USB Camera with Facial Recognition - Sensible Vision and Digi Create Facial Log on System for PCs

I can see this in use in any health care area.  By using facial recognition software, a user can easily log in and out just be moving into the view of the camera.  With using a usb connection, almost any PC, tablet, notebook, etc. could be converted.  Good news for administrators too is the integration with the Active Directory for monitoring network permissions as well.  This gives a new meaning to a "face off".  Busy health care workers are the victims of constant interruptions and and emergency responses.  With this device, simply removing yourself from the view of the camera would sign the individual off the computer until they return to log on, thus confidential information exposure would be limited as well plus it maintains a record of every log on, which can be very helpful when a PC is shared by more than one individual.  BD

“We are pleased to be adding the intelligent facial recognition of FastAccess to our Watchport cameras,” said Stephen Popovich, Vice President of Business Development at Digi. “We continue to see increased interest in biometrics as a seamless and transparent way to secure and monitor computers and workstations in a wide range of applications – from retail to healthcare environments. The intelligence of the FastAccess software to accurately recognize authorized users and eliminate passwords is a perfect fit with our high-performance cameras.”

• No More Unsecured, Unattended Computers: Computers instantly secure themselves when
  users step away.
• Better User Productivity: Users can focus on their jobs rather than time-consuming and
  frustrating processes of constantly entering passwords or other authentication procedures.
• Improved Access Control and Auditing: Provides an accurate audit of computer and network
  access for business and regulatory compliance – a true audit log of who’s been at the computer and when.
• Simple Setup and Administration: Unlike other security and biometric solutions, no special
  enrollment procedure is needed. Administrators can configure FastAccess locally or remotely
  through Microsoft's Active Directory.

Source:  http://www.sensiblevision.com/company/releases/5-08-07.htm

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PV Hospital goes wireless

Hospital becomes hot spot for Internet access.  This is a separate network from the hospital patient and administrative records, but can really be useful not only for visitors, but any medical staff member needing a connection to conduct any type of business on the web.  Can be very helpful to have this tool as an example for physicians when they are waiting for lab results, etc. to be able to be productive while waiting.  BD

Thanks to the recent installation of a new high-tech communications system, visitors to Pauls Valley General Hospital will now have another portable means of accessing the outside world besides their personal cell phone.
According to CEO Charles Johnston, the local hospital has added wireless Internet to its many local services, and the convenience is made available to all visitors free of charge.
“We’re pleased to announce the addition of wireless Internet capability throughout the whole hospital,” Johnston said.
“All people need to access the wireless Internet service is a personal laptop computer,” he said.However, according to hospital officials, people who choose to use the new wireless system now available at Pauls Valley General Hospital will be able to connect to the world wide web but they will not be able to connect to the hospital’s computer system nor will they be able to gain access to any of the patient’s files.

Pauls Valley, OK, Pauls Valley Daily Democrat - PV Hospital goes wireless

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New Siemens Software Helps To Correct Cardiac Fibrillations

 
Worldwide, five percent of all people over the age of 65 suffer from atrial fibrillation. While cardiac arrhythmia can be treated with medication, patients have to take it for the rest of their lives. Ablation therapy offers an alternative: myocardial cells in the left atrium are obliterated to interrupt the problematic pathway. However, every patient is different. For this reason, electro physiologists have to be able to discern the size and shape of the left ventricle in precise detail during the intervention. Syngo DynaCT Cardiac provides the necessary support: the software from Siemens Medical Solutions provides three-dimensional displays of the ventricle. The physician is able to view the 3-D object from all sides - even during an intervention.
During the examination, with the press of a button syngo DynaCT Cardiac delivers CT-like slice images of an organ in motion using an angiographic C-arm system. During the intervention, the physician simply moves the C-arm in a semicircle around the patient and -optionally ECG-triggered - acquires a defined number of projections. As with a CT scanner, these projections are then reconstructed into slice images and a 3D representation, which are sent to the monitor at the angiography system.

