Pregnancy is one of the most-expensive episodes for insurers, averaging about $19,000 for pregnancy, vaginal delivery and postpartum care, and $26,000 for cesarean births. Compared with other industrialized nations, costs in the U.S. are nearly eight times higher.
And what do mothers in the U.S. get in return for this high-priced care? They get the highest death rate per 100,000 live births in the developed world, with 18.6 deaths recorded in 2022, compared with 5.5 deaths per 100,000 in the
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Health IT & Digital Health-Opinion | Op-Eds | Guest Columns | Analysis, Insights - HIT Consultant
The Invisible Gap: Why Oncology EHRs Must Measure Emotional Recovery
In oncology care the clinical community has made remarkable progress in extending survival. Yet we face a persistent invisible gap in care: the emotional and cognitive recovery of patients after treatment ends. Emotional distress in cancer survivors such as anxiety, depression, and pain is not only common but also has measurable impacts on utilization, adherence, and quality of life. The next frontier in digital health is to treat this recovery as a data-driven outcome by embedding it into the
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Denial Management: Closing Gaps and Reducing Revenue Leakage
Revenue leakage on the front end and mid-cycle is an ongoing challenge for hospitals and health systems. Rather than taking a reactive approach to the problem, proactively collaborating among teams prior to admission helps providers avoid playing the blame game when their claims are denied after the fact.
By focusing on reducing the number of denials before a claim is submitted, rather than trying to eliminate denials after the fact, revenue cycle managers can save time and energy. Today’s AI
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The Many Hats of Health IT: Why Lifelong Learning Is No Longer Optional
The digital transformation sweeping across healthcare is reshaping not only patient care and administrative workflows, but also the skill sets demanded of IT professionals in the sector. Health IT practitioners are expected to wear many hats today: software developer, data scientist, cybersecurity analyst, cloud architect, and increasingly, AI integration specialist.
With hospitals and healthcare organizations relying on increasingly complex technology infrastructures to maintain compliance,
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Fragile Lifelines: How AI Can Reinforce Pharma Supply Chains
Drug shortages have surged to their highest levels in decades. In early 2024, U.S. pharmacies reported more than 323 active shortages, spanning essential generics, injectables, and even critical cancer therapies. These numbers echo findings from the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, which tracks persistent disruptions that ripple through hospitals, pharmacies, and ultimately to patients in urgent need of care.
While the pandemic made those cracks impossible to ignore, the reality
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The Compliance Blind Spot: Why Traditional Backups Fail HIPAA Integrity Standards
Healthcare organizations face a uniquely challenging compliance landscape. HIPAA requirements mandate robust data protection and breach notification protocols, while simultaneously, the sector has become the most targeted industry for ransomware attacks. There is now a growing gap between what compliance frameworks require and what traditional security measures can realistically deliver.
The stakes extend beyond regulatory fines. When ransomware strikes a hospital system, the consequences
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The Healthcare Balancing Act: How AI, RPM, and Predictive Analytics Cut Costs Without Sacrificing Care
Calling healthcare a balancing act is probably not doing it justice: Costs are rising, reimbursements are dwindling, and Medicaid is under the knife, but health organizations are still tasked with providing the highest quality of care to the most people they can without breaking the bank.
Under unprecedented financial strain, providers and payers need to optimize operations and trim the budget wherever they can, but never at the expense of quality patient care. That’s why many are investing
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Moving Beyond the Worklist: Agentic AI and Radiology’s Next Efficiency Leap
After years of flat or falling payment rates, radiology providers are being asked to do more with less. Medicare cuts continue to squeeze margins, and inflation-driven cost hikes in labor and supplies further strain budgets. At the same time, workforce shortages have left many radiology departments shorthanded and clinicians overextended. Meanwhile, the traditional follow-up worklist-centric model—essentially a growing to-do list of patients needing outreach, navigation, and scheduling—is
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Beyond Wearables: How Radar Technology is Revolutionizing Elderly Sleep Monitoring
Radar holds the potential to change the way we look after elderly people, with new radar-based sleep monitors offering a way to rethink the way elderly people are monitored both in elder care facilities and in their own homes. Traditional monitoring techniques have significant drawbacks when it comes to elder care: for example, cameras have significant privacy, security and compliance concerns, and wearables have practical issues both in elder care facilities and the home.
By
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The AI Paradox: Why Some Tools Save Millions While Others Increase Physician Burnout
AI has become everyone’s favourite topic in healthcare. From predicting diseases to creating personalised treatment plans, it’s already changing how hospitals, insurers, and health tech companies work. But behind all the excitement sits one big question: is AI really paying off, or is it just more talk than truth?
Like any other business, healthcare organisations need to see clear financial results before calling AI a success. The real question isn’t just how advanced the technology
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