Bernie Monegain

President Trump, Vice President Pence and Ivanka Trump met March 27 at a roundtable of business women and entrepreneurs. Meeting in the Roosevelt Room in the West Wing of the White House, the president, reading from prepared remarks, offered promising comments and compliments. From his remarks, we gleaned three promises and a couple of kudos. Promise: “Empowering and promoting women in business is an absolute priority in the Trump administration because I know how crucial women are as job creators, role models, and leaders all throughout our communities.” Promise: “We must ensure that our economy is a place where women can work and thrive. We will continue to address the barriers faced by women professionals and entrepreneurs, including access to capital, access to markets, and access to networks. We will make it very easy.  It's going to be a lot easier.  You do an amazing job.  And for a while it was a very, very tough -- almost impossible – job.” Promise: “My administration will also continue to advocate for policies that support working families, including making childcare more affordable and accessible.” Kudo: “Now you're providing hundreds of jobs across our country – thousands of jobs.  And you're really an inspiration to everybody – and that's men and women, believe me.  A lot of men out there, they're not doing what you're able to do.”  Kudo: “Today, women are the primary source of income in 40 percent of American households with children under the age of 15. We also know that companies that promote women to senior leadership roles realize significantly better profits, according to statistics, than their competitors.”

New research from Accenture concludes technology can help women advance at work and help close the gender pay gap. The report “Getting to Equal 2017” identifies several critical factors  that affect a women’s ability to achieve equal pay as early as university. For example, young women lag in adopting new technologies quickly – 45 percent vs. 63 percent, compared with young men. There are gaps too in taking coding and computing courses – 68 percent vs. 83 percent. The findings are based on insights and analysis from more than 28,000 women and men in 29 countries. The report offers what researchers call three powerful equalizers that could reduce the pay gap by 35 percent worldwide and add $3.9 trillion to women’s income by 2030. They are: Digital Fluency: The extent to which people use digital technologies to connect, learn, work – helping to get more women into paid work. Career Strategy: The need for women to aim high, make informed choices and manage their careers proactively. Tech Immersion: The opportunity to acquire greater tech and stronger digital skills – dramatically increasing women’s earning potential and opportunity for senior roles. Applying these career accelerators, combined with support from business, government and academia, could reduce the pay gap by 35 percent by 2030, boosting women’s income $3.9 trillion, according to Accenture The report also dives into the differences between men and women undergrads to examine how decisions made in college can impact women’s earnings later on –  factors that put women on the fast-track toward manager.  “The future workforce must be an equal workforce,” said Julie Sweet, Accenture’s chief executive officer – North America, in a statement. “The gender pay gap is an economic and competitive imperative that matters to everyone, and we must all take action to create significant opportunities for women and close the gap more quickly. “Gender equality is an essential element of an inclusive workplace, and this extends to pay.” Accenture Chairman and CEO Pierre Nanterme, added. “Business, government and academia all have an important role to play in closing the gap. Collaboration among these organizations is key to providing the right opportunities, environments and role models to lead the way for change.”

She comes to the North Carolina medical center from UC Davis, where she oversees its academic, research and clinical programs.

He takes the new position after leading Medical City Children's Hospital since 2013.

The Tennessee-based health system said it is replacing Meditech and NextGen with Cerner’s hosted Millennium electronic health record, revenue cycle management and transaction services.

CIO Dan Waltz said that moving to a new electronic health record platform gives the health system an opportunity to transform patient care.

CEO John Flannery said the company is embarking on a digital transformation of its healthcare entity, which is  focused on cloud, data analytics, population health, imaging and more.

CMS Administrator Seema Verma calls Obamacare a broken promise during the meeting.

It turns out many healthcare providers expected, or at least hoped, that the initiative would be delayed. It’s still coming and they need to prepare now.

Research firm said that the transition to value-based care is driving a need for diverse data flows and APIs to more effectively supply and consume data.