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San Francisco start-up Tiatros, a doctor-driven, patient-centered social network, has joined the IBM Watson Ecosystem, the companies announced March 2 at HIMSS16. Tiatros was designed to allow physicians, with the consent of patients, to create a social network around the patient, including all doctors involved in their treatment and their family members. The first user of the platform was the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California San Francisco. UCSF hopes to leverage Watson to analyze personality insights for more personalized treatment, officials say. [Also: See photos from Day 3 of HIMSS16] Currently, UCSF is using Tiatros to address the behavioral health needs of young veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq to keep all parties connected to the patient – whether family or multiple providers – in the loop. "The real measure of how a patient is doing is the story they tell, not the boxes they check; that tells part of the story, not the whole story," said Kim Norman, MD, psychiatry professor, UCSF. "I think the online treasure trove of data in clinical practice is in the unstructured data and the story it tells. "I feel Watson gives you the tool to really analyze and extract that data, patient by patient and aggregate that data to really understand populations," he added. Data is entered in increments of 2,000 words through an essay format or using the most recent text messages from a patient. With the addition of Watson, the platform can analyze the information to accurately assess the personality traits, human values and needs of a patient. For veterans, this means Watson can determine patients with pre-imposed personality traits to be the most resilient in preventing posttraumatic stress disorders and those more likely to respond to an intervention, Norman said. Furthermore, interventions can be modified to match the traits. Additionally, Watson analytics can provide themes and allow providers to measure how patients are doing based on their stories. Twitter: @JessiefDavis This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

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U.S. Department of Veterans' Affairs CIO LaVerne Council said last week that the VA needs to reconsider whether its proprietary Veterans Information Systems and Technology Architecture is the best electronic health record for its more than 1,200 healthcare sites. Council explained during testimony to U.S. House appropriators that changes in the VA's healthcare delivery plan, such as emphasis on mobility, security and women's health, as well as connections with private sector providers, are forcing the reconsideration of VistA. Specifically, Council said it was time to "take a step back" from the planned modernization of the VistA health record and announced VA plans to review whether it should continue upgrading VistA or turn to a commercial off-the-shelf product, much the way the Department of Defense elected to forego its in-house Armed Forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application, aka AHLTA, and is replacing it with a Cerner EHR. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] “We have not made up our minds about VistA,” Council said. When asked during a separate hearing last week by Montana Democrat Sen. Jon Tester why it’s taking so long to either fix or replace VistA, VA undersecretary David Shulkin, MD, explained that Council “has gone in with her private sector background and really challenged all of the assumptions that frankly have led to an underperforming part of the organization.” Council and Shulkin’s comments come after the Government Accountability Office published recommendations in Late February that both VA and DOD “develop and compare the estimated cost and schedule of their current and previous approaches to creating an interoperable electronic health record and, if applicable, provide a rationale for pursuing a more costly or time-consuming approach.” Twitter: @HealthITNews

Nominations period open for one more week as the federal agency looks to tackle concerns over a string of high-profile breaches.

