a patient first starts a medication, Dosis recommends an initiation dose. Over time, Dosis uses data on the medication administered and the responses seen in laboratory results to more precisely model the individual’s response to the drug and recommend optimal dosing. Patients with anemia, for instance, have a laboratory test to check their hemoglobin level periodically–typically every two weeks or once a month–which results in a dose adjustment. Dosis has found that it can help reduce the amount of drug required to effectively manage anemia by an average of 25 percent.
Chhabra reports that Dosis modeling takes a burden off of doctors, allowing them to focus additional time and attention on patients that require the most attention.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/ehr-vendor-cerner-announces-key-trends-to-close-out-2021
EHR Vendor Cerner Announces Key Trends to Close Out 2021
The healthcare industry will prioritize patient and clinician experience, data protection, and operational efficiency as 2021 nears its end, EHR vendor Cerner announced.
September 28, 2021 - Creating person-centric network strategies, advancing patient access and experience, and prioritizing efficient operational decisions are key trends rounding out the final months of 2021, according to EHR vendor Cerner.
The vendor has constructed a list of trends that will likely be the center of Cerner Health Conference discussions, as well as focal points for the rest of the year.
The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of developing strategies that center around the person and the community. Healthcare organizations are using data and insights to create person-centric network strategies that focus on addressing mental health, constructing social determinants of health initiatives, and furthering value-based care models.
Using data and analytics can not only unite all healthcare stakeholders, but it can also assist in creating and distributing treatments and therapies at a faster rate, Cerner indicated.
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Assessing the Future of Public Health Data Exchange, Interoperability
Micky Tripathi, PhD, MPP, ONC national coordinator for health IT noted that the ONC is working with CDC to improve public health data exchange.
September 28, 2021 - As COVID-19 continues to underscore the need for an enhanced health interoperability infrastructure, a panel of past health IT coordinators and the current ONC leader discussed the future of public health data exchange at HL7's 35th Annual Plenary.
Micky Tripathi, PhD, MPP, ONC national coordinator for health IT, noted that COVID-19 highlighted the need for an enhanced public health data interoperability infrastructure.
“We don't yet have ubiquitously available participation in nationwide networks for public health in the middle of a pandemic,” Tripathi said. “You have public health struggling to get access to Continuity of Care Document (CCD)-like information.”
Tripathi noted that the clinical ecosystem and the public health ecosystem are really parts of the same system, so public health should not be based on one-way static reporting mechanisms. Instead, there should be infrastructure that allows push and pull of data between clinical settings and public health agencies.
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https://mhealthintelligence.com/news/hrsa-health-centers-to-get-1b-for-telehealth-other-upgrades
HRSA Health Centers to Get $1B for Telehealth, Other Upgrades
The Biden Administration is awarding nearly $1 billion in American Rescue Plan funding through the HRSA to about 1,300 health centers across the country for capital improvements, including telehealth expansion.
September 28, 2021 - The Biden Administration is shelling out almost $1 billion in American Rescue Plan funding to health centers in every state to support a wide range of projects, including telehealth expansion.
In all, $954,255,430 will be awarded through the Health and Human Services Department’s Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) to support capital improvement projects at 1,292 Health Center Program-funded sites In every state as well as Washington DC and US territories.
Alongside telehealth services, the money is earmarked for COVID-19 testing, treatment and vaccination and advancing health equity initiatives in underserved regions.
“Health centers are lifelines for many of our most vulnerable families across the country, especially amidst the pandemic,” HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a press release issued this morning. “Thanks to American Rescue Plan funds, we’re modernizing facilities across the country to better meet the most pressing public health challenges associated with COVID-19. This historic investment means we get to expand access to care for COVID-19 testing, treatment and vaccination – all with an eye towards advancing equity.”
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https://patientengagementhit.com/news/next-day-cancer-care-access-yields-patient-satisfaction
Next-Day Cancer Care Access Yields Patient Satisfaction
A pilot program out of Yale Cancer Center underscores the importance of next-day cancer care, or at least shorter wait times, to good patient satisfaction.
By Sara Heath
September 28, 2021 - A next-day care access pilot program out of Yale Cancer Center yielded a near-perfect patient satisfaction rate, underscoring the importance of timely care access on a good experience for cancer patients, researchers said.
The study, presented at the 2021 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Quality Care Symposium, unveiled the results of the next day access (NDA) for oncologic follow-up program, showcasing it as a win for cancer patients.
