The impact of COVID-19 on the healthcare industry’s ability to innovate has been stunning. We have seen FDA emergency authorizations and relaxed regulatory guidelines enable the development of radical new ventilator ideas, accelerated timelines for vaccine development, and an extraordinary transition to telehealth services. Many of these actions were a response to the exposure of weak spots in our healthcare system, but even as those weaknesses have been shored up (in large part due to public
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Health IT & Digital Health-Opinion | Op-Eds | Guest Columns | Analysis, Insights - HIT Consultant
How Can Health IT Address Socially Determined Risk amid COVID-19?
Many have argued that the COVID-19 pandemic is a “black swan”: a catastrophic event that can only be understood with the benefit of hindsight. While there is some appeal to this observation, the originator of the black swan theory, Naseem Taleb, strongly refutes this assertion. He counters that COVID-19 was a “white swan”—a predictable event with predictable consequences.
New federal data shows that Latinos and African Americans living in the US are three times as likely to become
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Why EHR Interoperability is Critical for Telehealth
Telehealth has recently taken off as a way to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, but even though telehealth has been around for several years, clinics had difficulty adopting it pre-COVID-19. This caused clinics to not view telehealth as a viable option, and it was often seen as a last resort approach to healthcare.
As reducing the spread of COVID-19 became paramount, Medicare and Medicaid were forced to develop telehealth service codes, and clinics were tasked with finding an
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Maximizing Telehealth Success: How to Optimize Operations & Revenue Cycle Management
In COVID-19’s wake, providers’ financial recovery will be crucial yet daunting. U.S. hospitals and health systems stand to collectively lose $36.6 billion between March and June 2020 alone. Physician practices also face serious financial challenges as they recoup revenues that declined up to 55 percent and patient volume that decreased 60 percent.
Amid these hardships, telehealth has emerged as a widely accepted vehicle for care delivery – providing a way for healthcare organizations to
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How Contactless Technologies Can Propel Healthcare Towards the Future
With the continued spread of COVID-19, health organizations around the world are accelerating their adoption of tech solutions that mitigate the need for physical contact between healthcare providers and patients. Contactless innovations like automated robots and the Internet of Things (IoT) not only reduce the spread of disease in medical facilities, though; they also have the potential to improve overall organizational performance due to their advanced data-collecting and protecting
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The Coronavirus Crisis’ Silent Death Toll: Chronically Ill Patients
The impact of the coronavirus crisis is shining a bright light on many of the challenges facing the U.S. healthcare system.
So much more than a lack of primary care physicians and hospital beds, the all-hands-on-deck approach to combating the spread of COVID-19 has forced patients fearful of engaging with the healthcare system for needs unrelated to the virus to put elective procedures, routine care and timely treatment for chronic or critical conditions on the back burner.
Compounding
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Why International Expansion Must Remain a Priority for Cerner, Epic, Allscripts, MEDITECH
What You Should Know:
- How the top US acute EHR vendors, namely Cerner, Epic, Allscripts, and MEDITECH (+85% share of US acute market in terms of revenues), have progressed on international expansion.
As highlighted below, there is a significant variance amongst the big four in terms of revenue and share of business outside the US. Cerner has by far the highest revenue at more than $650M in 2019, representing 12% of its business. Whilst MEDITECH has considerably lower revenue than
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Designing A Digital Experience to Drive Revenue and Patient Engagement
With the rise of healthcare consumerism, people are looking to hospitals, health systems, and physician practices to deliver the same user-friendly, digital experiences they receive from other industries. A recent survey found that more than 80% of consumers surveyed believe “shopping for healthcare should be as easy as shopping for other common services.” Specifically, they want streamlined access points online where they can shop for and purchase healthcare, easily make appointments,
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9 Ways UX/UI Design Can Improve Digital Health Adoption for Seniors
Seniors have the lowest reported usage of telehealth of any age group. As many healthcare providers are increasing the use of telehealth, especially in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the implementation of new tools and technologies could impact seniors.
In my experience, this doesn’t indicate that older adults aren’t tech-minded, or that they are not using tech products currently. In fact, studies show that seniors use smartphones at the same rate as younger groups. Over 80 percent of
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Fighting COVID-19 Pandemic: It Starts With Cleaning Our Devices
The importance of handwashing has never been more obvious than in recent months, but as experts continue to share information on the spread of the virus, there’s a need to disinfect more than just our hands. In healthcare settings where the spread of infectious diseases is not just a possibility, but a likelihood on any given day, healthcare leaders are examining the best methods to clean devices, such as mobile computers.
According to a recent study by the Healthcare Infection Society,
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