A public official in a small town in Maine claims there are links between the high costs of an electronic health records system and the decision to close tiny St. Andrews Hospital and Healthcare Center in nearby Boothbay Harbor. That may not be the case.
Officials last year announced St. Andrews, a 19-bed critical-access hospital owned by Portland-based MaineHealth, would be closed due to low volume, but that hasn't set well with the citizenry.
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A pair of new reports from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology deserve your click-throughs.
Two surveys conducted with the help of the American Hospital Association show strong growth in overall electronic health-record adoption and substantial increases in literally dozens of key EHR functions. The reports cover the years 2008 through 2012.
The first report (PDF) focuses on growth in the percentages of EHR acquisition and adoption. It provides a state-by-state comparison of hospital “basic” EHR adoption rates. Some 14 states have achieved rates of 90% or higher, including Vermont and New Hampshire with 100%.
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Where's Epic?
In his keynote address Tuesday, cardiologist and healthcare information technology futurist Dr. Eric Topol asked that question.
The context was a much-ballyhooed consortium of five health IT vendors announced Monday at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society conference in New Orleans.
They joined hands to launch a not-for-profit consortium called the CommonWell Health Alliance, with the stated aim of improving health information interoperability. The founding members of the consortium are Allscripts Healthcare Solutions, Athenahealth, Cerner Corp., Greenway Medical Technologies, and McKesson Corp., along with its connectivity unit RelayHealth. At the launch, the founders said the consortium is open to everyone.
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I've written about plans to scrap the Veterans Affairs Department's VistA electronic health-record system and replace I've written before about plans to scrap the Veterans Affairs Department's VistA electronic health-record system and replace it with a whole new EHR system built from scratch, jointly, with the military, but it bears repeating—that idea, building a whole new EHR system, was worse than nutty.
Taxpayers have invested billions of dollars in VistA. The development effort, started in 1977, produced one of the best EHRs ever, maybe the best.
I was personally introduced to VistA in 2003 by Dr. Louis Coulson, who graciously gave me a demonstration at the Jesse Brown VA Medical Center in Chicago.
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What am I thankful for today?
The usual stuff. A loving family. My faith and my church home. Good health. An interesting job where I can put my skills to good use.
And—as a professional skeptic, this is weird for me to say—I'm also grateful for our government, or at least some aspects of it.
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Last month, the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives celebrated its 20th Fall CIO Forum "back home" where the first one was held, the Coachella Valley in the Southern California desert.
One major bit of post-convention news for CHIME was that there will be a change at the top. Perennially cheerful CHIME President and CEO Rich Correll is to become the new chief operating officer of the 1,400-member organization once the search for a new president and CEO is completed—expected by March.
Correll has headed the organization since its founding. "CEO" was added to "president" in his title in 2005. I've had the good fortune to have attended the past two CHIME fall events, which is the larger of its two semi-annual gatherings, and from personal experience I know Rich and his crew put on a solid, tightly run show with the right balance of social and educational programs. He'll continue heading the day-to-day operations of the organization going forward.
I had a chance to talk this week with Drexel DeFord, board chairman of CHIME this year and CIO of the multihospital Steward Health Care System, Boston.
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I had an opportunity last week to speak with a number of folks caught in the middle of dealing with Hurricane Sandy.
Not to go all Nietzsche on you, but what doesn't kill you at least gives you the opportunity to take some pride in being resilient—and maybe, if you're into healthcare IT, to figure out whether your disaster plan was adequate, and if not, how to do things better next time. And, oh yes, when facing disaster, be sure to keep a couple of reams of paper and a few old folks on hand.
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