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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How can we support primary care staff to use remote monitoring tech?
Remote monitoring technology across healthcare is on the rise following the restrictions put in place during the pandemic. Jana Lloyd, UCLPartners’ national programme manager for Proactive Care Frameworks (Cardiovascular Disease Prevention), explores how primary care staff can be supported when using this type of technology.
DHI News Team = 25 January 2022
The use of remote monitoring technology has become more common across the health service as a result of restrictions from the pandemic. By using remote monitoring technology, such as mobile medical devices like blood pressure monitors, healthcare staff can gather patient-generated health data outside of traditional health and care settings.
One of the most widely implemented examples of remote monitoring technology during the last year has been the use of pulse oximeters, which enabled home monitoring for people with Covid-19 and earlier detection and intervention for those who developed more serious complications.
Remote monitoring technology has fantastic potential to benefit both patients and staff, but with the increasing amount of tech available, it’s essential healthcare staff feel comfortable using it.
At UCLPartners we worked with Care City to conduct a survey of primary care staff to understand what could support them in using remote monitoring technology, with some interesting findings. Here, I’ll share the some of the learning from our work.
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Jan 21, 2022,08:30am EST|226 views
How You Can Prevent Data Loss When You're Facing These Data Security Trends
CEO at DefendX, overseeing Secure Data Management- File Discovery, Compliance and Mobility for our customers globally.
If you’ve even just caught a glimpse of the news in the last year, you’ve likely heard about some major data security breaches. In fact, 2021 saw more data breaches in the first nine months than in all of 2020.
Fortunately, there are things you can do to stay safe. Here are five cybersecurity trends to keep an eye on, plus tips for data loss prevention. These will give you ideas for what you might want to consider investing in (if you haven't already) in the near future.
1. Greater Investment In Safe Cloud Storage: File archiving would be nothing without encryption, but you still need to back up and access your data safely. One safe way to store data is with a cloud storage platform. Cybersecurity has been trending toward cloud storage in recent years, largely due to its state-of-the-art encryption and ease of access. And there's no sign of that slowing down.
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https://semiengineering.com/health-care-is-gold-mine-for-hackers/
Health Care Is Gold Mine For Hackers
Connected medical devices and systems offer many benefits, but they create security, safety, and privacy risks.
January 24th, 2022 - By: John Koon
Today’s digital health care systems are facing relentless cyberattacks, which are targeting health care organizations as well as the medical devices they use.
The critical nature and size of the U.S. health care market — an estimated $3.5 trillion in 2020, with substantial growth anticipated — make it a favorite target of hackers. Vanson Bourne conducted a survey for Sophos in early 2021, polling 5,400 IT decision makers across 30 countries. The responses revealed that 34% of health care organizations were attacked by ransomware the previous year, and 65% were victimized in some way. Ransomware successfully froze the data of 54% of the IT systems. Some 44% of the affected firms used backups to restore their data, while 34% ended up paying the ransom to get their data back.
Other studies are even more alarming. Black Book Research indicated that more than 93% of health care organizations have been hacked since Q3 2016, and 57% had more than five data breaches during the same timeframe.
In 2020, health care hackers demanded $4.6 million on average for each attack. This number is expected to grow as hackers become more and more aggressive. Overall, health care data breaches cost the industry $4 billion.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/leidos-deploys-largest-wave-of-dod-mhs-genesis-cerner-ehr
Leidos Deploys Largest Wave of DoD MHS GENESIS Cerner EHR
The health IT deployment brought the MHS GENESIS Cerner EHR platform to an additional 19,000 clinicians across 100 locations in Texas.
January 27, 2022 - The Leidos Partnership for Defense Health (LPDH) has successfully completed its largest deployment to date of the Department of Defense (DoD) MHS GENESIS Cerner EHR.
The deployment brought the EHR platform to more than 19,000 clinicians and providers spanning 100 locations in Texas.
"MHS GENESIS is now live and operational in the only Level 1 Trauma Center in the Defense Department," Liz Porter, Leidos Health Group president, said in a press release. "It is a great honor knowing the system will enable clinicians and providers to continue delivering advanced care to several thousand trauma and burn patients in Central San Antonio."
LPDH developed MHS GENESIS and has been providing program management and technical expertise to the program executive office, defense healthcare management systems (PEO DHMS) since 2015.
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https://healthitanalytics.com/news/machine-learning-tool-provides-ed-clinical-decision-support
Machine Learning Tool Provides ED Clinical Decision Support
Providers are using a recently evaluated machine learning tool’s ability to provide clinical decision support for emergency department discharges.