New Siemens Software Helps To Correct Cardiac Fibrillations

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Hospitals curing financial ills with specialty surgeries

 

Parkview Community Hospital has emerged from its 2002 bankruptcy better off financially, partly because of its bariatric surgery center, which is the only one in Riverside.

The hospital is on track to perform as many as 200 of the weight-loss surgeries this year, which could bring in an estimated $25,000 per procedure and ease the losses that plague hospitals nationwide.

All emergency rooms at Riverside and San Bernardino county hospitals lost money in 2001, according to the California Medical Association's 2004 annual emergency room losses report, its most recent. Parkview's emergency room lost $176,013 in 2001, according to the report.

Hospitals tend to select programs like orthopedics and cardiac care to round out their budgets because reimbursement rates are good and more people need them as they get older.

Experts say hospitals must invest in the medical specialties to compensate for money they lose caring for Medi-Cal and indigent patients seen in emergency rooms.

"Losses carried for three to five years are very strong predictors of closure," he said, including hospitals that are part of profitable health care groups. "They won't deal with losses forever. That means (a low-performing hospital) is a likely target for being sold."

Inland hospitals curing financial ills with specialty surgeries | Inland News | PE.com | Southern California News | News for Inland Southern California

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Hospitals Fear Privacy Claims Over Medical Records

HIPAA and the courts - still undecided?

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act is raising new legal fears for health care providers in light of tougher government enforcement and recent court rulings that could trigger private lawsuits.

Labor and employment attorneys who represent health care providers are especially concerned about the prospect of private HIPAA litigation because the law does not currently provide a private right of action. But plaintiffs appear to be getting around that. They say that courts in recent years have begun letting plaintiffs use HIPAA standards to prove liability in privacy lawsuits alleging that their sensitive medical records were inadequately protected.

For example, in Utah, a doctor is facing a lawsuit after an appeals court last year cited HIPAA standards in determining that the physician owed a duty of confidentiality to his patients, and allowed the case to proceed. Sorensen v. Barbuto, 143 P.3d 295 (Utah Ct. App. 2006).

In North Carolina, a similar case is pending after an appeals court allowed a privacy claim to proceed based on the standard of care HIPAA establishes for protection of patient medical records. Acosta v. Byrum, 638 S.E.2d 246 (N.C. Ct. App. 2006).

Law.com - Hospitals Fear Privacy Claims Over Medical Records

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WellPoint CFO resigned after investigation

 

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Wellpoint Inc. on Thursday said its chief financial officer, David Colby, resigned after an investigation revealed that he violated the health insurer's code of conduct.

The board of directors named Chief Accounting Officer Wayne DeVeydt as Colby's successor, effective immediately.

Reuters Health - News Page

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Wal-Mart: $4 generics now 38 pct of filled scripts

It sounds like the generic $4.00 prescriptions are catching on.  With retailers such as WalMart and Target offering over 300 commonly prescribed generic drugs for this price, how much longer will other retailers be able to compete...I would guess until the co-pays of $5.00 or more for prescriptions are slowly eliminated by the insurance industry for these types of drugs, as economically it doesn't make a lot of sense to pay claims for prescriptions and co-pays that are far more expensive than $4.00.  It would be great to see those savings ($350 million quoted below) be available for other medical claims from the insurance industry.  BD

BENTONVILLE, Arkansas (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said on Thursday that just six months after completing the roll-out of its $4 generic prescription drug program, 37.8 percent of all prescriptions it fills are $4 prescriptions.

Wal-Mart began selling certain generic drugs for $4 per monthly prescription in September and by the end of November had extended the program to all its U.S. pharmacies -- far ahead of schedule. Other retailers, including close rival Target Corp., have rolled out similar programs.

Simon estimated that Wal-Mart's $4 program has removed $350 million in costs from the U.S. healthcare system, with that number projected to rise to $1 billion in a year.

