2020 was undeniably the year that saw telehealth and remote care services come to the forefront of medical care. Many have hypothesized that, in the post-COVID world, remote care programs will be ubiquitous throughout hospitals and health systems. However, such a future is far from certain, as too many organizations currently lack the budget, IT infrastructure, and time necessary to implement new innovative remote care programs. There is a considerable disparity between the hype surrounding
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Treat in Place: Protecting Nursing Home Patients From Hospital Readmission
A night doctor’s dilemma Five years ago, I was practicing medicine in a rural hospital in North Carolina as a nocturnist, when I received a call from an Emergency Room (ER) doctor. “Hey, it’s Blake. Room 7. Demented. UTI,” he says, and hangs up. I was struck by the abrupt and sparse communication—no detailed report. Not even a name. Charged with admitting and caring for patients, I head downstairs and find myself in room 7 where an elderly woman with a blown IV and no family around is
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5 Steps for Interoperability Excellence for Healthcare Providers
As if 2020 couldn’t be any more challenging for healthcare providers, new federal rules on interoperability and patient access, granting patients direct access to their healthcare data, begin taking effect in 2021 and will continue into 2022. These rules, while ultimately beneficial to patients, bring an additional level of operational complexity to many revenue-stressed healthcare organizations. If anything, the 2020 pandemic has illustrated the vast potential of interoperability. For
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How Data-Driven Technology Holds The Promise of Better Outcomes for Vascular Patients
Abbott recently released global research on vascular patient care, designed to shine a light on the vascular patient journey. The report called “Beyond Intervention” uncovers the universal challenges faced by physicians who deliver vascular care, their patients, and the hospital administrators who support them. It also explores how the right use of technology and data could potentially enable more precise diagnoses and better treatment strategies to ensure the best possible patient
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AI Leads Way to Less False Positives on Remote Cardiac Monitoring Devices, Improved Results
What You Should Know: - Cardiac patients and their cardiologists are
experiencing a high number of false positives with remote patient monitoring
devices as a result of signal artifact providing inaccurate data, which can
lead to many complications—other than medical, such as unnecessary tests and
increased medical costs. - Ambulatory cardiac monitoring provider InfoBionic has devised a way to decrease false positives and increase efficiency. Remote cardiac monitoring’s false
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M&A: Anthem Reportedly in Negotiations to Acquire CareCentrix
What You Should Know: - Health insurer Anthem
is in late-stage negotiations to acquire home healthcare benefits manager CareCentrix, according to PE Hub. - PE Hub reports
that customer concentration issues have been a factor in negotiations; however,
the deal is far from certain. - Backed by growth private equity firm Summit Partners, East Hartford, CT-based
CareCentrix provides specialty benefit management services to health plans,
improving quality and reducing costs in several
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Applying Social Determinants of Health to Improve Care Coordination
In today’s era of value-based care, providers must focus more than ever on ensuring that patients get the care they need, when they need it, across the entire care continuum, including in non-traditional health care settings. This is important not only as it relates to patient outcomes, but also to providers’ bottom lines. However, when patients lack access to basic care-centric needs like proper housing, food, transportation, and a support system, they’re unable to get the right type of care
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Why COVID-19 Underscores The Importance of Social Determinants of Health
Google “Social Determinants of Health” and one will quickly discover a kind of litany of data pointing to a certain definition of “health” defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) as “A state of complete physical, mental and social well-being not merely the absence of disease or infirmity,” and socioeconomic barriers, which may prohibit equitable access to good health and wellness (Healthcare) more completely among diverse populations. Nevertheless, the heart of the matter
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Social Determinants of Health Trends in 2020: The End of the Beginning?
2020 will mark the end of the beginning of Social Determinants of Health (SDoH).
One would be remiss not to give pause and to consider how much time it has taken to get to this pivotal period in US health and healthcare delivery and, focus on the cornerstone “why” healthcare must, with a fierce urgency, step into the twenty-first century of US healthcare delivery. Meaning, it has taken nearly seventy years to go from the World Health Organization identifying the profundity of SDoH influence on
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UNC Health Care Adopts CarePort’s Care Coordination Platform Across 12 Hospitals
- CarePort, a provider of care coordination and management solutions is collaborating with North Carolina’s statewide health information exchange, NC HealthConnex.- The partnership allows for all 12 hospitals in the UNC Health Care system to improve efficiency and ultimately improve patient outcomes as the not-for-profit health system builds a more effective care coordination program between hospitals.- CarePort’s platform provides real-time patient data, alerts for critical patient events (e.g.
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