January 27, 2022 - University of Minnesota Medical School researchers evaluated the real-time performance of a machine learning tool that supported clinical decision-making for emergency department discharges at M Health Fairview Hospital.
The multidisciplinary team of intensivists, hospitalists, emergency doctors, and informaticians studied the real-time performance of a machine learning-enabled COVID-19 prognostic tool. The tool can provide clinical decision support for emergency department providers to conduct shared decision-making with patients regarding emergency department discharge.
“COVID-19 has burdened healthcare systems from multiple different facets, and finding ways to alleviate stress is crucial,” said an assistant professor at the U of M Medical School and Medical Director of M Health Fairview University of Minnesota Medical Center, Monica Lupei, MD, in a press release.
The training data set included 1,469 patients that tested positive for COVID-19 within 14 days of acute care, hospital-based visit including emergency department, observation, and inpatient encounters between March 4 to August 21, 2020. The final training model included 2,041 patients.
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Parents, Patients Prefer Telehealth, In-Person Combo for Asthma Care
Young adult patients and parents of pediatric patients appreciated the convenience of using telehealth for asthma care but found in-person care to be more effective in certain circumstances, a study found.
January 27, 2022 - Utilizing a combination of telehealth and in-person visits may be the most suitable strategy for treating pediatric and young adult asthma patients, according to a UC Davis Health study published in the Journal of Asthma.
According to the CDC, asthma affects around 8 percent of children and young adults across the country.
“Because asthma is one of the most common, chronic conditions of childhood, optimizing the delivery of care to families is of unique importance,” Rory Kamerman-Kretzmer, a pediatric pulmonologist at UC Davis and an author of the study, said in the press release. “We wanted to explore if telemedicine is a convenient solution for parents and patients with asthma care needs.”
Researchers gathered data from the EHR for patients between the ages of 2 and 24 who received asthma care at UC Davis Health between March 19, 2020, and Sept. 30, 2020. There were 502 patients in total, of which 207 had at least one telehealth visit.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/blog/where-it-leaders-should-focus-their-energies-2022
Where IT leaders should focus their energies in 2022
One CIO names the technologies and leadership strategies he'll be focused on this year: platform design, 'Virtual Care 3.0' and more.
By David Chou
January 28, 2022 10:15 AM
Since the arrival of the pandemic, healthcare organizations have faced a cultural shift. In the past, health leaders have naturally been risk-averse and have, of necessity, created systems that established a wide array of administrative roadblocks to change.But many organizations have cut back on a variety of rules and requirements over the past two years to help expedite the changes needed to tackle the pandemic. This represents a big opportunity for innovation.
Going into 2022, we may now be able to benefit from this historic shift away from rigid workflows and risk avoidance. If we can seize this moment, we may be able to make this a uniquely transformative year for healthcare.
Here are some priorities for technology and leadership focus for CIOs in 2022.
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2022 Predictions for AI and Machine Learning in Healthcare
January 28, 2022
As we head into 2022, we asked the Healthcare IT Today community to share some predictions for the new year. I always find it interesting to learn what people think is coming down the road. Be sure to check out all our Health IT Predictions.
One of the most exciting topics in healthcare today is the use of AI and machine learning. I love this topic because we can finally start having this conversation. Even 10 years ago we didn’t have the data electronically available to do this. Now we do. As you’ll see in these healthcare AI and machine learning predictions, the big task ahead of us is how do we take all this data and make it useful?
Here’s a look at some of the 2022 healthcare AI and machine learning we received:
Prashant
Natarajan, VP, Strategy and Products at H2O.ai
1. COVID will continue to impact health data and AI. Providers’ financial and
patient realities will increase modernization and transformation in data,
analytics, and AI-ML.
2.
In order to manage costs effectively and scale beyond point/custom-built solutions,
healthcare organizations will see the rise demand for Responsible AI programs
and platforms. Capabilities will focus on flexibility and time to value +
interpretability/
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From HITECH to SMART-on-FHIR: Where does the healthcare app ecosystem stand?
SMART-on-FHIR is the inflection point for driving the shift to value-based care. The reason: It offers another pathway to integration in which user experiences, not just discrete data, are shared across systems, enabling lightning quick implementation.
Jan 28, 2022 at 2:00 PM
A little over a decade ago, fewer than 10% of hospitals were using electronic health records (EHRs). But then healthcare officially moved into the digital age when the 2009 Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act was signed into law, ushering in widespread and rapid adoption of EHRs in hospitals across the country.