Simon also said the retailer still expects to open as many as 2,000 in-store health clinics in the next five to seven years if current demand persists.

Wal-Mart: $4 generics now 38 pct of filled scripts - Yahoo! News

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Flexicath gains FDA Approval

 

The FirmGrip™ combines a standard catheter enclosed in a polymer sleeve with a special silicone insertion unit to produce a self-contained sterile catheter insertion field.

• FirmGrip.15
  In this model, a soft midterm catheter (20 cm) encased in the compact sterile sleeve is inserted in a simple, efficient manner using Peel-away needle or standard IV canula as port of entry. Having the midterm catheter encased in the sterile sleeve reduces the chance of infection and the need for an external sterile environment. FirmGrip.15 provides physicians the flexibility to leave a soft catheter in place for midterm (up to 29 days) treatment periods.

First product will be available for sale on June 2007.

Source:  Flexicath Ltd

Hat Tip:  Medgdget

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Patient told to cough up or ship out

The practice continues to work with needy patients as stated in the full article...BD

When a doctor's office prescribes timely payment for its services, a patient might be wise to comply -- even when the bill is for a relatively small amount of money.

A coastal Sussex County businesswoman, for instance, has been forced to find a new primary-care physician for herself and her children after allowing a $40 bill to linger for months. It wasn't that real estate agent Donna Atsidis didn't intend to pay the debt, she said recently, she simply hadn't gotten around to it.

"I didn't think it was real," Atsidis said, but she was shaken nonetheless. "I went in there and I was so embarrassed my voice was cracking when I tried to find out what it meant."

She paid off what she owed -- $40.20, to be exact -- but that didn't change her status. She and her daughters, ages 9 and 12, were eligible for emergency service in the short term, but would have to find a new provider for routine care. The decision was final.

The Daily Times - www.delmarvanow.com - Salisbury, Md.

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Bill Gates and Steve Jobs Together

Nice interview and interaction and very well done. BD

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ID cards for Medical Pot users to be issued

 
The application fee for county residents will be $153, or $76.50 for Medi-Cal recipients. Medical marijuana users must present a doctor's written recommendation to obtain the drug, and must apply to the Department of Public Health.

ID cards for medical pot users to be issued - Los Angeles Times

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Medical lab automated at UCI

New automated process for securing lab results...results sent electronically to the physicians...be sure your PC or network is ready...BD

The specimens are all marked with bar codes that the automated lab reads to direct the samples along the line. The first read sends the sample into a centrifuge for spinning or to a device that pops off the cap.

At a testing station, a needle-like instrument rapidly dips into the sample to remove a dab for placement on a testing device, whether to measure cholesterol or potassium levels. A self-cleaning function sterilizes the needle before it dips again.

Lab workers don't have to handle open containers in the automated system.

"When you have the human element, I've seen spills happen," Congelliere said. "There's always that potential of hazard."

A computer spits out the results, alerting lab scientists of unusual or dangerous results. The process is also tailored to track an individual's changes since the last test.

"Most of the specimens that go through the lab are normal results," Berman said. "In a hospital, you're going to have a lot of criticals and you want to put your attention on those adverse results."

Results are also sent electronically to doctors.

Article - Money - Medical lab automated at UCI

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Former San Jose Medical Group manager stole patients' information

 

The former manager at San Jose Medical Group entered a guilty plea to charges that he stole computer equipment containing sensitive personal information, the U.S. Attorney's office said Thursday.

U.S. Attorney Scott N. Schools said Joseph Nathaniel Harris, 44, who now lives in Riverside, admitted stealing equipment in March 2005 that included a DVD with information on almost 200,000 patients in the San Jose area.

FBI agents recovered the DVD.

Harris was branch manager at the San Jose Medical Group, a medical services organization that includes hundreds of affiliated physicians in the South Bay, but left in September 2004. In March 2005, employees discovered computer equipment missing from the group's administrative office, including information on patients' names, addresses, phone numbers, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, diagnoses, and medical procedures.