The NDA program works to flag patients who need oncologic consultation and gets that patient in to see a provider within a day, the researchers said. This helps close the loop on patients and ideally cuts down on the worry and anxiety a patient might experience when waiting for a consult.
“Delays in access to treatment have been shown to cause anxiety and distress in patients with cancer and even more troublesome, worse outcomes,” Sarah Mougalian, MD, associate professor of medicine (medical oncology) and deputy chief ambulatory officer at Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center and lead author of the study, said in a statement.
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https://patientengagementhit.com/news/patients-prefer-home-monitoring-for-chronic-disease-management
Patients Prefer Home Monitoring for Chronic Disease Management
Patients preferred tracking their blood pressure at home over in-person clinic visits or remote patient monitoring with wearable devices, research showed.
By Sara Heath
September 28, 2021 - Patients prefer home monitoring for chronic disease management or detection over other in-person and remote patient monitoring options, according to data from the American Heart Association.
The research presented at AHA’s Hypertension Scientific Sessions 2021 gave critical insight into how healthcare providers can best flag high blood pressure to confirm diagnosis, a key sticking point in the industry right now.
According to AHA, about 1 in 2 adults in the US have high blood pressure, but not everyone knows it. To complicate matters, diagnosis high blood pressure can be tricky. Most healthcare providers diagnose high blood pressure using in-office blood pressure readings; in other words, they use limited data from what can often be a high-stress setting for patients, potentially skewing readings.
“Most hypertension is diagnosed and treated based on blood pressure measurements taken in a doctor’s office, even though the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force and the American Heart Association recommend that blood pressure measurements be taken outside of the clinical setting to confirm the diagnosis before starting treatment,” Beverly Green, MD, MPH, senior investigator and family physician at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute and Kaiser Permanente Washington in Seattle, said in a public statement.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/walmart-health-announces-partnership-epic
Walmart Health announces partnership with Epic
The retail giant said it would begin using Epic's electronic health record platform in its health centers, starting with its new facilities opening in Florida.
By Kat Jercich
September 28, 2021 11:14 AM
Walmart announced this week that it would begin using Epic's electronic health record in its health centers, starting in Florida in early 2022.
Eventually, all of Walmart's health and wellness lines of business will be supported by the Epic platform as it's rolled out.
"The Epic system complements our omnichannel health care offerings – letting customers and healthcare professionals access care and health records to lead to more personalized care," said Dr. Cheryl Pegus, executive vice president at Walmart Health and Wellness, in a statement.
WHY IT MATTERS
Walmart has been slowly opening health centers designed to deliver primary and urgent care, labs, x-ray and diagnostics, counseling, dental, optical and hearing services.
At this point, most of the clinics are open in Georgia, with one in Oklahoma and two in Illinois. Prices vary from location to location, with an annual adult checkup in Chicago costing double that of one in Dalton, Georgia.
As it continues to open facilities, Walmart says it will use Epic's EHR to stay connected with patients, healthcare professionals, insurance carriers and other stakeholders.
It also aims to enhance communication, personalization and information sharing amongst healthcare professionals and patients who use the portal.
"Our vision to provide best-in-class health care, anywhere, anytime includes a seamless experience for our customers, health care professional partners and associates," said Pegus.
"Leveraging best-in-class partners like Epic and [its] technology platform will assist us in providing a unified health record across care settings, geographies and multiple sources of health data," she added.
The partnership comes on the heels of announcements earlier this week that Epic had made its vaccine credential technology available to 25 million patients.
"Across medical, dental and virtual care, patients will have a unified experience – both within Walmart Health clinics and as they move across the nation’s health care ecosystem. Providers will have new ways to collaborate with patients, payers and each other more effectively, so they can work cooperatively to manage a patient’s care journey," said Alan Hutchison, vice president of population health at Epic.
THE LARGER TREND
Walmart continues to expand its foothold in healthcare, particularly in the virtual care space.
As with its retail giant competitor, Amazon, it has signaled plans to widen its telehealth offerings in dozens of states: Its medical group filed to do business in 37 as of mid-July.
Marcus Osborne, senior VP of Walmart Health, said earlier this year that he viewed the company's telehealth offerings as ideally part of an omnichannel experience.
"As we think about telehealth it's about recognizing – give people options, give people multiple pathways to engage care the way they want, and guess what they'll do?" he said. "They'll get care."
