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SCIO Health Analytics has acquired Westlake Village, California-based Clear Vision Information Systems, the companies announced Thursday. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Clear Vision provides software-as-a-service analytics focused on risk adjustment and quality metric strategies for health plans and providers. SCIO Health Analytics CEO Siva Namasivayam said combining Clear Vision's analytics offerings and outreach services with SCIO's predictive and prescriptive analytics tools will help clients better manage the transition from fee-for-service to value-based care. Namasivayam points to the government’s goal of tying 30 percent of payments to value-based mechanisms such as accountable care organizations by the end of 2016, and 50 percent by the end of 2018, and said the combined offering will help ease the shift. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] The acquisition of Clear Vision – whose clients include government and commercial health plans/payers, providers, medical groups and ACOs – adds to SCIO’s offerings in the ever-growing analytics market. "The two sets of technologies dovetail nicely to deliver a well-rounded picture of the changes organizations need to make to achieve their goals,” said Tom Peterson, founder, president and CEO of Clear Vision, in statement Peterson founded Clear Vision with Pam Klugman in 2006. Both will join SCIO Health Analytics in executive roles. Twitter: @HealthITNews

For the sixth straight year, Epic has secured the top spot for Overall Software Suite in the Best in KLAS: Software & Services report, which is compiled based on feedback from healthcare providers. Epic was also named the best Overall Physician Practice Vendor and received Best in KLAS awards in seven segments. The Verona, Wisconsin-based behemoth also won for best acute care EMR, ambulatory EMR, and patient portal. Epic also notched a win in the health information exchange category, for its Care Everywhere technology. Impact Advisors, meanwhile, was tops in the Overall IT Services Firm category for the fourth year running, also winning Best in KLAS for IT Advisory Services. Also, with a 20 percent score increase from last year, Medicity won recognition as the overall most improved vendor for its population health technology. Among vendors who received multiple Best in KLAS awards, Merge earned three for cardiology, radiology and VNA/image archive; athenahealth, CareTech Solutions, CureMD and Galen Healthcare each earned two awards. "As healthcare continues to evolve, it is imperative that we seek innovation and constantly address the needs of a shifting market," said Adam Gale, CEO and president of KLAS in a statement.  "KLAS is honored to work with talented healthcare providers who willingly share their experiences with us and make the Best in KLAS report possible," he said. "We also commend all the vendors who strive to improve their products and services in order to provide the best possible healthcare." Here is the full list of winners: Award Category Recipient Award Category Recipient SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Acute Care EMR Epic EpicCare Inpatient EMR (Large - Over 200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Ambulatory EMR (1-10 Physicians) CureMD EMR (1-10 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Ambulatory EMR (11-75 Physicians) athenahealth athenaClinicals SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Ambulatory EMR (Over 75 Physicians) Epic EpicCare Ambulatory EMR (Over 75 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Business Intelligence/ Analytics Dimensional Insight The Diver Solution SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Cardiology Merge Cardio SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Claims and Clearinghouse ZirMed Clearinghouse SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Community HIS MEDITECH C/S Community HIS (v.6) (Small - 1-200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Document Management and Imaging Hyland OnBase SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Emergency Department Wellsoft EDIS SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE ERP Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Global (Non-US) Acute EMR InterSystems TrakCare EPR SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Global (Non-US) PACS Sectra PACS (Non-US) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Global (Non-US) Patient Administration Systems Cerner Millennium Patient Administration System (Non-US) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Health Information Exchange (HIE) Epic Care Everywhere SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Homecare Thornberry NDoc SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Laboratory McKesson Lab SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Long-Term Care PointClickCare SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE PACS Sectra PACS (Large - Over 200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Access Experian Health eCare NEXT (Passport) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Accounting and Patient Management Epic Resolute Hospital Billing (Large - Over 200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Portals Epic MyChart SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Population Health IBM Population Health Management Suite (Phytel) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Practice Management (1-10 Physicians) CureMD PMS SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Practice Management (11-75 Physicians) athenahealth athenaCollector (11-75 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Practice Management (Over 75 Physicians) Epic Resolute/Prelude/Cadence Ambulatory (Over 75 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Radiology Merge Unity RIS (DR Systems) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Speech Recognition - Front End Dolbey Fusion SpeechEMR (EMR) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Surgery Management Epic OpTime SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE VNA/Image Archive Merge iConnect Enterprise Archive SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Application Hosting (CIS ERP HIS) Cerner Application Hosting (CIS/ERP/HIS) SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Extended Business Office Navigant Cymetrix SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Extensive IT Outsourcing CareTech Solutions SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES HIT Enterprise Implementation Leadership Navin, Hafty & Associates (NHA) SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES HIT Implementation Support & Staffing Galen Healthcare SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES IT Advisory Services Impact Advisors SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Partial IT Outsourcing CareTech Solutions SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Revenue Cycle Transformation Deloitte Consulting SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Technical Services Galen Healthcare SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Value-Based Care Advisory Services Premier SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Value-Based Care Managed Services Lumeris CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE 340B Management Systems Macro Helix 340B Architect CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Acute Care EMR (Community) Cerner Millenium PowerChart/CommunityWorks Clinicals CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Alarm Management Connexall CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Anatomic Pathology Cerner CoPathPlus CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Anesthesia Epic Anesthesia Information Management System CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Cardiology Hemodynamics Merge Hemo CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE CDI Software Chartwise CDI CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Chargemaster Management Craneware Chargemaster Toolkit CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Claims Management MedAssets Claims Management CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Care Plans Zynx Health ZynxCare CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Order Sets Zynx Health ZynxOrder CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Point of Care Clinical Reference VisualDx (Logical Images) CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Surveillance Wolters Kluwer Pharmacy OneSource Sentri7 CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Computer-Assisted Coding Optum Optum360 Enterprise CAC CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Decision Support - Business Strata Decision StrataJazz Decision Support CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE ECG Data Management Epiphany Healthcare cardio Server CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Enterprise Advanced Visualization Philips IntellisSpace Portal CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Enterprise Scheduling Streamline Health Looking Glass Enterprise Scheduling and Resource Management CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Image Exchange DICOM Grid DG Suite CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Infection Control and Monitoring BD MedMined (CareFusion) CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Integration Engines Corepoint Health Integration Engine CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Interactive Patient Systems TVRC pCare CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Labor and Delivery Clinical Computer Systems OBIX Perinatal Data System CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Laboratory (Small/Ambulatory) Orchard Harvest LIS CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Medical Device Integration Systems Capsule DataCaptor CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Medical Records Coding 3M Codefinder CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Mobile Data Systems Ingenious Med impower & MedAptus Pro Charge Capture CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Oncology Varian ARIA CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE PACS (Ambulatory) INFINITT PACS CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE PACS (Community) INFINITT PACS CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Accounting and Patient Management (Community) MEDITECH C/S Patient Accounting CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Flow TeleTracking Capacity Management Suite CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Privacy Monitoring Iatric Systems Security Audit Manager CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Pharmacy - Outpatient (Retail) QS/1 NRx CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Point of Use Inventory Management PAR Excellence Systems CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Quality Management Nuance Clintegrity 360 Quality Management Solutions CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Secure Messaging Imprivata Cortext CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Single Sign-On Imprivata OneSign Single Sign-On CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Speech Recognition - Back End Dolbey Fusion Speech CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Staff/Nurse Scheduling GE Healthcare API Healthcare ShiftSelect CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Talent Management Halogen Software TalentSpace for Healthcare CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Time and Attendance Kronos Workforce Timekeeper CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Treatment Planning Varian Eclipse CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Urgent Care Practice Velocity VelociDoc Tablet Urgent Care CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Business Solutions Implementation Services Xerox CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES CDI Services PwC CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Go-Live Support Apex Systems CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Outsourced Coding Oxford Healthcare IT (On Assignment) CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Release of Information MRO Corp CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Revenue Cycle Outsourcing MedAssets CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Transcription Services FutureNet Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN

The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute has approved $70 million for nine new patient-centered research projects. The new studies will focus on conditions ranging from a type of very early-stage, localized breast cancer to diabetes, chronic lung disease and migraines. [Also: PCORI adds $142M for big data research] With these latest awards, PCORI has now approved or awarded more than $1.2 billion for research. The new studies will compare: active surveillance to traditional treatments, effectiveness of two common medications for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, varying approaches to smoking cessation among adults with mental illness, competing approaches to managing chronic migraines and the use of inhaled corticosteroid versus symptom-based use in treating asthma exacerbations.  PCORI is an independent, nonprofit organization authorized by Congress in 2010. Its mission is to fund research to provide patients, their caregivers, and clinicians with evidence-based information needed to make better-informed healthcare decisions. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] PCORI also awarded $6.7 million to three members of PCORnet as part of its ongoing work to establish a national patient-centered clinical research network. That money will go toward studying population health policies and interventions for type II diabetes. The agency awarded another $5.2 million to researching the effectiveness of wellness coaches for African Americans with uncontrolled diabetes. And PCORI allocated $3.8 million for a study to determine the optimal dose of aspirin for preventing heart attacks and strokes. Twitter: @HealthITNews

MedicFP LLC, a new vendor that focuses on combating phantom billing and other healthcare fraud, and Fujitsu will debut an identity validation product that scans palm veins at HIMSS16.