Former San Jose Medical Group manager stole patients' info - Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal:

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FDA Approves Wyeth's Torisel For Treatment Of Advanced Kidney Cancer

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) yesterday approved Wyeth's new drug Torisel (chemical name temsirolimus) for the treatment of renal cell carcinoma, the most common form of advanced kidney cancer.
The FDA approval was based on the results of a clinical trial published today in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The trial showed that patients who were given Torisel alone showed a significant improvement in overall survival of about three and a half months compared with patients who were only on interferon.

Source:  FDA Approves Wyeth's Torisel For Treatment Of Advanced Kidney Cancer

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Wearable monitoring devices from BodyMedia

Working on a diet...products are available for both personal and professional use and the data is recorded and used with PC software.  The article states the armband can be given to a patient for monitoring, the results are sent to the patient's PC  whereby they can be emailed to the monitoring physician.  I would anticipate seeing the personal versions showing up at gyms and with personal trainers in the new future.  Sounds like a very simplistic way to really find out how many calories we burn and perhaps find some new areas for improvement as we continue the battle of the bulge.  BD

bodybugg™ armband
The bodybugg™ armband monitors an individual's Total Energy Expenditure (TEE). This is the total number of calories their body burns during the day while exercising, driving a car, walking the dog, even sleeping. The armband is a comfortable device worn on the back of the upper arm that continuously and accurately measures calories burned throughout the day. The slim design of the armband minimizes interference with day-to-day activities and can be worn discreetly under clothing.

SenseWear® software applications
The SenseWear® software applications allow you to easily upload, annotate, analyze and share data recorded with the SenseWear® armband. SenseWear® Professional software includes advanced algorithms that accurately process your patients' continuous body data into information you can use. The software allows you to easily graph data and print reports. Advanced features let you customize the collection rate of each of the sensor channels as well as the METs levels that determine different levels of activity, from sedentary to very vigorous.

              

The bodybugg system enables individuals and healthcare providers (personal trainers, nutritionists, etc.) to accurately monitor calories burned and compare it to calories consumed. It's the perfect tool for anyone struggling to manage their weight effectively or helping someone else do the same.

For the health practitioner, we provide valuable tools that can be used to drive client/patient success and create new revenue streams.

Source:  BodyMedia

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Northrop Grumman Provides Patient Information Application to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid

CMS outsourcing efforts for improving health care...BD

MCLEAN, Va., May 30, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) has been awarded a task order from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to develop and implement a Web-based application that will help Medicare providers develop comprehensive assessments of patients discharged from post-acute care.

Under the CMS Professional Information Technology (IT) Services indefinite-delivery/indefinite quantity contract, Northrop Grumman will create and deploy a patient assessment instrument that will allow Medicare providers to capture health and demographic information for complete, electronic patient profiles. The secure, Web-based environment will support CMS' post-acute care program, which is care provided to individuals who need additional help recuperating from an acute illness or serious medical procedure.

The post-acute care assessment instrument will be used for patient placement decision-making; enhanced safety and quality of information to a receiving provider; and comprehensive information for patient health follow-up and outcome. The data collected from the assessment instrument will also be used by CMS to improve Medicare's payment for post-acute care services and the coordination of these services.

Work on the contract will be conducted in Woodlawn, Md., over one year with three one-year options.

Source: Northrop Grumman Provides Patient Information Application to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid

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United Health Group demonstration held at the annual meeting

 

MINNEAPOLIS - While United Health Group, Inc., tried to reassure shareholders that it's addressing a stock scandal that forced the ouster of CEO William McGuire, protesters outside the HMO's annual meeting called for universal health care.