While EHRs today are ubiquitous and contain more patient data than ever before, these systems can often create information silos. Such technological barriers can make it difficult to share data with stakeholders, from patients and providers to payers and the research community.
These limitations are no longer acceptable. Healthcare providers expect the same ease of use and interoperability in healthcare applications that they experience with online banking or online shopping. And as our industry moves away from the fee-for-service status quo, healthcare services can be improved if providers have all the data they need at their fingertips, which in turn helps them make more informed decisions and deliver better care and greater value and outcomes to patients.
Breaking down these silos requires EHRs to interoperate with each other and a host of diverse applications created by innovators in healthcare. The first step toward this goal was the 2011 introduction of Fast Interoperable Health Resources (FHIR), a data standard that defines the structure of health data in transit. FHIR ensures EHRs and third-party applications can speak the same language, such that health data can flow freely and securely between EHRs and other digital solutions. Around the same time came Substitutable Medical Applications, Reusable Technologies (SMART). With a $15 million grant from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), SMART fostered development of a standard framework that enabled development of interchangeable healthcare applications. This innovation paved the way for the EHR app marketplaces we know today.
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How 5 key steps can jump-start patient matching accuracy
Absent consensus about how best to match patients to records, providers need to realize that using best practices is a key to interoperability.
Jan 27 2022
Vice President of Interoperability, Kno2
One of the great consequences of COVID-19 is the rapid shift to digital enablement. Healthcare providers had no choice but to move to contactless admissions and new patient onboarding, try to support e-case reporting and look for ways to electronically share patient information – all in a virtual health environment.
These new digital requirements, combined with staffing challenges, require more efficient processes. Interoperability and the ability to share critical patient data cannot be overlooked as an essential way to optimize the front office. Thus, data sharing is elevated when organizations use patient matching best practices.
It may not be intuitive to a provider to think of patient matching as the first line of defense when it comes to interoperability. The reality is “according to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC), there’s a 50 percent to 60 percent match rate as data is shared across unaffiliated organizations. This less-than-optimal rate leads to duplicates, overlays and overlaps.” While patient matching is one of the most complicated parts of interoperability, and one of the most important to get right, but when it's done right, could help reduce costs and support better patient outcomes.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/everything-you-wanted-know-about-tefca-were-afraid-ask
Everything you wanted to know about TEFCA (but were afraid to ask)
A data sharing expert offers readers a deep dive into the new Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement from the ONC.
By Bill Siwicki
January 27, 2022 01:21 PM
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology made the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement available on January 18.While TEFCA is structured to create national connectivity of electronic health records, it can't perform unless a network of provider organizations becomes a part of the Qualified Health Information Networks, or QHINs, which facilitate data sharing. Unfortunately, many providers still aren't familiar with the new agreement, industry observers note.
Drew Ivan, chief strategy officer at healthcare interoperability vendor Lyniate, is a TEFCA expert and knows data sharing well. Healthcare IT News interviewed Drew, asking him to do a deep dive into TEFCA so readers can get a better understanding of what the agreement means and requires.
Q. On January 18, the ONC announced the publication of TEFCA. What is TEFCA, and were there any surprises in the announcement?
A. ONC called for the creation of TEFCA under the 21st Century Cures Act, which was passed in 2016, and TEFCA drafts were released in 2018 and 2019. Healthcare leaders have been anticipating this for several years.
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What Hinders Clinicians From Using Technology for Coordinated Care?
January 27, 2022
What Hinders Clinicians From Using Technology for Coordinated Care?
Lumeon, a digital health firm that helps healthcare companies automate their workflows, is circulating a draft of an eight-stage “Digital Transformation Maturity Model” (Figure 1) for discussion. The model traces the use of technology—especially artificial intelligence—to improve patient engagement. In my view, they are going far beyond what most practices consider “engagement,” venturing into remote monitoring, peer support, and self-care. Most clinical practices are very low on the scale, often only in the first step toward active engagement.
I will leave it to the reader to view the Lumeon slides and read about the eight stages there. This article deals with the question I ask in the title—barriers to doing the things recommended in the slides.
Lack of programming and IT staff
You need a carpenter to build a house, and you need computer professionals to implement a digital strategy. Off-the-shelf programs might be available, but you still need to customize a solution and integrate it with all your other IT systems. Lumeon, for instance, offers workflow design support, not just configurable off-the-shelf software.