LAS VEGAS – Commvault, an enterprise data protection and information management technology provider, launched at HIMSS16 its Commvault Clinical Archive, a system designed to modernize the way healthcare organizations manage, migrate and share clinical data. As healthcare provider organizations look to control costs and improve care, Commvault Clinical Archive, the vendor said, can centralize information management and break down data silos, reducing storage costs and complexity, enabling better data-sharing, and eliminating costs of maintaining and supporting legacy systems. Following Commvault’s investment in PACS replacement data migration and storage services vendor Laitek, Commvault developed a system built on the Commvault Data Platform and Laitek’s Semperdata platform. The system migrates data and enables clinical data management for healthcare providers. Through this integration, Commvault Clinical Archive addresses data management on both the clinical and business sides of healthcare in a single platform. [Also: See photos from Day 3 of HIMSS16] As a result, for example, providers can decommission legacy PACS systems into a single data management platform while making legacy studies accessible to new PACS systems and available for bulk migration, Commvault said. Data is extracted from a legacy PACS in its original format, normalized and migrated into the clinical archive in a standard format for interoperability, and then stored for future use. Commvault Clinical Archive also can be used as a vendor-neutral archive for all clinical information. “Healthcare customers are facing many pressures to modernize data management strategies, reduce costs and increase efficiencies,” said N. Robert Hammer, chairman, president and CEO of Commvault. “Retiring legacy PACS and managing clinical data across multiple vendor silos is increasingly becoming frustrating for healthcare IT teams, and our new solution supported by Laitek’s technology will help healthcare organizations better manage, control and protect clinical data while also benefiting from our proven approach to overall data management.” Recent research by International Data Corp. dives into the issue of legacy PACS decommissioning and medical image archiving. “IDC research shows that replacing legacy picture archiving and communications systems is a priority among healthcare IT administrators as a result of high total cost of ownership and the solution’s proprietary and siloed nature with a single department, especially as new types of unstructured content other than medical images, like scanned documents, photos and videos, proliferate across the enterprise,” said Judy Hanover, research director at IDC Health Insights. “Healthcare providers are moving to standards-based application-independent clinical archiving solutions that have lower total cost of ownership and allow them to manage, secure and share medical images alongside other vital content, improving provider operations and the quality of care by making content available for clinical decision-making.” Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

LAS VEGAS – Newly expanded health IT vendor CPSI has introduced nTrust, a program designed to help community hospitals and skilled nursing facilities improve financial operations while moving into an electronic health records system with no upfront costs, CPSI said. The vendor unveiled the program last week at the 2016 Annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition. “There are many providers that are unhappy with their EHR, but they don’t have the financial capability to make a switch,” said Boyd Douglas, CPSI president and CEO. “With nTrust, we help providers in acute and post-acute settings improve business operations via our TruBridge management services, while at the same time funding the purchase of their EHR with no advance payment required.” Through nTrust, hospitals and senior care facilities outsource revenue cycle management operations to TruBridge business services, which recently has been strengthened by the addition of revenue cycle management tools from Rycan Technologies, CPSI said. As a result of this business relationship, proceeds are allocated to finance the purchase and ongoing support of either Evident’s EHR system for acute care providers or American HealthTech’s EHR for post-acute care facilities. [Also: See photos from Day 3 of HIMSS16] CPSI is the parent of Evident LLC, TruBridge LLC, Healthland Inc., American HealthTech Inc. and Rycan Technologies. “nTrust gives customers a pathway to a better-performing EHR without upfront costs, with a partner that is taking a stake in their success,” Douglas said. “We will help you achieve the improved cash flow and increased financial efficiency in your operations that will help pay for an EHR that fits your needs for the complex and shifting healthcare environment. We are making a financial investment in the ongoing success of our clients who choose to take advantage of this program.” Sharkey-Issaquena Community Hospital entered a relationship with CPSI that began with TruBridge services to improve the hospital’s business operations, explained John Hodnett, RN, director of clinical systems at the hospital. “To further enhance our ability to effectively serve our patients and our community, the Thrive EHR from Evident was implemented simultaneously,” he said. “This business venture was without a big upfront expense.” The partnership aspect of the nTrust approach is invaluable and made the goal of implementing a new electronic health records system financially obtainable, Hodnett added. Douglas added the nTrust program was specifically designed to be of value to rural and community hospitals and senior care facilities. “We understand how today’s complexities associated with revenue cycle management has put increasing pressure on community healthcare providers that are already financially stressed,” he said. “TruBridge brings proven operational expertise and industry leading tools to bear to greatly enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of managing the revenue cycle process.” Douglas said nTrust is the first of many product and service offerings emerging from the recent blending of the Evident, TruBridge, Healthland, American HealthTech and Rycan businesses. Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

