The Insider's Guide - Tech - The Business of Health Care - Physicians - Subscribe The EHR "Final Rule" (Finally)
By ASHISH JHA, MD
Six months to the day after the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released the “preliminary rules” for Meaningful Use, the final rules are in. For clinicians and policymakers who want to see Electronic Health Records (EHRs) play a key role in driving improvements in the healthcare system, there’s a lot to like here.
For the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC), the agency that oversees the federal health information technology incentive program, the Meaningful Use rules are a balancing act. On one hand, ONC wants to get as many clinicians and hospitals on board with simply adopting EHRs (and thus, the need to set a low bar). On the other hand, they want to ensure that once people start using EHRs, they are using them in a “meaningful” way to drive improvements in care (and thus, the need to set a high bar). I think ONC got that balance just about right. Read more.
A Tale of Two Systems By DAVID DRANOVE It was the worst of systems. It was the worst of systems. For decades, policy analysts have debated how we to strike a proper balance among access, quality and cost in our healthcare system. This debate has missed a crucial point: we do not have one healthcare system, we have two. And both are broken. Fortunately, if we fix one the other may heal itself. The first system is the one that we encounter when we seek treatment for an illness. This system defines how much we pay out of pocket, which depends which providers we seek and what treatments they deliver. This system also defines how much our providers are paid, including rewards for exceptional quality and penalties for substandard quality. Historically, patients have relied on their physicians to guide them through the complexities of this system. In recent years, supporters of consumer-driven healthcare have argued for a bigger role for patients. They make the important point that patients will never make a serious effort to balance access and quality against cost unless they are responsible for all three. Read more.
Health Care: An Alternate Economic Universe
By JEFF GOLDSMITH
In July, 2012, the US economy produced roughly the same volume of goods and services as it did five years earlier with five million fewer workers. Yet, during the first four years of the recession (May 2007 to May 2011), the US health system, despite slowing or declining utilization, added 1.149 million workers. Key sectors, specifically hospitals and physician offices, grew their workforces despite declining admissions and office visit volume.
Compared to the rest of the economy, health care seems to exist in an alternate economic universe. This would be good news, rather than a problem, if we were not borrowing roughly half of every dollar of general revenue the federal government is spending on health care and if employers were not robbing their workers of wage increases to fund their health benefits. Read more.
Electronic Health Records In the Classroom? By ISHANI GANGULI, MD As the Electronic Health Record (EHR) slowly but inexorably assumes its rightful place in modern health care, obviating the ridiculous cultural norm of physicians with illegible handwriting, reducing medical errors, and making care (usually) more efficient, educators are asking the question: are we teaching this in medical school? Not consistently, it turns out. Read more. Fools' Gold Rush: Obamacare And The Medicaid "Opportunity"
By J.D. KLEINKE
You know we’ve gone through the looking glass when the hottest health care money on Wall Street is chasing Medicaid.
No, I didn’t mean Medicare, the $560 billion per year federal program for insuring the elderly that has launched a thousand IPOs. The current darling of health care investors is Medicaid, the hybrid federal-state program for insuring the poor that now dominates, and often overwhelms, state government budgets. Read more.
What's The Real Emergency Room?
By DAVID ALLEN
With no imminent disaster, you’re likely in a bigger one. It’s more dangerous, because it’s insidious. Crisis generates stress, for sure, but that pressure is addressed, utilized, and relieved. The stresses of the potentially overwhelming aspects of life and work become the boiled frog – it won’t get out of the water that slowly cooks it to death. Solution? Learn from what crisis teaches us about appropriate engagement, and practice it day to day, instead of waiting for a crisis to force it. Read more.
What Am I Worth?
By DR. WES
Seriously. What do YOU think a doctor who is board certified in cardiac electrophysiology, cardiology and internal medicine with almost twenty years of medical experience charge to consult on a per-hour basis? Think about it but be sure to justify your price per hour. Then put it in the comments. I’ll try to post your thoughts as fast as I can, given today’s clinical constraints. If nothing else, this should be interesting. Read more.
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NEW RELEASES
The Health Care Handbook The American health care system is vast, complex and confusing. Books about it shouldn’t be. The Health Care Handbook is your one-stop guide to the people, organizations and industries that make up the U.S. health care system, and the major issues the system faces today.
How to Live Forever *Results May Vary. Nominee Palm Springs International Film Festival. Nominee Hamptons International Film Festival. How to Live Forever Director Mark Wexler embarks on a worldwide trek to investigate just what it means to grow old and what it could mean to really live forever. But whose advice should he take? Does 94-year-old exercise guru Jack LaLanne have all the answers, or does Buster, a 101-year-old chain-smoking, beer-drinking marathoner?