Good programmers and operators are hard to come by. Most clinical practices are understaffed in the areas of computer training. The market is particularly tight for people who understand sophisticated AI analytics. It’s even more difficult to find experts who are also sensitive to the health care domain and to patients’ oddities, which range from a fear of technology and an annoyance at interruptions to a resistance when given advice.
Payment models divorced from the goals of coordinated care
Most payer systems in the U.S., and even around the world, are still oriented to fee-for-service. If you treat a patient after a fall, you get paid. If you offer guidance to keep them from falling, you don’t.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/rwe-alliance-commends-fda-draft-guidance-for-ehr-data-use
RWE Alliance Commends FDA Draft Guidance for EHR Data Use
The RWE Alliance commended FDA’s draft guidance on the use of EHR data to support regulatory review of medical products.
January 25, 2022 - The RWE Alliance has submitted a comment letter in response to the FDA draft guidance on using medical claims and EHR data for real world evidence (RWE) to support regulatory decision making.
The RWE Alliance commended the draft guidance and gave several recommendations on how FDA can adjust the final guidance to enhance confidence in RWE study results.
In particular, RWE Alliance officials suggested that FDA state more clearly in the final guidance that different approaches to RWE studies can be appropriate in specific use cases, depending on the circumstances.
Additionally, they called on FDA to provide recommendations for successful use of real-world data curated from more than one source, such as EHR data and medical claims information.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/additional-ehr-data-privacy-key-to-compel-consumer-data-sharing
Additional EHR Data Privacy Key to Compel Consumer Data Sharing
Additional EHR data privacy protections may be needed to help support the use of EHR data sharing for socially beneficial uses, researchers say.
January 25, 2022 - Patients are no more likely to share their medical and EHR data than they are personal data from other parts of their lives, according to a new study published in JAMA Network Open, suggesting that additional EHR data privacy protections could compel more patient data sharing.
These findings come as healthcare works on projects like precision medicine, which leverages patient data and real world data to improve treatments and therapies. Without consumer enthusiasm for sharing their health data, these programs would not get off the ground.
But this latest data showed that patients aren’t any more likely to share that health data, which could serve for the common good, than they are any other type of information in their daily lives.
The research is based on a national survey of 3,543 adults. More than half of respondent (55 percent) preferences to share or not share their information were largely independent of context: 10 percent were universally opposed to all data sharing; 33 percent were opposed to most data sharing; and 13 percent were in favor of most data sharing.
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https://mhealthintelligence.com/news/technology-privacy-concerns-pose-barriers-to-virtual-hiv-care
Technology, Privacy Concerns Pose Barriers to Virtual HIV Care
Patients with HIV and their providers recognize the benefits of using telehealth for HIV care but noted that technology access and privacy concerns hinder virtual care success.
January 26, 2022 - During the COVID-19 pandemic, patients living with HIV were satisfied overall with telehealth appointments, but they identified challenges to virtual care, such as technology limitations and privacy concerns, a study published in AIDS and Behavior found.
Health systems have previously used telehealth for HIV care to help reduce travel burden for patients, increase access to timely care, and alleviate stigma.
Researchers from Yale University and SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University conducted a study at two urban HIV clinics in New Haven, Connecticut, and Brooklyn, New York, to understand patient and clinician perceptions of telehealth. They used a survey to glean patient feedback and organized virtual focus groups for provider feedback.
There were 273 patients who had an in-person or telehealth visit at the clinics between May 15, 2020, and Aug. 11, 2020, and responded to the follow-up survey. Out of those patients, 205 had a telehealth visit in the two months before the survey.
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Cigna: Virtual Care Reduces Healthcare Costs by About $100 Per Visit
Virtual care yielded lower healthcare costs for Cigna members and expanded access to care for members without a primary care physician, according to a white paper from the payer.
January 25, 2022 - Virtual care lowers healthcare costs, increases access to care, and leads to improved health outcomes among patients, according to Cigna’s white paper Does Virtual Care Save Money?
Health systems have been utilizing virtual care and telehealth services for decades, but the COVID-19 pandemic led to a significant increase in use. Since March 2020, virtual visit volume has risen by 50 percent and experts estimate that even in a post-pandemic world one in three healthcare visits will be virtual.
Healthcare stakeholders have invested heavily in telehealth services and the global virtual care market is expected to grow to $636 billion by the year 2028.
However, some skeptics believe that as virtual care use increases, healthcare costs will rise as well.