LAS VEGAS – Population health management technology vendor ZeOmega has launched Jiva for Performance Management, a software-as-a-service system that enables healthcare organizations to quickly manage the clinical and financial performance of their pay-for-performance and readmission reduction programs across multiple payers, including Medicare, Medicaid and commercial contracts, the vendor said. ZeOmega made the announcement at the 2016 Annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition. “While the industry has steadily moved toward value-based care, many healthcare organizations still struggle with the problem of provider performance measurement, which, in turn, impedes their ability to participate in meaningful risk-sharing models,” said Nandini Rangaswamy, chief strategy officer at ZeOmega. “Our conversations with hospital executives, industry analysts and consultants have indicated that the biggest challenges continue to be a lack of multi-payer support, the cost of interoperability and deployment time.” [Also: See photos from Day 3 of HIMSS16] Jiva for Performance Management was developed to address these challenges, Rangaswamy added. The new system integrates with nearly three dozen disparate health data systems, and healthcare organizations can use this single platform to measure and manage performance across multiple populations, multiple payers and different types of value-based care contracts, Rangaswamy said. ZeOmega said Jiva for Performance Management can be deployed in a matter of weeks and that the system is able to quickly integrate claims and electronic health records data. Dashboards monitor an organization’s progress toward achieving Star, Medicare Shared Savings Program, Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set, and other pay-for-performance goals, the vendor added. The system also delivers patient registries, predictive analytics driven by psycho-social risk factors, and patient engagement capabilities that can enable organizations to better manage admission and readmission risk and develop patient outreach programs, ZeOmega said. Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

LAS VEGAS – UnitedHealthcare and Qualcomm are collaborating on a new mobile health program dubbed UnitedHealthcare Motion that aims to boost wellness by linking financial incentives with the use of wearable devices. The goal is to help UnitedHealthcare plan participants enrolled in high-deductible health plans improve their health and save money by encouraging daily walking, while testing and building new connected health technologies for consumers. The new wellness program provides plan participants with wearable devices at no additional charge and enables them to earn up to $1,460 per year by meeting certain goals for the number of daily steps. UnitedHealthcare Motion was showcased for the first time at this year’s 2016 Annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition. The collaboration between the two companies will seek to develop connected health systems to employees and consumers across the United States. The collaboration will focus on new UnitedHealthcare programs and services that incorporate the latest generation of wearables, medical devices and home diagnostic tests that use Qualcomm Life’s 2net Platform for medical-grade connectivity. [Also: See photos from Day 3 of HIMSS16] UnitedHealthcare Motion is now available to employers and their employees in Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington and Washington, D.C. Additional markets will be added later this year. The wellness program and related fitness trackers are being offered initially to companies with 101 to 300 employees with a fully insured health plan. Employees and their covered spouses receive custom-designed wearable devices that track the number of steps users take each day. Unlike other wearable devices that simply track the total number of steps, the UnitedHealthcare Motion devices tabulate the total number, frequency and intensity of the steps taken, providing a more accurate and comprehensive summary of the user’s daily activity, the companies said. The data then is sent to the UnitedHealthcare Motion app, which securely links to Qualcomm Life’s 2net Mobile connectivity platform. Employees can earn Health Reimbursement Account credits that can total up to $1,460 per year, while employers can obtain premium savings based on program participants’ combined results. “We’re excited to collaborate with UnitedHealthcare to power its connected care solutions, starting with the UnitedHealthcare Motion program,” said James Mault, MD, vice president and chief medical officer at Qualcomm Life. “UnitedHealthcare’s leadership in innovation and broad reach across the United States, combined with Qualcomm Life’s medical-grade connectivity solutions, enables personalized, connected care to health care consumers nationwide.” Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Whereas a democrat would be more prone to simple tweaks, a republican would opt for tax credits, Romney said, acknowledging that since Obamacare is the law of the land it would would be hard to go back to his preferred model under which the states decide how to insure their citizens.

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