ON THE RECORD
"We’re excited to power Walmart’s vision to bring comprehensive, accessible health care to patients across the country," said Epic's Hutchinson.
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https://healthitanalytics.com/news/identifying-disease-with-natural-language-processing-technology
Identifying Disease with Natural Language Processing Technology
A Kaiser Permanente study illustrates the value of AI-based natural language processing technology in disease diagnosis.
September 27, 2021 - A recent study by Kaiser Permanente demonstrated the value of AI-based Natural Language Processing (NLP) technology with clinicians identifying more than 50,000 patients with previously undiagnosed cases of aortic stenosis, a common heart disease.
The study was conducted by Matthew Solomon, MD, a cardiologist at The Permanente Medical Group and a physician researcher at the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research in Oakland, California.
According to Solomon, while healthcare is currently in an era of big data and data analytics, it remains hard to identify patients with complex conditions such as valvular heart disease, making it difficult to study the disease, track practice patterns, and manage population health.
“Currently, health systems track patients using diagnosis or procedure codes, which are mostly created for billing purposes. These can be very non-specific and are not useful for clinical care or research,” Solomon told HealthITAnalytics.
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Researchers Develop an mHealth Wearable That Can Deliver Vaccines
Researchers at Stanford and UNC have developed an mHealth wearable that can take the sting out of vaccine delivery, improve the effectiveness of the vaccine and be mass-produced for distribution in underserved regions.
September 27, 2021 - Researchers are developing an mHealth wearable that might someday take the sting out of vaccine shots and make them more effective as well.
Teams from Stanford University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have developed a 3D-printed vaccine patch that would not only eliminate the need for needles, but work 10 to 50 times better than the current delivery method. It could also be mass produced and distributed more easily, offering more opportunities at effective delivery to underserved regions and communities.
Their work was detailed in a study published this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“In developing this technology, we hope to set the foundation for even more rapid global development of vaccines, at lower doses, in a pain- and anxiety-free manner,” Joseph M. DeSimone, a professor of translational medicine and chemical engineering at Stanford University, professor emeritus at UNC-Chapel Hill and lead author of the project, said in a press release.
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https://healthitsecurity.com/news/healthcare-employee-cybersecurity-training-is-lacking-report-finds
Healthcare Employee Cybersecurity Training is Lacking, Report Finds
A new report shows employee security awareness is lacking, exposing a major gap in healthcare employee cybersecurity training.
By Jill McKeon
September 27, 2021 - Thorough and frequent employee cybersecurity training can ensure enterprise-wide security and prevent cyberattacks, while poor and infrequent training can leave an organization’s network extremely vulnerable to cybercriminals. For healthcare in particular, the latter seems to be the norm, indicating a major need for more healthcare employee cybersecurity training.
A new report conducted by Osterman Research on behalf of KnowBe4 found that employee cybersecurity training leaves significant room for improvement across multiple sectors, including healthcare. Researchers surveyed a random sampling of 1,000 US employees across a variety of industries on how much cybersecurity training they have received and how that knowledge impacts overall security and data privacy.
Less than half of respondents reported believing that it is likely that clicking on a suspicious email link or attachment could infect their mobile device with malware. In addition, 45 percent of respondents reported believing that they do not need to implement additional cybersecurity safeguards because they do not work in an IT department.
About half of respondents underwent continuous cybersecurity and data privacy training throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. But a quarter of respondents reported that their training stopped when lockdowns began.
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Ransomware attacks impact patient care, including increased mortality rates, report finds
Sep 24, 2021 3:45pm
Nearly a quarter of healthcare providers report increased mortality rates following ransomware attacks, a new report finds.
Ransomware impacts patient care in more ways than one, with 70% or more of healthcare organizations reporting a longer length of stay or delays in procedures that lead to poor outcomes, according to a Ponemon Institute report.
A majority of organizations also report an increase in patient transfers, while more than a third report increased complications from medical procedures.
Healthcare delivery organizations are under siege, as 67% have been victims of ransomware attacks. One-third of those said they experienced two or more.
Less than half of respondents completed a risk assessment of their third-party security vendor before contracting with them. And more than a third said their assessment conclusions were ignored, the report found.
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Op-ed: How Indiana Health Information Exchange impacts patient care
John Kansky
Indiana Health Information Exchange 09/24/2021
Nearly everyone has experienced how frustrating it is when healthcare records don’t follow you around. Indiana Health Information Exchange, a nonprofit health information exchange, makes it possible for healthcare teams across the state to get the patient information they need to provide the best possible care.
