May 15, 2012 Jennifer Prestigiacomo
article
The CIOs who participated in a panel that tackled strategies for creating data warehouses at the Healthcare Informatics Executive Summit on May 7 largely agreed that the main challenges in doing so centered around issues of governance and integration. “I think that governance for us is still the greatest problem,” says Patricia Skarulis, vice president, information systems and CIO, Memorial Sloan- Kettering Cancer Center. “I mean it in the sense that there are still some areas where [departments] withhold their data from putting it into the warehouse.”
May 1, 2012
news
According to a new report from the Orem, Utah-based KLAS, more healthcare providers will be making business intelligence (BI) purchases over the next three years. Authors of the report, Business Intelligence Perception 2012: A Wave is Coming, say the energy around healthcare BI is increasing at a frenetic pace; with half of providers looking to buy or replace their BI solutions in the next three years.
April 27, 2012
news
Researchers from The State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo will use IBM analytics technology to study genetic and environment factors that contribute to multiple sclerosis (MS) symptoms. According to the Armonk, N.Y.-based tech company, SUNY researchers will tap into IBM's analytics technology to develop algorithms for big data containing genomic datasets to uncover critical factors that speed up disease progression in MS patients.
April 25, 2012 Gabriel Perna
blog
Using social media to go the extra step and appeal to consumers, while tapping into their concerns, is the kind of phenomenon that’s starting to occur in healthcare, and one hopes will become even more frequent as providers and payers implement social media business strategies. Many industry observers say social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and independent patient communities like Patients Like Me, can improve patient experiences and drive engagement for providers, payers, and pharmaceutical companies.
April 23, 2012
news
Thomson Reuters, a New York-based provider of information systems for numerous industries, including hospitals and healthcare providers, is selling its healthcare business to New York-based Veritas Capital for $1.25 billion in cash. The sale is subject to regulatory approval and customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the next few months. The sale is not subject to any financing condition. Veritas has obtained debt financing commitments for the transaction.
April 19, 2012 Gabriel Perna
article
An exclusive interview with PwC's John Edwards on the research firm's latest study on social media usage in healthcare. The study, “Social media ‘likes’ healthcare: From marketing to social business,” looks at the opportunities that exist for providers, payers, and pharmaceutical companies in using social media platforms in healthcare, amid the growth of its presence in the industry.
April 9, 2012
blog
.....only clinician involvement can orchestrates the process by which clinicians are “integrated” in the process of delivery of quality-centered care. An obstructionist clinician team can derail an otherwise successful HIT adoption project and/or your EHR application implementation.
April 4, 2012
blog
I don’t understand why application vendors place little importance on reporting requirements. I get the fact that customers like to customize their reports, but why not make that an inherent feature? Maybe that is why the market is constantly creating so many 3rd party Business Intelligence (BI) vendors. But what about Clinical Intelligence (CI) requirements?
March 28, 2012 John DeGaspari
article
Healthcare data security spending is growing rapidly, and is expected to reach $40 billion in 2012—a 22-percent increase from 2011. The higher cost of maintaining data centers has led healthcare organizations to consider lower cost cities in which to locate these operations, according to a recently released report by The Boyd Company, Inc., Princeton, N.J. The study estimates that data security spending will top $70 billion by 2015.
March 28, 2012 Jennifer Prestigiacomo
article
In this podcast, Rick Schooler, vice president and CIO at Orlando Health, also recipient of the 2011 John E. Gall Jr. CIO of the Year Award, discusses how leaders in the industry are using clinical data analytics for performance improvement. This podcast gives a flavor of the panel, "Beyond the Data Warehouse: Strategizing the Use and Analysis of Clinical Data for Meaningful Use," Rick will be headlining at the Healthcare Informatics Executive Summit to be held May 6 through the 8 in Orlando. He will be joined on the panel by colleagues Dr. Bobbie Byrne, vice president of IT of Edward Hospital; Dr. George Reynolds, CMIO and CIO of Children’s Hospital and Medical Center; and Patricia Skarulis, vice president, Information Systems and CIO, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
March 7, 2012 Jennifer Prestigiacomo
article
To solve the perennial challenge of reporting clinical quality measures to myriad quality programs, more healthcare providers are using quality data warehouses to streamline their quality reporting efforts. It was at a HIT Policy Committee Meaningful Use Workgroup meeting last fall, where CIOs voiced this barrier, saying that one of the most valuable things the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) could do was to harmonize all the programs to which providers must report quality measures.
February 27, 2012 Mark Hagland
article
As the leaders of patient care organizations nationwide move forward on a host of pressing mandates, driven by healthcare reform and the meaningful use process, as well as a gradually awakening healthcare consumer world, more and more of them are coming upon a very basic truth: change initiatives must be strongly organized to get healthcare where it needs to go. Indeed, the leaders of pioneering U.S. patient care organizations began more than a decade ago to learn and adopt formal performance improvement methodologies—including Lean Management, Six Sigma, the Toyota Production System (TPS), and others—either individually, or more often, in combination—in order to turbo-charge change.