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https://patientengagementhit.com/news/hhs-launches-task-force-to-support-reproductive-health-access
HHS Launches Task Force to Support Reproductive Health Access
Through collaborative and action-oriented approaches, the task force will protect and strengthen sexual and reproductive health access.
January 25, 2022 - HHS has launched an intra-agency task force to protect and support reproductive healthcare access, according to a recent announcement from HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra.
The task force comprises senior-level HHS officials who are experts in the subject matter their agencies have designated. Loyce Pace, assistant secretary for Global Affairs, and Rachel Levine, MD, assistant secretary for Health, will serve as co-chairs.
The group will implement activities focusing on outreach efforts, coordinating federal interagency policymaking, and program development to address reproductive health barriers.
“Across America, we must protect access to sexual and reproductive health,” Levine said in the announcement.
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Tapping new tech helps marketers matchmake rare disease drugs for elusive patients
Jan 19, 2022 8:30am
Rare disease treatments continue to be a hot area for drug developers, with the global market predicted to grow from $161.4 billion in 2020 to more than $547 billion by the start of the next decade.
But rare diseases are just that—rare—so marketing drugs to treat them can be a challenge.
A mass media campaign to pitch a product that’s relevant to a relatively small group of people dispersed around the globe would be wildly inefficient, not to mention costly.
Yet finding patients (and their doctors) who might benefit from targeted messaging about a specialty treatment can be like searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack.
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The emerging role of blockchain and how it could change your practice
Naveed Saleh, MD, MS|January 24, 2022
Key Takeaways
· Blockchain is an immutabile cryptographic ledger, mostly used to record transactions.
· Since blockchain is encrypted and distributed, it could one day serve another purpose: storing and distributing health data.
· Policy makers have continued to signal that they’re interested in enhancing interoperability, and blockchain may be the technology to do it.
Blockchain is the digital ledger on which bitcoin and other cryptocurrency exist. Although sentiments about crypto are mixed, the underlying blockchain technology has diverse applications—including in health care.
A blockchain-powered health information exchange could expand interoperability, with the potential to reduce the costs and hassle of intermediary systems, experts say.
Blockchain background
What is blockchain?
Blockchain is a type of distributed database technology. Rather than being centrally located, the database is shared among individual nodes of a computer network. All information is stored electronically in a digitally encrypted format. Right now, the chief use case for blockchain is cryptocurrency.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 21, 2022
Contact: HHS Press Office
202-690-6343
media@hhs.gov
ONC Seeks Public Comment on Electronic Prior Authorization Standards, Implementation Specifications and Certification Criteria
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) today released a Request for Information (RFI) seeking input from the public on electronic prior authorization standards, implementation specifications and certification criteria that could be adopted within the ONC Health IT Certification Program (Certification Program). Responses to this RFI may be used to inform potential future rulemaking to better enable providers to interact with health care plans and other payers for the automated, electronic completion of prior authorization tasks. Ultimately, such electronic processes will serve to ease the burden of prior authorization tasks on patients, providers, and payers.
Prior authorization requirements are established by payers to help control costs and ensure payment accuracy by verifying that an item or service is medically necessary, meets coverage criteria, and is consistent with standards of care. However, stakeholders have frequently noted that the processes associated with satisfying these requirements result in administrative burden for patients, health care providers, and payers. Diverse payer policies, workflow challenges, and technical barriers around prior authorization processes contribute to health care provider burnout, patient frustration and can even pose a health risk to patients when it delays their care.
To further explore stakeholder input, ONC is requesting public comment on how the Certification Program can build on existing efforts to reduce the burden of prior authorization tasks. ONC is also seeking stakeholder input on anticipated benefits and burdens of any updates to the Certification Program for providers, health IT developers, and patients.
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ONC looks for comments on how to improve prior authorization
The agency is requesting input from the industry for how to use standards and how to implement these in workflows to facilitate the process.
Jan 25 2022
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology is taking aim at one of the prime pain points for clinicians, providers, payers and patients – the prior authorization process.
This process is widely used to ensure that treatments for patients are first approved by organizations that cover the costs. While meant to ensure that treatments are effective and costs are controlled, the prior authorization process now is viewed as an administrative logjam that interrupts care and remains highly manual.
Finding standards and using them, which would enable organizations to use data exchange to automate at least some of the prior authorization process, would help improve patient safety, ensure continuity of care, reduce administrative burden and help relieve clinician burden. For example, a May 2021 poll by the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) indicated that 81 percent of respondents stated that prior authorizations had increased during the pandemic, while only 2 percent said they thought requirements had actually decreased. Nearly four out of every five providers are estimated to use a manual prior authorization process.