Steward Health Care Network, the second largest physician network in Massachusetts, will offer Quartet Health's platform as a service to its providers and their patients. The multi-year agreement expands the partnership between Steward and Quartet Health that started in 2015. Boston-based Steward Health Care, a Next Generation ACO,  is the largest integrated community care organization and hospital network in New England, with more than 17,000 employees in more than 150 communities. [Also: Steward Healthcare: ACO success hinges on IT strength] Former Rhode Island Congressman Patrick Kennedy joined the board of the New York-based startup last October. Kennedy has been open about his addictions to alcohol and prescription drugs, and he recently wrote about his struggles – and those of his family – in his book, A Common Struggle: A Personal Journey Through the Past and Future of Mental Illness and Addiction. While serving in Congress, Kennedy authored the Mental Health Parity Act, which required health insurance companies to provide coverage benefits for treatment of mental health conditions that are comparable to coverage provided for physical conditions. Quartet estimates that 7 to 9 percent of Massachusetts residents are treated for both a chronic medical condition and behavioral health condition in a given year. [Also: Legislation seeks to extend meaningful use incentives to behavioral health] Also, an additional 20 percent of this population is either not diagnosed or not treated for behavioral health conditions. As Quartet executives put it, care is often disjointed. Quartet's technology platform identifies individuals in need of behavioral health resources and enables primary care providers to set those individuals on effective treatment paths in tight collaboration with behavioral health professionals. To date, more than 70 percent of Steward providers who used the Quartet platform for the first time became repeat users. Under the expanded agreement with Quartet, all Steward primary care providers will be able to use the Quartet platform and all Steward patients will be able to access free tools and services including online self-care resources, peer support interventions and telepsychiatry. "Access to behavioral health resources is one of the most pressing challenges in primary care today," Steve Stein, MD, said in a statement. Stein is part of Family Medical Associates, a practice within the Steward Health Care Network. Besides Kennedy, Quartet is backed by Annie Lamont from Oak and Carl Byers from Fidelity Bio. Twitter: @HealthITNews

The onset of cloud computing brought with it an information technology revolution, allowing organizations to have their IT resources hosted off site, reducing their costs and simplifying operations. Unfortunately, the move to the cloud did not mean organizations could forget about requirements for a successful security profile. Healthcare organizations making the move to a cloud-centric strategy can’t lower their guard on security defenses, said Chris Bowen, founder and chief privacy and security officer of ClearDATA, a healthcare cloud computing company. “People may think that by offloading security responsibility to the cloud, they won’t have to worry, but that’s not the case,” Bowen said. “We know that threats exist in the cloud.” See all of our HIMSS16 previews Bowen will discuss this issue at HIMSS16 along with J. Gary Seay, senior vice president and CIO of Community Health Systems, Bowen will give a presentation entitled, “Developing a Cloud Security Roadmap." Bowen and Seay will look at the specific security problems facing healthcare organizations, which often rank behind retail and financial organizations in creating hardened, multi-layered approaches. The session will show how to develop a cloud security roadmap that can eliminate the main causes of data breaches using a "Defense in Depth" multi-layered approach to security. The discussion will also look at how a provider enterprise can develop a defense strategy that hardens security at seven distinct layers: physical; network; application; server; data; devices; and users. If done right, cloud technology enables organizations to take advantage of many layers of security, which may range from data encryption to threat management, and drive accelerated compliance, cost savings and data analytics for healthcare organizations. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] Healthcare CIOs evaluating cloud providers as partners have to make sure that their security expertise is airtight, Bowen said. “Just because a cloud provider has a great set of building blocks doesn’t mean they have great solutions,” he said. “Your building blocks will fall if they are not in the right place.” The session will take place on Wednesday, March 2 at 10:00 a.m. in the Sands Convention Center, Palazzo E Ballroom. Twitter: @HealthITNews

Electronic data interchange and in-house transcription are just two of the five emerging health IT applications that will surge in 2016, according to a new report by HIMSS Analytics.

