Health consumers and health care providers live in parallel universes when it comes to health IT, a smart CMIO friend of mine recently told me. 2015 will be a year when consumers, patients and caregivers pressure providers to converge toward greater convenience, access, transparency and quality using health IT. This health IT forecast for 2015 focuses on the forces that could advance and slow that convergence.
Three health IT groups announced a new strategic partnership designed to streamline the process for health data exchange across state lines, Health Data Management reports (Slabodkin, Health Data Management, 11/17).
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT released a 10-year vision report for leveraging health IT to enable quality improvement in health care, Health Data Management reports.
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT clarified that Karen DeSalvo will be "maintaining her leadership of" the agency while she serves as acting HHS assistant secretary for health, Modern Healthcare's "Vital Signs" reports (Conn, "Vital Signs," Modern Healthcare, 10/28).
Health IT stakeholders appear split on how former National Coordinator for Health IT Karen DeSalvo's departure will affect future health IT initiatives, FierceHealthIT reports (Bowman, FierceHealthIT, 10/24).
CMS announced plans to reopen the submission period for hardship exemption applications for the meaningful use program, EHR Intelligence reports (Murphy, EHR Intelligence, 10/7).
Our Chief Experience Officer, Bennett Lauber, has been invited to participate as a member of the Health IT Policy Committee’s Implementation, Usability, and Safety Workgroup.
The draft charge for the workgroup is:
The Health IT Implementation, Usability, and Safety Workgroup will provide input and make recommendations on policy issues and opportunities for improving how health IT is designed, certified, implemented and used to minimize safety risks and leverage data to support improvements in patient care and health outcomes.
Nearly 100 million wearable health monitoring devices are expected to be sold over the next five years, according to a new ABI Research report, FierceMobileHealthcare reports (Mottl
Apple announced the release of its new iPhone and its Apple Watch, which CEO Tim Cook called a comprehensive fitness and health device, Healthcare IT News reports (Monegain, Healthcare IT News, 9/9).
Apple is in talks with electronic health record provider Allscripts, as well as several hospitals to determine how hospitals could use its cloud-based health information platform known as "HealthKit," Reuters reports (Farr, Reuters, 8/12).
Medical experts told members of Congress that health IT solutions, such as electronic health records, are falling short in efforts to improve patient safety, Healthcare IT News reports (McCann, Healthcare IT News, 7/18).
The HIMSS EHR Association in a letter urged the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and CMS to quickly issue a final rule regarding 2014 meaningful use reporting requirements and to delay the start of Stage 3 until at least 2018, Healthcare IT News reports (Monegain, Healthcare IT News, 7/11).
Our Chief Experience Officer, Bennett Lauber will be presenting "EHR Usability, The future of medicine is easy to use" at the 3rd Annual OSEHR Conference on Sept 5th at 10:30 am.
OSEHRA, an emerging leader in advancing open source electronic health record software and related health information technology, is bringing together the best and brightest from healthcare and other open source initiatives to share their expertise in three key areas:
Jacob Reider, deputy national coordinator and chief medical officer at the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT, said that the agency wants to make the meaningful use program more flexible and less focused on providers meeting a specific set of clinical quality measures, Modern Healthcare reports.
The American Hospital Association sent a letter Tuesday asking CMS and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT to quickly finalize a proposed rule that extends the meaningful use timeline so that providers can take advantage of the added flexibility, EHR Intelligence reports (Murphy, EHR Intellig
An electronic health record company has developed an application that allows physicians using Google Glass to store patient data on a cloud-based storage and collaboration site, Reuters reports.
California-based Drchrono is calling the application the first "wearable health record."
Although the majority of patients expect hospitals to use electronic health records, only about half say they believe EHR technology is secure, according to a new poll by Morning Consult.
The poll surveyed a national sample of 3,687 voters from March 21 to March 23 and May 2 to May 4.
Health IT is a key part of many of the programs that will receive a total of up to $110 million in federal funding through CMS' Health Care Innovation Awards, Modern Healthcare reports (Conn, Modern Healthcare, 5/23).
User-centered design processes must be applied to each capability an EHR technology includes that is specified in the following certification criteria: § 170.315(a)(1) through (4), (8) through (10), and (18) and (b)(2) and (3).
There will be an additional 41,100 health information management jobs in the U.S. by 2022, a 22% increase over 2012, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Health Data Management reports (Goedert, Health Data Management, 4/25).
The report notes that HIM workers typically:
The Usability People work with you on improving the Usability of Healthcare IT.
Together we may save a life! #SafeHealthIT