For many hospitals and health systems, creating a culture of high reliability is a priority. As healthcare shifts toward value-based care models that reward strong clinical outcomes, using repeatable, standardized processes to avoid errors and deliver safe, high-quality care is vital.
Despite dedicated efforts, however, the healthcare industry still struggles to achieve consistent, widespread quality. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), nearly 1.7
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7 Best Practices to Improve Professional Fee Revenue Cycle for Better ED Bottom Lines
Most healthcare organizations partner with physician services groups for niche coverage. While outsourced medical services are available across all specialties, common areas for external physician support include anesthesia, radiology, wound care, and emergency medicine. However, when outsourced physician services are used, challenges to ensure accurate reimbursement for both components of care—the hospital portion and the physician’s professional fee—increase.
Snafus are largely attributable
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Jumping to Lightspeed – Consolidating Patient Monitoring Devices
In the early summer of 2005, Star Wars Episode III – Revenge of the Sith premiered worldwide. Diehard fans flocked to the theaters to see Anakin Skywalker embrace the dark side of the force, battle Obi Wan Kinobi and transform into the infamous Darth Vader.
While audiences were enthralled by vivid battle scenes and cool effects, I was intrigued by a less popular scene, where Padmea, mother of Luke and Leia Skywalker, is examined and cared for in an out-of-this-universe hospital room. Padmea
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Why SDoH Data Is Key For Developing Population Health Strategies
The healthcare industry has come a long way in its appreciation of non-clinical factors impacting a patient’s overall well-being, such as social determinants of health (SDoH).
However, the industry has made less progress when it comes to gathering information on individual patients’ social determinants, analyzing the details and – most importantly – translating the findings into actionable information that healthcare organizations (HCOs) can use to improve population health management.
One
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Using the 3M’s to Get Physicians to Embrace Telehealth: Metrics, Money & eMotion
Telehealth utilization is on track to explode due to consumer demand, reimbursement alignment and an improved regulatory environment.
But for health systems to reap telehealth’s financial and clinical benefits, organizational leaders must demonstrate strong leadership, provide relevant education, align financial incentives and change daily culture to help physicians fully embrace this disruption.
Many physicians are starting to understand the benefits of telehealth, which include better access
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Getting Back to Joy in Work: A Call to Prioritize The Patient-Provider Relationship
When I think about the term “joy in work”, coined by the Institute for Health Improvement, the first thing that comes to mind are my patients and their health. If I feel like I can contribute in some way to overcoming an illness, meeting their health goals, or improving their quality of life, then it makes the long days of work worthwhile. Like anyone else in any other profession, the impact I make through my work keeps me going throughout all the other headaches. That’s why re-prioritizing the
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Integrated Behavioral Health: Expectations vs Realities?
When patients go to the doctor, they’re putting their trust in a highly-trained professional. They trust that professional to provide them with the necessary care and attention to improve or sustain their health.
However, some underlying health issues can’t be detected with a simple blood test or CAT scan. Behavioral health problems can impact every part of a person’s life. Some can develop as a result of physical problems, and vice versa.
This is why the integration of physical and behavioral
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Using Patient Relationship Management Tools to Improve Preventive & Chronic Care
Every year, another 1.5 million people learn they have diabetes. The number of people in the U.S. managing chronic diseases has been growing steadily for several years. In addition, there is more and more pressure on providers to help patients manage these conditions to improve outcomes and avoid complications or readmissions.
The challenge providers face is that visits are short, often just 15 minutes, and patients struggle to retain the information given to them during the appointment.
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The Graveyard of Digital Health, and How to Stay Out of It
- How partnerships are breaking the adoption barrier for digital health.
Collaboration is at the heart of successes over history — in Darwin’s words, “those who learn to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed.”
Yet the healthcare space has been slow to learn that lesson. Far from functioning as a team focused on a single goal, healthcare stakeholders operate on a fractured playing field, each one trying to get to the goal on their own. From that perspective, everyone becomes
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How Video Remote Interpretation (VRI) Boosts Acute Care Quality
Imagine traveling to another country on vacation, only to get terribly ill after consuming seafood at dinner. You experience chills, your hands are curling up and you feel faint all over. Getting to the hospital is a challenge, as you do not speak the native language there. When you arrive at the hospital, all of the medical staff is speaking another language and no one can understand you when you try to tell them your symptoms. You have no understanding of your condition, diagnosis or treatment
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