The demonstrators, organized by the Universal Health Care Action Network-Minnesota, www.uhcan-mn.org,  said United Health and other insurers continue to make massive profits while millions of Americans lack health coverage. They protested outside the Minneapolis Convention Center where United Health – the largest HMO in the country – held its annual meeting Tuesday morning.
"Right now, we have a market-based system that's been proven unsustainable," said UHCAN member Stefanie Levi. "People are dying as a result of our broken health care system."
At the annual meeting, United Health announced that in 2006, it increased earnings by 37 percent, revenue by 54 percent, and cash flow by 60 percent. Management also tried to reassure shareholders that the company was responding to concerns raised after McGuire was forced out last year in a scandal over the backdating of stock options. Before his ouster, McGuire was the highest-paid executive in Minnesota, receiving $124 million in stock options alone in 2006.

United Health shareholders rejected proposals put forth by investor groups, including the California public pension system, to tighten controls on executive compensation and open up board elections. Instead, shareholders approved company-backed proposals that make modest changes in the board election process.
The number of uninsured Americans is approaching 50 million and millions more are under-insured.

Source: Welcome to Workday Minnesota, your leading source for labor news!

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Blue Cross to lose 350 jobs after Medicare contract expires

 

TOPEKA - Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas will lose 350 jobs in the state after a bid for a five-year Medicare contract was rejected.

The company was told that a bid by one of its subsidiaries, Wheatlands Administrative Services, was rejected by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, company spokesman Graham Bailey said.

After the current contract expires, Topeka is expected to lose 335 jobs and Salina 15 jobs.

Source: Kansas.com | 05/30/2007 | Insurer to lose 350 jobs after Medicare contract expires

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Microsoft unveils new Surface computer

This may totally change the way radiology reports and images are viewed or just accessing a patient chart.   Last year I remembered viewing the "play anywhere" video from Microsoft and this appears to be the next phase of the technology emerging. Get your cellphones and wireless equipped tablets ready for some interaction....BD 

The machines, which Microsoft planned to debut Wednesday at a technology conference in Carlsbad, Calif., are set to arrive in November in T-Mobile USA stores and properties owned by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. and Harrah's Entertainment Inc.

Surface is essentially a Windows Vista PC tucked inside a shiny black table base, topped with a 30-inch touchscreen in a clear acrylic frame. Five cameras that can sense nearby objects are mounted beneath the screen. Users can interact with the machine by touching or dragging their fingertips and objects such as paintbrushes across the screen, or by setting real-world items tagged with special bar-code labels on top of it.

 

Unlike most touchscreens, Surface can respond to more than one touch at a time. During a demonstration with a reporter last week, Mark Bolger, the Surface Computing group's marketing director, "dipped" his finger in an on-screen paint palette, then dragged it across the screen to draw a smiley face. Then he used all 10 fingers at once to give the face a full head of hair.

 

 

Popular Mechanics also provides a nice video preview from their website.

Source: Microsoft unveils new Surface computer - Yahoo! News

Surface Page Presentation from Microsoft:  http://www.microsoft.com/surface/ 

Additional information here:  http://on10.net/Blogs/larry/first-look-microsoft-surfacing-computing/

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Visits to Doctors Who Are Not in, Ever

This story breaks down the generations in the search for information, "Dr. Google" in particular here provides the basic information and the article continues on to talk about how different generations locate and find information today with technology.  BD

“I’m contagious,” my 9-year-old said, looking up from the laptop on which she had just typed her symptoms one morning last week. “I shouldn’t go to school with strip throat.”

“It’s strep throat,” I said, not looking up from my breakfast. “And you don’t have it. So go get dressed.

Patients should not skip going to the doctor in favor of sleuthing online, though. “I encourage my patients to get more medical information to be a better patient,” Dr. Rohack said. “But I also think you need help wading through all that information, and that continues to be the higher role of doctors.”

As today’s children age, they will increasingly rely on collaborating online with peers as a tool to weed out erroneous information, Mr. Prensky predicted.

“Our generation holds information that might be useful one day close to the chest, but kids share it like crazy,” he said, adding that in the future, “Kids will look at a situation and say, ‘This is a problem for 20 people to figure out,’ or ‘This is a problem that will take 10 people,’ and they’ll break it down and share it.”