ONC last week announced that it is seeking public comment on electronic prior authorization standards, implementation specifications and certification criteria that could be adopted within the ONC Health IT Certification Program.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/behavioral-health-and-telemedicine-whats-store-2022
Behavioral health and telemedicine: What's in store for 2022
Eric Meier, a mental health technology expert, discusses where behavioral health is headed this year and describes how telehealth can help offer wider access to care.
By Bill Siwicki
January 26, 2022 01:34 PM
The United States is in the middle of a mental and behavioral healthcare crisis. There simply are not enough clinicians and therapists to go around as the pandemic and its stresses drag on.
The problem is worsened by geography – in rural America, such providers are even harder to find.
But technology has a huge role to play in lessening the crisis. Telemedicine technology can connect rural patients to psychiatrists in big urban hubs.
Eric Meier, CEO and president of Owl, a vendor of data-driven, evidence-based behavioral health technology, has his finger on the pulse of mental healthcare in the U.S. today. Healthcare IT News sat down with him to talk about the state of mental health today and the roles that different technologies can play to make sure everyone can access mental healthcare when they need it.
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https://www.healthcareittoday.com/2022/01/26/2022-predictions-for-healthcare-cybersecurity/
2022 Predictions for Healthcare Cybersecurity
January 26, 2022
As we head into 2022, we asked the Healthcare IT Today community to share some predictions for the new year. I always find it interesting to learn what people think is coming down the road. Be sure to check out all our Health IT Predictions.
There’s no topic in health IT that keeps healthcare CIOs more than security. It’s likely one of the most challenging problems any CIO faces. Plus, if they do a great job at it, no one will know what they did. However, if they fail, everyone will know. That’s a challenging recipe for any leader. However, the trust of patients depends on the success of CIOs and CISOs to protect patient information. Given this, hopefully we can help you get a peak into what healthcare cybersecurity will look like in 2022.
Here’s a look at some of the 2022 healthcare cybersecurity predictions we received:
Drex DeFord, Executive Healthcare Strategist at CrowdStrike
1. 2022 has more ransomware that previous years – more activity is the result of success + little risk to adversary.
2. Data exfiltration will get new emphasis this year – the “extortion e-crime economy thrives – privacy regs/laws will ramp up across the board — the fines/penalties for losing data becomes a new painful motivator to build better security programs.
3. API’s are more exploited that previous years, driving new attention to how they’re written/secured.
4. Data-sharing, AI, & aggressive analytics approaches means more consolidated data, in more places, making the “crown jewels” even harder to protect using antiquated cybersecurity models.
5. Identity Protection becomes paramount. Adversaries are now “logging in” vs “breaking in” because of the availability of credentials on dark-web “Access-Broker” sites; protecting flawed Active-Directory becomes critical.
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https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/411479
5 Healthcare IT Trends Entrepreneurs Should Watch in 2022
Those who plan to capitalize on unprecedented levels of investor interest in the healthcare tech space must first be aware of significant market shifts and new IT methods of managing both care and administrative tasks.
By stephen snyder January 24, 2022
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
The pandemic has catalyzed significant changes in the healthcare industry, particularly on the technology front as patients, payers and providers look for ever-newer ways of delivering, receiving and being reimbursed for care. These have created new opportunities for business leaders committed to delivering innovative solutions, and, of course, entrepreneurs with the best ideas are positioned to most readily obtain funding.
According to Deloitte, venture funding for healthcare tech doubled year-over-year in 2020 and further accelerated during 2021 with record levels of investment through special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), private equity, venture capital and debt financing.
A closer look at five healthcare IT trends to watch:
1. Movement to the cloud continues
The healthcare industry has been transitioning to cloud-based tools for some time now, but adoption has generally lagged among smaller/independent groups. Over the last two years, the need to quickly access information and deliver virtual care to patients has further accelerated this move to the cloud, especially among smaller independent groups, and this will continue in 2022.
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https://www.healthcareittoday.com/2022/01/25/is-telehealth-on-its-way-out-i-say-just-the-opposite/
Is Telehealth On Its Way Out? I Say, Just The Opposite
January 25, 2022
If you read standard business publications like Fast Company, this month you’ll probably be treated to a takeout on how the telehealth bubble has burst.
