Quality and Safety
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, through its regional extension centers, has started recruiting “physician champions” who are well on their way to becoming meaningful users of electronic health records (EHRs) to help others in their area get over the hurdles of digitizing their medical records.
Hospital executives and patients agree that healthcare needs a revamp, and they're looking to information technology to make that happen, according to a recent survey. But when it comes to their technology desires and concerns there are some differences.
Apple introduced the iPad 2 on Tuesday with a special event that included a video highlighting the technology's use in different fields, with an appearance by John Halamka, MD, chief information officer of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.
The advisory panel that is developing proposals for the next set of EHR quality measures is weighing whether to follow the same structure for Stage 2 of meaningful use as for Stage 1, with core and specialty items, and whether to carry forward the 2011 measures.
Robert Graham, MD, a family medicine physician from Cincinnati, will lead the Aligning Forces for Quality (AF4Q) program, the cornerstone of a $300 million initiative of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) to improve the quality and equality of healthcare nationwide.
Americans who have health issues are now using the Internet to expand their support networks to include online peers, especially if they have a rare disease, according to a new report by the Pew Internet Project and California HealthCare Foundation.
Use of computerized physician order entry systems (CPOE) is one key factor to providing superior clinical quality, CEOs at HealthGrades 50 Best Hospitals for 2011 reported.
Promoting a two-heads-are-better-than-one approach, Baylor Health System's David Muntz and consultant Stuart Gardner called for greater collaboration between IT departments and clinical engineering during a Tuesday afternoon session at HIMSS11.
Surescripts, the American Hospital Association and the College of American Pathologists have been awarded a $4.9 million grant to launch a program to prepare hospitals to submit electronic data on reportable lab results to public health agencies - a Stage 1 requirement for meeting meaningful use incentives.
The nation’s chief technology officer stood before a room of health IT and business leaders Sunday at HIMSS11 and submitted what he called a "hypothesis."