Cyberattacks around the world are growing in size and complexity, according to Arbor Networks 11th Annual Worldwide Infrastructure Security Report, released January 26 by Arbor Networks, the security division of NETSCOUT. For the first time, nearly half of the respondents were from enterprise, government and educational organizations, with service providers at 52 percent. Healthcare is one of the verticals included in the enterprise category. The survey garnered 354 responses, up from 287 received last year, from a mix of Tier 1 and Tier 2/3 service providers, hosting, mobile, enterprise and other types of network operators from around the world. [Also: Understanding the 5 enemies of healthcare IT security] “This report provides broad insight into the issues network operators around the world are grappling with on a daily basis,” Arbor Networks Chief Security Technologist Darren Anstee said in a statement announcing the report. “The findings from this report underscore that technology is only part of the true story since security is a human endeavor and there are skilled adversaries on both sides.” Arbor Networks lists the top five Distributed Denial of Service trends and also the top five advanced threat trends. DDoS usually involves a system infected with a Trojan: malware designed to give unauthorized access to a user’s computer. DDoS trends: Change in attack motivation: This year the top motivation wasn’t hacktivism or vandalism, but ‘criminals demonstrating attack capabilities’ - something typically associated with cyber extortion attempts. Attack size continues to grow: The largest attack reported was 500 Gbps, with others reporting attacks of 450 Gbps, 425 Gbps and 337 Gbps. In 11 years of the Arbor Networks survey, the largest attack size has grown more than 60X. Complex attacks on the rise: 56 percent of respondents reported multi-vector attacks that targeted infrastructure, applications and services simultaneously, up from 42 percent last year. Ninety-three percent reported application-layer DDoS attacks. The most common service targeted by application-layer attacks is now DNS (rather than HTTP). Cloud under attack: Two years ago, 19 percent of respondents saw attacks targeting their cloud-based services. This grew to 29 percent last year and to 33 percent this year. Fifty-one percent of data center operators saw DDoS attacks saturate their Internet connectivity. There was also a sharp increase in data centers seeing outbound attacks from servers within their networks, up to 34 percent from 24 percent last year. Firewalls continue to fail during DDoS attacks: More than half of enterprise respondents reported a firewall failure as a result of a DDoS attack, up from one-third a year ago. Firewalls add to the attack surface and are prone to becoming the first victims of DDoS attacks, as their capacity to track connections is exhausted. Because they are in line, they can also add network latency. Advanced threat trends: Focus on better response: 57 percent of enterprises are looking to deploy solutions to speed the incident response processes. Among service providers, one-third reduced the time taken to discover an advanced persistent threat in their network to under one week, and 52 percent stated their discovery to containment time has dropped to under one month. Better planning: 2015 saw an increase in the proportion of enterprise respondents who had developed formal incident response plans and dedicated at least some resources to respond to such incidents, up from around two-thirds last year to 75 percent this year. Insiders in focus: The proportion of enterprise respondents seeing malicious insiders is up to 17 percent this year (12 percent last year). Nearly 40 percent of all enterprise respondents still do not have tools deployed to monitor BYOD devices on the network. The proportion reporting security incidents relating to BYOD doubled to 13 percent - up from 6 percent last year. Staffing quagmire: There’s been a significant drop in those looking to increase their internal resources to improve incident preparedness and response, down from 46 to 38 percent. Increasing reliance on outside support: Lack of internal resources has led to an increase in the use of managed services and outsourced support, with 50 percent of enterprises having contracted an external organization for incident response. This is 10 percent higher than within service providers. Within service providers, 74 percent reported seeing more demand from customers for managed services. Twitter: @HealthITNews

Many accountable care organizations are still struggling to overcome the challenges associated with health information technology integration, patient management and drug selection to improve care outcomes, according to a new study from the Pharmacy Benefit Management Institute.  In fact, fewer than a third of ACO providers use a single electronic health record system while 59 percent are on multiple systems and find it difficult to streamline and integrate them. Remarkably, PBMI found that 23 percent of ACOs still use paper charts. [Also: Behavioral telehealth key for ACO success.] PBMI surveyed 101 ACO providers, who cover over 30 million patients, specifically to analyze current practices in pharmacy management, the use of pharmacists in ACOs, the state of care management and patient engagement, clinical integration and future goals. The study found most ACOs use support tools in their practices: 90 percent utilize quality reporting tools, and 60 percent use point-of-care decision tools. However, only 34 percent of these respondents found these tools easy to use. "ACOs represent a critical and growing part of the solution to help improve value, quality, and care in our nation's healthcare and pharmacy plays an important role in achieving those goals," Jane Lutz, PBMI executive director, said in a statement. [Also: Steward Healthcare: ACO success hinges on IT strength] Almost all ACOs, 93 percent, said managing population health is very or extremely important, while an even greater majority of 98 percent said their focus on population health will increase in the next three to five years. The role of the pharmacist will be front and center, they said. Additionally, more than 60 percent of respondents said the use of biologics and specialty products and they expect genome testing will increase in the next three to five years [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] But health IT utilization among ACOs needs to increase for these goals to be feasible, the report said. Additionally, the pharmacist's role needs to be more prominent to support management goals to improve adherence, reduce inappropriate utilization and drug selection for better clinical outcomes. But only 57 percent of the ACO respondents currently employ or contract clinical pharmacists. More than half of the respondents said ACOs can decrease the cost of prescription drug therapy and another 69 percent said ACOs can increase the quality of prescription drug therapy. "Pharmacists are underutilized as trusted advisors to patients, physicians and other providers," according to the report. "Their patient-facing role can be very powerful in education and motivation, providing a potential solution to the lack of patient engagement and commitment to self-care." Twitter: @JessiefDavis

Group sends letter to lawmakers urging fixes such as strengthening telehealth reimbursement policies under Medicare.