February 15, 2013 Gabriel Perna
blog
In an NCQA webinar, managing partner and CEO of Crystal Run Healthcare, Hal Teitelbaum, M.D., talked about the mentality his organization has in being an ACO. It’s clear being an ACO, and getting accreditation from the NCQA, is not something that can be done with negligence.
February 13, 2013 Mark Hagland
news
In his first State of the Union address of his second term, President Barack Obama on Feb. 12 directly addressed some of the challenges and opportunities facing the federal Medicare program in the coming years, citing value-based purchasing in particular as an important change to the U.S. healthcare system, as well as proposing changes in pharmaceutical policy and in Medicare rules for wealthy seniors.
February 7, 2013 Gabriel Perna
blog
When it comes to patients’ skills and knowledge on their care, more equals less, according to the recently published findings of one research team. The study found the most tuned in patients cost 8-to-21 percent less than the costs of patients with the lowest level of activation. It’s just one more piece of evidence that supports this growing movement.
February 6, 2013 Mark Hagland
blog
When Carolyn Clancy, M.D., announced on Jan. 31 that she was leaving the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), which she had headed for almost exactly 10 years (she became that agency’s director on Feb. 5, 2003, after previously working at the agency as director of its Center for Outcomes and Effectiveness Research), it signaled the end of an era.
February 3, 2013 Mark Hagland
article
Jane Brock, M.D., the chief medical officer of the Colorado Foundation for Medical Care, that state's Medicare quality improvement organization, discusses recent research-driven learnings around what makes for successful forays into improving care transitions-and the IT leveraging that will need to take place in communities nationwide.
January 30, 2013 Mark Hagland
article
Leaders at the American Health Quality Association recently showcased the release of an article published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) that documented an impressive decline in avoidable hospitalizations and readmissions among Medicare patients in communities in which Quality Improvement Organizations (QIOs) have coordinated interventions that engaged whole communities in care improvement.
January 28, 2013 John DeGaspari
article
An interdisciplinary team of clinicians, informaticists, and quality experts at NorthShore University HealthSystem, Evanston, Ill., has taken a major step in controlling this disease in its outpatient population, by harnessing its electronic health record (EHR) to screen for and evaluate individuals with previously undetected hypertension in its multi-specialty medical group. The system, which went live in January 2011, has helped the integrated health system make significant progress in eliminating undiagnosed hypertension among its patients receiving care within its primary care network.
January 28, 2013 Gabriel Perna
article
Whether it’s through better communication or simple amenities, even the most optimistic leader at a hospital will tell you there is no perfect path to perfect patient satisfaction. However, thanks to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) mandatory Value-Based Purchasing (VBP) program, the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) initiative, hospitals across the country are certainly going to try to achieve that formula.
January 22, 2013 John DeGaspari
news
A review of the available evidence underscores the safety of the federal childhood immunization schedule, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. However, the report offers a framework for conducting safety research using existing or new data collection systems. should signals indicate the need for investigation of the schedule.
January 19, 2013 Mark Hagland
article
David Wennberg, M.D., M.P.H., CEO of the Northern New England Accountable Care Collaborative, a Portland, Maine-based collaborative organization founded by four integrated health systems in New England, shares his perspectives on the challenges and opportunities involved in laying the IT foundations for accountable care
January 14, 2013 Gabriel Perna
blog
Can entrepreneurs, healthcare providers, payers, app developers, and other stakeholders figure out a way to turn people’s obsession with simplistic smartphone games like Angry Birds into the next health enterprise? If they can, I think you’ll be seeing it in a lot more places.
January 8, 2013 David Raths
article
At the Jan. 8 Health IT Policy Committee meeting, Farzad Mostashari, M.D., national coordinator for health IT, and Paul Tang, M.D., vice chair of the committee, outlined some priorities for the year ahead, including a glimpse of what Stage 4 of meaningful use might address.
