The number of quality initiatives is rapidly rising in the healthcare industry as stakeholders shift their focus toward the value of patient care. In addition, with the recent implementation of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA), the rules surrounding healthcare reimbursement are being rewritten, incentivizing healthcare providers to prioritize the quality of patient visits over the quantity.Historically, it has been difficult to achieve consensus on defining quality;
Read More
Health IT & Digital Health-Opinion | Op-Eds | Guest Columns | Analysis, Insights - HIT Consultant
Why Payers Must Invest in Real-Time Analytics to Increase Profitability Against ACA’S Risk Adjustment Program
With the future of the Affordable Care Act in limbo, health payers and providers alike are back to focusing on how to work within that system. And as payers in particular struggle to find avenues to profitability in the ACA’s complex topography, we’ll likely hear more rhetoric about the difficulty of enticing young, affluent Americans to sign up for health insurance.The conventional wisdom of the moment holds that failure to enroll enough of those so-called “healthy wealthies” to offset the
Read More
6 Reasons Why Healthcare Needs The Internet of Things (IoT)
Editor’s Note: Abhinav Shashank is the CEO & Co-founder at Innovaccer Inc., a datashop integrating complex data across multiple distributed sources to give healthcare organizations greater insights to provider better care.Technology can never replace humans because the ultimate decision-making authority always lies with the individual. He or she can, however, in the course of time, opt for technological solutions that simplify their work and bring about efficiency.Convenience. Efficiency.
Read More
The Internet of Voice in Health: Why It’s Time to Pay Attention
According to the Future Today Institute, about 50% of our interactions with computers will be via voice by 2023. Voice interfaces are already having an impact on health. The recently completed Alexa Diabetes Challenge demonstrated that voice-computer interfaces can play a role in chronic condition management. Are you up-to-speed on this trend? To help, I've outlined five questions and answers about the current state of voice interfaces in healthcare. 1. Is interest in the potential of voice
Read More
Why Veterans Deserve Better Patient Handoffs at Care Transitions
Communication failures in U.S. Hospitals are a leading cause of preventable medical errors and adverse events. The most dangerous times are patient care transitions at the time of shift changes and patient transfers between hospital areas, healthcare facilities, and care settings. According to the Joint Commission, an estimated 80 percent of serious medical errors involve miscommunication between caregivers during “handoffs” and between care providers at patient care transitions. In light of
Read More
Healthcare IT: Now More Than Ever, It’s About Quality… and Quantity
Editor's Note: Scott Ciccarelli, CEO SRS Health, a provider of EHR/EMR, PM, and PACS software solutions for high-performance medical practices. Ciccarelli has 20 years of diverse management and operations experience garnered as a senior executive at GE, where he headed two of the company’s businesses—most recently, GE Healthcare’s Services, Ambulatory and Revenue Cycle Solutions.People perform better if they have a vested interest in the outcome of a given situation. Employees who are given an
Read More
Health IT Interoperability Standards are Essential, Someone Has to Create Them
It’s not exactly a sweater or tie that gets worn once and then relegated to the top of the closet, but it turns out that patient data may have something in common with unloved holiday gifts. Both, it appears, are shared and then seldom used.At least that’s one takeaway from a recent Health Affairs study on interoperability and how far forward we’ve actually moved the ball. The authors used the most recent available data (2015) and the four interoperability standards established by the Office of
Read More
How Personalized Patient Care is Brokering a Reset in Payer-Provider Relationships
For better or for worse, patients increasingly call the shots in the healthcare arena. Yes, they’re paying more for care. But with the emergence of telehealth and personalized therapies, patients also have more care options. To meet their expectations, both payers and providers must have access to personalized information about the patient. And they can best get this by working with instead of against each other.Specifically, insurers and providers must collaboratively approach the patient both
Read More
Care Intelligence System: The Revolution of Innovations in Value-based Care
Keeping a system of records for storage and backup has always been a must for healthcare organizations all over the U.S. As the method of storing data went from paper to electronic, healthcare became more and more adept at collecting data and archiving it.However, the route of exchanging meaningful information was still lost on many. As of 2017, a majority of the health industry has adopted EMRs, however, gaining meaningful insights out of them is still an unfulfilled promise.The real trouble
Read More
Is The Digital Health Industry Failing or Flourishing? New Report Provides Answers
Recently, there's been an argument about whether digital health (as an industry) is dead, or alive. In some cases, investors have failed to realize rapid returns and companies are struggling to gain traction. Others argue that it's too early to declare digital health's death, mainly because of the long sales and technology adoption cycles characteristic of the health market.This debate is framed within the context of funding levels and investor returns because of how the strength of the digital
Read More