In the Fast Company story, the author argues that the whole online healthcare thing is already proving to be overplayed. “While telehealth remains an important tool for doctors, it no longer seems likely…that the vast majority of healthcare is going to happen online,” writes contributor Ruth Reader.
Her evidence for this includes that while funding for healthcare startups is growing exponentially, the money is no longer flowing directly into telehealth at the same pace. She notes (and I agree with her to this extent) that investors aren’t sure where telehealth will fit into the long-term healthcare landscape.
However, where she and I part company is the notion that the slowdown in dollars aimed directly at telehealth-specific projects is a sign of the medium showing its limitations. In fact, I’d suggest that the opposite is true — that far from becoming less relevant, telehealth is becoming an integral part of how providers think about the future of their tech infrastructure.
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https://ehrintelligence.com/news/how-analytics-can-inform-ehr-workflow-optimization-clinician-burden
How Analytics Can Inform EHR Workflow Optimization, Clinician Burden
Advanced text analytics of EHR inbox messages could help guide EHR workflow optimization to mitigate clinician burden.
January 24, 2022 - Using advanced text analytics to assess inbox messages can inform EHR workflow optimization to address clinician burden, according to a study published in the American Journal of Managed Care (AMJC).
EHRs have transformed the daily work of primary care physicians (PCPs). However, despite promised benefits of health IT, PCPs find that they spend more than half of their work hours on the EHR, with a significant portion spent on administrative tasks.
To understand EHR inbox management at a more granular level, researchers used advanced text analytics on EHR inbox messages from 2018 for 184 PCPs from 18 practices.
The analysis revealed 30 different work themes that fell into two categories: medical and administrative tasks.
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Interpreters, Privacy Bolster Virtual Care for Non-English Speakers
Patients with limited English proficiency were less likely to attend virtual video visits, prompting clinicians to update their telehealth platforms, increase patient outreach and education, as well as the use of language interpreters.
January 24, 2022 - Clinicians at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) helped address virtual care disparities for patients with limited English proficiency by increasing access to telehealth platforms, ensuring privacy for immigrant patients, and including language interpreters in virtual visits, according to a paper published in the American Journal of Managed Care.
Prior to the COVID-10 pandemic, the Boston-based health system’s Department of Interpreter Services offered interpretations for in-person outpatient visits. The most popular languages included Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Chinese, and Haitian Creole, and most of the interpretations occurred over the phone.
When the pandemic hit, the hospital transitioned to telehealth for the majority of its ambulatory care services. Following the transition, the number of interpretations over the phone increased by 57 percent, but video interpretations did not follow this trend. Researchers also found that patients with limited English proficiency were less likely to have a video visit.
To address these disparities in accessing telehealth, clinicians implemented three strategies within their virtual care platforms: increase access to technology, ensure privacy for immigrant patients, and include language interpreters in telehealth visits.
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Big Tech’s Brazen HIPAA Violations Are Unethical, Immoral, and Legally Actionable
Dr. David Lenihan· January 21, 2022
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is an American federal statute that stipulates how private patient information should be protected against fraud, theft, and abuse. Passed in 1996, it establishes safeguards that health care providers and others must establish in order to protect the privacy of patients’ medical data. The statute also outlines numerous offenses relating to the security of patient information, and establishes civil and criminal penalties for any violations.
While one might think that U.S. doctors, pharmacies, hospitals, insurers, medical service providers, and healthcare/wellness facilities are the primary entities that could potentially leak, share, or exploit private patient data, the truth is that the most audacious HIPAA violations are being perpetrated every day by Facebook and Google.
My outrage about this matter isn’t an attempt to jump on the Big Tech-scolding bandwagon with no actual skin in the game: it’s based on an event in which I personally experienced an alarming HIPAA violation that was the result of the geo-tracking of my location by Google.
Last year, I accompanied my wife to a hospital in St. Louis, where she was scheduled to have a breast biopsy. As I sat in the waiting room, a series of ads appeared on my phone for the Mayo Clinic Cancer Center as well as Cancer Treatment Centers of America.
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EHR tool decreases clinicians' phone calls by 60%: Yale exec shares insights
More automated transfers of electronic health information could bring "huge value" to healthcare providers in terms of saving clinicians' time, according to David Mulligan, MD, chief of transplant surgery and immunology at Yale New Haven (Conn.) Health.
Yale partnered with New England Donor Services, the northeastern U.S.' organ procurement organization, to develop an EHR tool to streamline the organ donation process. NEDS told Becker's it was looking for a partner with the time and interest to collaboratively determine the best technical methodology to transmit organ donation referrals electronically.