Why Nobody Believes the Numbers Ever wonder if those wellness, disease management, medical home and other programs imposed on your medical practices really work? Answer that question for yourself by reading Why Nobody Believes the Numbers, the first population health outcomes measurement book not infused with THC.
The Great Experiment is about much more than a single state experiment, or the immediate questions the presidential primary may raise regarding Mr. Romney’s term as governor of Massachusetts. Rather, Pioneer assembled some of the best thinkers to outline the options before state and federal officials. The Great Experiment aims to lay out a market-oriented blueprint for the next decade. Download free chapters, including an introduction by Dr. Jeffrey Flier, Dean of Harvard Medical School, or purchase a copy at greatexperiment.org.
CONFERENCES
Fifth Annual IEM Symposium: Nanotechnology and Nanomedicine
Aug. 28, 2012, Mayo Auditorium, U of MN, Minneapolis, MN
The 5th Annual Institute for Engineering in Medicine Symposium will be taking place August 28, 2012. This year's program, Nanotechnology and Nanomedicine, covers one of the most revolutionary fields in modern science. During this all day event, seventeen top researchers at the University will be presenting on topics covering /tools and materials, basic nanomedical research, clinical applications, and the ethics and future of nanomedicine.
Opening remarks this year are being provided by Dr. Eric Kaler, President of the University of Minnesota, highlighting why this topic is so important to the University as well as the industrial and local communities. Previous IEM symposiums have been rather popular, so Register NOW!
This event is open to the public. Contact Adam Klein, klei0115@umn.edu for additional information or see the Agenda (pdf).
AARP Health Innovation@50+ LivePitch
Sept. 21, New Orleans Convention Center
Please join us for AARP Health Innovation@50+ LivePitch, Friday, September 21 at the New Orleans Convention Center. Health Innovation@50+ is the premier showcase featuring the most exciting companies in the “50 and over” health technology and innovation sector. The pitch event offers the venture capital and angel investor community as well as the media, the opportunity to connect with outstanding startups in the field of health technology and innovation.
Health Innovation@50+ takes place at the annual Life@50+ AARP National Event & Expo, which is attended by 20,000+ members and guests from across the U.S. and the globe. This is the best opportunity of the year for entrepreneurs and investors to capitalize on the world’s largest and fastest-growing consumer market. Register now at http://Health50.org
Health 2.0 San Francisco
October 7-10, Hilton San Francisco
The groundbreaking conference series returns to San Francisco. Keynotes by Joe Flower and Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini. Speakers from Qualcomm, AT&T, Mayo Clinic, National Cancer Institute, ZocDoc, OptumHealth and RedBrick Health, along with presentations from top health care startups changing the field and many more.
The First Annual Open Source EHR Summit and Workshop
October 17-18, Gaylord National, National Harbor, MD
It is projected that more than 200 hospitals and 1000 clinics, within the federal sector alone, will be managing and maintaining their EHRs using open source codes within the next few years. An increasing number of state agencies are deploying open source solutions as well. In recent months, many private sector health care communities facing the unsustainable high costs of health IT have started calling for alternate approaches to maintain and manage traditional proprietary electronic health records. These open source activities create a huge market opportunity for both private and public sectors.
REAL ESTATE 61,000 Square-Foot Building Available For Lease Near Boston
Ideal for Medical Offices, Back Office Uses
A 61,000 SF building that can be easily converted to medical use is available for lease just 17 miles from downtown Boston. Located in Hingham Technology Park 3 on a 9-acre parcel in Hingham, Mass., and there is close proximity to numerous hotels and conference centers, and easy access to Rtes. 3, 93, 128 and 95. The site is a quick drive to Plymouth and Cape Cod.
For more information, contact Richard McKinnon at 617-472-2000, or email richmck@grossmanco.com. To learn more about the additional development potential of this site, visit www.HT3park.com.
COURSES
UPenn Online Course: Health Policy
Health Care and the Affordable Care Act, Ezekiel Emanuel, MD PhD "This course will explore the history and structure of the current American health care system, including the history of and problems with employment-based health insurance, the challenges surrounding access, cost and quality, and the medical malpractice conundrum. The course will then explore the history of health care reform and the challenges that were overcome to achieve health reform in America. Finally, we will delineate the specific ways that the Affordable Care Act improves access and quality, and will control costs. Throughout lessons regarding health economics, health policy, and medical practice will be elucidated." For more information, click here.
THE FINE PRINT
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