Q: What is a Health Information Exchange (HIE)?
A: An HIE allows doctors, nurses, hospitals, pharmacists and other healthcare providers to access and share essential patient health information securely and electronically. HIEs were created to improve the quality and efficiency of patient care to ultimately save lives.
Q: Why are HIEs important?
A: HIEs improve healthcare quality and overall patient care. So many medical records exist on paper, which adds layers of complexity when sharing those records via fax, mail, or phone by leaving room for medical and medication errors. When errors are made, the entire process is slowed down for both providers and patients. Timely sharing of patient information through HIEs can better inform decision making at the point of care. HIEs also improve the completeness of a patient's records, as incomplete records can have a significant negative effect on care.
Q: What is IHIE?
A: Founded in 2004, IHIE is a non-profit organization formed by the Regenstrief Institute, BioCrossroads and other healthcare and community organizations in Indiana. IHIE enables hospitals, physicians, laboratories, payers, and other health service providers to avoid redundancy and deliver faster, more efficient, higher quality healthcare to patients in Indiana. It operates the Indiana Network for Patient Care (INPC), the nation’s largest interorganizational clinical data repository, with participation from over 120 hospitals, 18,000 practices and 50,000 providers, and it includes data on more than 17 million patients. IHIE makes healthcare better by electronically delivering clinical results to doctors and nurses and making the patient's data available in hospital emergency departments, inpatient wards, outpatient clinics and other settings across the healthcare system.
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https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/959665
Apple Devices Identify Early Parkinson's Disease
Daniel M. Keller, PhD
September 24, 2021
Apple Watches and iPhones can differentiate between individuals with early, untreated Parkinson's disease (PD) and healthy controls, new research shows.
Results from the WATCH-PD study show clear differences in a finger-tapping task in the PD vs control group. The finger-tapping task also correlated with "traditional measures," such as the Movement Disorder Society-Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (MDS-UPDRS), investigators report.
"And then the smartphone and smartwatch also showed differences in gait between groups," lead investigator Jamie Adams, MD, University of Rochester, New York, told Medscape Medical News.
The findings were presented at the virtual International Congress of Parkinson's Disease and Movement Disorders 2021.
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https://www.healthleadersmedia.com/payer/threat-and-potential-quantum-computing-healthcare
The Threat and Potential of Quantum Computing for Healthcare
Analysis | By Laura Beerman | September 27, 2021
"If I was a payer right now, security and ransomware would be keeping me up at night," says one HIPAA legal expert.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
· Quantum computing's ability to process a staggering amount of complex data while arriving at multiple, independent conclusions has wide applications, including for healthcare.
· It also poses new data privacy and security risks.
· Payer response will likely require collaboration in an environment where technology and regulation must advance together.
Quantum computing derives its name from quantum physics, in which particles can operate in two states at the same time. Quantum computing's potential is to "tackle certain types of problems—especially those involving a daunting number of variables and potential outcomes, like simulations or optimization questions—much faster than any classical computer." The difference is the quantum bit or qubit, the equivalent of the transistor, which has itself advanced exponentially since its creation more than 60 years ago.
Just as the number of transistors per microchip increases processing power, so theoretically does the qubit, with the added phenomenon that multiple computing realities are present at once. The question is how payers and other healthcare stakeholders can apply such technology. The potential for quantum computing in healthcare includes what it can be used for and what it may protect organizations from.
Quantum computing's healthcare applications
A commonly cited quantum computing application in the for column is drug discovery speed and effectiveness for manufacturers and process optimization for payers and providers. CB Insights writes: "Optimization problems are notoriously difficult for classical computers to solve due to the overwhelming number of variables and possible combinations involved. Quantum computers, however, are well suited to this type of task as different options can be sifted through at the same time."
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https://histalk2.com/2021/09/24/weekender-9-24-21/
Weekly News Recap
- Athenahealth is reportedly considering a sale of the company or an IPO at a $20 billion valuation.
- Clearsense acquires AI-powered predictive modeling company Compellon.
- AGS Health acquires EZDI.
- Former Teladoc executive David Sides joins NextGen Healthcare as president and CEO.
- Apple’s latest operating system gives IPhone users the ability to share health data with their providers via EHRs.
- Shares in Definitive Healthcare jump 81% in their first week of trading following last Wednesday’s IPO, valuing the company at $7 billion.
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Enjoy!
David.