Yale and NEDS began conversations in 2018, with both parties recognizing the highly manual organ donation process could be made more efficient through electronic information transfer. It took 18 months to develop the solution. During that time, Yale and NEDS ensured the solution was nonproprietary and scalable.
The tool automates organ donor referrals by sending a message with the information needed for the initial screening. The message is sent directly in the EHR, and a message is sent to the hospital to notify its care team whether the patient has potential to donate organs. The messages are sent using the Health Level Seven International information exchange protocol, according to Dr. Mulligan. "Having more automated transference of information is a huge value," he said.
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/so-tefca-live-now-what
So TEFCA is live. Now what?
Former National Coordinator for Health IT Dr. Don Rucker discusses what's next for interoperability and why he sees TEFCA as a "solid first step."
By Kat Jercich
January 24, 2022 02:58 PM
This past week, the U.S. Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT announced that the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement is now live.
The announcement marks a major step forward toward nationwide interoperability, aimed at simplifying inter-organizational connectivity and ultimately giving individuals access to their healthcare information.
TEFCA has been in progress over multiple administrations following the passage of the 21st Century Cures Act in 2016 – and few have a better sense of its ins and outs than Dr. Donald Rucker, who served as national coordinator for health IT from 2017 through 2021.
Rucker, now chief strategy officer with 1upHealth, sat down with Healthcare IT News to chat about what's next for interoperability in the United States, the advantages of FHIR-enabled tools and the importance of being able to analyze population-wide health data.
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2022 Predictions for Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) and In Home Care
January 24, 2022
As we head into 2022, we asked the Healthcare IT Today community to share some predictions for the new year. I always find it interesting to learn what people think is coming down the road. Be sure to check out all our Health IT Predictions.
One of the silver linings of COVID-19 was the experience providing care to patients remotely. This is reflected in the predictions related to remote patient monitoring and in home care. In many cases, patients no longer want to go into the office or hospital. They want to receive care at home as much as possible. Below you’ll find a bunch of predictions about this shift in mindset.
Here’s a look at some of the 2022 remote patient monitoring and in home care predictions we received:
Wendy
Deibert, SVP, Clinical Solutions at Caregility
Looking ahead, I anticipate ample innovation in the field of specialized remote
patient monitoring devices. RPM will be used more routinely post-discharge to
improve outcomes, reduce the risk of readmission, and automate the capture of
care quality metrics. Virtual care platforms and integrated RPM devices that
can transition with the patient from the inpatient setting to the home will
enable a more seamless, consistent care experience.
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Cybersecurity is Still The Top Tech Threat in Healthcare, According to ECRI
Analysis | By Eric Wicklund | January 24, 2022
The non-profit's annual list of technology concerns in healthcare begins with a perennial threat, and includes a couple of dangers bumped up the list by the pandemic
The threat of cybersecurity attacks is still the top technological threat to healthcare organizations, according to the ECRI Institute. But a problem cause by the two-year-old pandemic isn’t that far behind.
The Pennsylvania-based non-profit, which analyzes the safety, quality and cost-effectiveness of care across the healthcare spectrum, says the threat of unauthorized online access or a data breach is as high as ever, due in large part to the sophistication of the attackers and the growing value of medical data.
“The question is not whether a given facility will be attacked, but when,” Marcus Schabacker, MD, PhD, the ECRIs’ president and chief executive officer, says in a press release accompanying the Top 10 Health Technology Hazards for 2022. “Responding to these risks requires not only a robust security program to prevent attacks from reaching critical devices and systems, but also a plan for maintaining patient care when they do.”
Schabacker notes that health systems are placing more and more faith on connected technology and integrated data systems, expanding the potential for hackers to find a vulnerability. That could lead to rescheduled healthcare appointments or medical procedures, the diversion of emergency resources or even the closure of departments of organizations.
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https://histalk2.com/2022/01/21/weekender-1-21-22/
Weekly News Recap
- Quest Diagnostics will acquire Pack Health.
- Big funding is announced for Lyra Health, Gale Healthcare Solutions, Big Health, Wheel, and Verana Health.
- Babylon acquires DayToDay Health.
- ONC and The Sequoia Project publish TEFCA.
- CliniSys acquires Horizon, combines with Sunquest to operate under the CliniSys name.
- VA pushes its second Cerner go-live back due to staff shortages.
- MPulse Mobile acquires HealthCrowd.
- CHIME launches the degree-granting CHIME University.
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Enjoy!
David.
