In comments filed on Tuesday, the nation’s top consumer advocates praised the Office of the National Coordinator’s (ONC’s) draft Shared Nationwide Interoperability Roadmap for advancing full and equal interoperability, not just among health care providers but also between providers and patients and their family caregivers. The Consumer Partnership for eHealth (CPeH), a group of more than 50 leading consumer, patient and labor organizations, filed the comments in advance of the April 3
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Report: Regulatory Action May Strengthen Telehealth Adoption
On Tuesday, Price Waterhouse Cooper's Health Research Institute (HRI) released an industry brief on how recent regulatory action may be the catalyst to spur the fledgling telehealth market. In October 2014, the federal government expanded Medicare reimbursement for telehealth services, including remote chronic care management and an addition of seven new covered procedure codes for telehealth, including annual wellness visits, psychotherapy and prolonged services in the office.
Providers are
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HHS Awards BioCyst $12M for Experimental Ebola Drug Development
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR) has awarded $12 million to Durham, NC-based BioCryst Pharmaceuticals for experimental Ebola drug development. The development also includes preparing for large-scale manufacturing of the drug and conducting related studies.
The initial work will be undertaken over the next 18 months with support from ASPR’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority
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e-MDs Acquired by Marlin Equity, Merges with MDeverywhere
e-MDs, a provider of ambulatory electronic medical record (EMR) and practice management (PM) solutions has been acquired by Marlin Equity Partners, a global investment firm with over $3B in capital under management. Following the acquisition, e-MDs has been merged with MDeverywhere, an existing Marlin portfolio company and leading provider of revenue cycle management (RCM) services and credentialing for physicians.
The acquisition and merger bring together two ambulatory
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EHR Physician Workflow: The Way It Is vs. The Way It Should Be
As you know, EHRs grew out of the computer system that runs a hospital’s inner workings – billing, pharmacy, lab, scheduling, and admissions. EHR physician workflow needs were an afterthought – talk to any doctor and you’ll find that typical hospital EHRs leave a lot to be desired. As a result, the typical hospital EHR frequently makes doctors who use it less efficient and productive – and more frustrated.
The infographic created by PatientKeeper depicts the way it is today for physician
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Google To Create Robotic-Assisted Surgical Platform with J&J
Google is partnering with Ethicon, a medical device company within Johnson & Johnson to create an innovative robotic-assisted surgical platform with the goal of improving health care delivery in the operating room. Under the strategic collaboration, Ethicon will work with Google's Life Sciences team known as Google X led by Andrew Conrad on advancing surgical robotics to benefit surgeons, patients and health care systems.
Robotic-assisted surgery is a type of minimally invasive surgery
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Connected Fitness Trackers to Exceed $5B by 2019
Global revenues from connected fitness trackers is expected to increase from over $2 billion in 2014 to $5.4 billion by 2019, according to new report from market research firm Parks Associates. The report, Digitally Fit: Products and Services for Connected Consumers examines the current adoption and usage of connected health devices with analysis of multiple nationwide surveys of U.S. broadband households.
“Our latest data finds adoption of connected health devices increased from 24% of U.S.
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Senator Proposes $50M Prize for Integrated DoD/VA EHR
Today, Rep. Phil Roe, M.D. (R-TN) reintroduced a bill proposing a $50 million dollar prize to create an integrated EHR system between the Department of Defense (DoD) and Veterans Affairs (VA). Roe's bill would establish a competition for non-governmental, American-based entities to develop an integrated EHR system for use by the DoD and VA to help streamline the coordination of care and benefits claims for those that have served.
The bill would create a temporary panel, chosen by the
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CommonWell Health Alliance Appoints Jitin Asnaani Executive Director
CommonWell Health Alliance, a nonprofit consortium of health IT companies working together to create universal access to health care data, has appointed Jitin Asnaani its first-ever executive director. As the new executive director, Asnaani will build on the current CommonWell momentum in nationwide data exchange as the organization extends the availability of its services nationwide.
Asnaani comes to CommonWell Health Alliance with experience in both the public and private sector—equipping
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Samsung, TeleHealth Services Unveil Smart TV Patient Engagement Solution
Today, TeleHealth Services, a provider of hospital televisions and interactive patient engagement solutions, announced through their partnership with Samsung, the completion of a new patient engagement solution called SmarTigr. The solution utilizes the Smart TV functionality of the Samsung healthcare televisions combined with the clinical features of TeleHealth’s iTigr patient engagement solution. With the upcoming announcement of the meaningful use stage 3 criteria, innovative hospitals are
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