People of a certain age speak wistfully of a time when doctors made house calls. The in-home visit had advantages for patient and physician alike.“House calls” eliminated the need for ill patients to get to the doctor’s office—along with the risks of coming into contact with other health-compromised people. For doctors, it was a break in routine, an opportunity to observe patients in their own home environment—and, sometimes, to gain insight beyond what was possible during an office exam,
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Health IT & Digital Health-Opinion | Op-Eds | Guest Columns | Analysis, Insights - HIT Consultant
4 Trends We Expect to See at HIMSS 2019
In less than two weeks, 45,000 health IT professionals, clinicians, executives and “technology superheroes” (a HIMSS’ term, not ours – but one we’re going to run with) will descend on Orlando for the annual HIMSS conference. Viewed as the pinnacle for new product launches in digital health, the exhibition floor at HIMSS also offers a glimpse of the future and a reflection of the state of healthcare IT today.As the HIMSS organizers galvanize attendees with their call “champions of health unite”,
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Is The Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) on Par With the IoT Market as a Whole?
The Internet of Things (IoT) has bred a variety of new technology solutions, used across just as many disparate industries. The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is essentially IoT devices used within construction, development and industrial environments.Similarly, the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) involves connected devices used within the medical and health care industry.They differ from general IoT not just in terms of usage, but also in design. IoT is often more consumer-focused,
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Alert Fatigue: A Smarter Approach to Clinical Alarm Management
Thinking back to my time as a nurse on a busy telemetry unit, I can tell you how most days began. Clock in by 6:55 a.m. and throw my lunch in the fridge. Then, I check the assignment board, see who is in charge and how many patients I have. Next, I had to find the nurses who will report on my four to six patients, which usually includes a quick synopsis of any pertinent issues and the plan for the day.This sounds relatively easy. However, I am trying to accomplish these modest but critical goals
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Clinical Secure Texting: Optimizing Care Coordination in Hospice Care
Playing phone tag and leaving voice mail is painfully inefficient. Thankfully, most of us can rely on e-mail and text messages to communicate with one another both personally and in business. In healthcare though, especially when at-risk hospice patients are involved, phone tag with a clinician is not only frustrating, but it can have life-threatening consequences.Consider this real-life scenario: Sue, a hospice nurse, went to check on Flo, a terminally ill cancer patient. Upon the initial
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Patients are the New Payer: The New Dynamics of the Healthcare Economy
As consumers, we can use our smartphones to buy everything from airline tickets to groceries. In both cases, the products are delivered or confirmed almost immediately. Many of us instantly compare prices to see if we’re getting a good deal.This type of purchasing is not as seamless in healthcare. It can often be difficult to determine the exact cost of care prior to a procedure being done. There isn’t an easy way to compare the cost of medical procedures between healthcare organizations — which
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How to Get Ahead of Mobile Device Security Risks in 2019
Healthcare data breach news dominated headlines again in 2018. A November 2018 Data Breach report posted by the HIPAA Journal cites a massive increase in exposed protected health information (PHI). During the month of November, more than 3 million records were exposed, stolen or accessed without permission. The report states the number of records exposed in November alone is greater than those exposed in all 180 data breaches reported to the HHS’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) during the first
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How Improving Primary Care Can Drive Innovation in Care Delivery
Despite having some of the most advanced healthcare tools and highly-trained practitioners, the United States has one of the least efficient healthcare systems of all developed countries.Over the years, I have come to realize that it’s not the development of devices or the medical prowess that makes the difference: it is the delivery of these services and the impact it creates on the population. Moreover, it is our delivery of care to patients which is often inefficient and ineffective, leaving
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Practices: Focus More on Patient Relationships and Less on Management
Patient relationship management (PRM) software is taking center stage in the battle to improve the patient experience. Essentially, PRM is customer relationship management (CRM) for healthcare. It helps practices more effectively communicate with and engage patients and tracks those interactions. For example, if a practice needs to improve reminders and recall, PRM can automate sending messages via text, email, and/or phone by pulling data from the practice management or EHR system.Even though
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7 Steps to Data Lake Success: What Payers Need to Know Before Diving In
There is a promising new trend in healthcare data science. Innovative health payers are beginning to complement their use of structured data with raw data – from healthcare transactions, physician notes, digital health applications, and more – to make decisions that affect population and individual member health.As payers have massive amounts of both types of data at their disposal, the concept of a “data lake” is gaining traction. A data lake stores both structured and unstructured data without
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