July 9, 2012 John DeGaspari
I recently had an opportunity to speak with David Willis, M.D., who is a family practice physician in Ocala, Fla., about his experience with the electronic health record. The timing of our conversation was good: Willis has worked with the EHR (actually an integrated EHR and practice management solution from Greenway Medical Technologies, Inc.) for about two years, making him a relatively new user, but also one with substantial experience.
July 3, 2012 John DeGaspari
At the HFMA conference last week in Las Vegas, Marc Halley, president and CEO of Halley Consulting Group, LLC, Westerville, Ohio, described a perfect storm of unprecedented demand, declining reimbursements, and increasing regulations and costs that will affect healthcare more than anything coming out of Capitol Hill.
June 28, 2012 John DeGaspari
Do lower-cost hospitals mean lower quality? Jamie Cleverley, principal of Cleverley & Associates, Worthington, Ohio, compared the performance of hospitals nationwide, in a Wednesday session of the HFMA ANI conference.
June 27, 2012 John DeGaspari
Provider organizations have the opportunity and responsibility to act today to improve care, according to James G. Lee, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Adventist Healthcare, Rockville, Md. In 2009, the health system started a primary care medical home pilot system for its employees.
June 26, 2012 John DeGaspari
Bethesda Memorial Hospital in Boynton Beach, Fla., has used lean sigma disciplines as a basis of continuous improvement and to ensure sustainable business outcomes.
June 25, 2012 John DeGaspari
This year’s annual conference of the Healthcare Financial Management Association in Las Vegas is an great example of interesting timing, because it may well coincide with the Supreme Court’s expected announcement of its decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act.
June 20, 2012 John DeGaspari
With the expected decision on healthcare reform by the Supreme Court, what will happen to patient safety and quality reforms taking place under the Affordable Care Act? In a recent article in Scientific American, several healthcare experts said that patients will suffer if the law is struck down. Yet a recent article in the New York Times also points out that initiatives that hospitals have already put in place will have a lasting impact, and the economic pressure to provide better care to more people is irreversible.
May 8, 2012 John DeGaspari
A group of researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston maintain that resident physician’s participation in a brief training program that is designed to increase empathy with their patients has resulted in significant improvements in how patients perceive their interactions with residents.
April 30, 2012 John DeGaspari
With the Affordable Care Act under scrutiny by the Supreme Court, I was interested in a piece of good news, reported by The New York Times over the weekend, that the growth in health spending has slowed substantially over the last few years. As noted in the article, healthcare spending grew by less than 4 percent nationally in 2009 and 2010, and its share of the gross domestic product held steady in 2010.
It’s a trend that caught some experts by surprise, and there are a few theories about what’s behind the leveling off of health spending.
April 26, 2012 John DeGaspari
With the dizzying array of initiatives currently underway to bring more efficiency to the nation’s healthcare system, I was interested in an interview that ran in last week’s New York Times’ Well blog: a Q&A with Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society, who has just published a book: “How We Do Harm: A Doctor Breaks Ranks About Being Sick in America.”