Until then? The next time my daughter comes down with a case of strip throat, I may suggest to her that Dr. Google’s treatment of choice is a shot.

Source: Visits to Doctors Who Are Not in, Ever - New York Times

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Bloodless Prostate Cancer Surgery Performed

More about robotic surgery.  As this field continues to grow and procedures are added, it really can help speed up recovery times and in most instances is far less invasive.  The picture below shows the surgeon in the operating room, viewing everything from the da vinci console.  BD

Even if traditionally invasive open surgery had been an option, Reginald's relatively young age at 55 allowed for a less traumatic, nerve-sparing prostate cancer treatment called a da Vinci Robotic Prostatectomy. Taking advantage of the da Vinci robot's improved operative dexterity and superior magnification, a surgeon makes five keyhole incisions rather than the six-inch invasive incision required for open prostatectomy. Smaller incisions mean less nerve damage, less pain, a shorter hospital stay and faster catheter removal. Most importantly, in Reginald's case, the da Vinci Robotic Prostatectomy could be performed with less than 100CCs of blood loss, which is insignificant, and would not challenge his religious beliefs.

 

 

Source: Bloodless Prostate Cancer Surgery Performed On Jehovah's Witness Patient

Related Link:  http://www.roboticoncology.com/Da-Vinci-Robotic-Prostatectomy.php

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ICU Nurse Working Conditions Linked To Increase In Patient Infections

"Nurses are the hospitals' safety officers"....BD

A review of outcomes data for more than 15,000 patients in 51 U.S. hospital ICUs showed that those with high nurse staffing levels (the average was 17 registered nurse hours per patient day) had a lower incidence of infections. Higher levels of overtime hours were associated with increased rates of infection and skin ulcers. On average nurses worked overtime 5.6 percent of the time. These findings, reported in the June issue of Medical Care, one of the leading health care administration journals, support the notion that a systematic approach aimed at improving nurse working conditions will improve patient safety.
"Nurses are the hospitals' safety officers," said Patricia W. Stone, Ph.D., M.P.H., R.N., assistant professor of nursing at Columbia University Medical Center and the study's first author. "However, nursing units that are understaffed and that have overworked nurses are shown to have poor patient outcomes. Improvements in nurse working conditions are necessary for the safety of our nation's sickest patients. With the looming nursing shortage, hospitals direly need to address working conditions in order to help retain current staff now and recruit people into nursing in the future.

Source: ICU Nurse Working Conditions Linked To Increase In Patient Infections

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AMA wants doctors to swap idea online

I think this is already taking place in many circles on the web...goes under the name of "blogging"  BD

The AMA on Wednesday plans to announce a partnership with a company called Sermo Inc., which seeks to use the Web to tap into the collective wisdom of the service's growing network of 15,000 U.S. doctors.

Some doctors are skeptical the nine-month-old service can advance medical safety, and a pharmaceutical industry group worries the service could spread as much rumor as fact.

But the 160-year-old AMA hopes its collaboration with Cambridge, Mass.-based Sermo will open a new line of communication, allowing members to quickly share everything from advice about treating an individual patient's unique symptoms to opinions on whether regulators should approve an experimental drug.

Other doctors rank postings based on whether the information appears credible — a "wisdom of the crowd" approach that Sermo says assigns low rankings to spurious claims that should be read with skepticism. Doctors can challenge or corroborate others' postings.

Source: AMA wants doctors to swap idea online - Yahoo! News

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Hospitalist Model May Reduce Costs without adversely Affecting Outcomes

(from Medscape, may require subscription

May 25, 2007 (Dallas) — For patients with common inpatient diagnoses, the hospitalist model reduces length of stay and costs without adversely affecting mortality or readmission, according to a presentation by Peter K. Lindenauer, MD, MSc, medical director of clinical and quality informatics at Baystate Health and associate professor of medicine at Tufts University School of Medicine, in Springfield, Massachusetts, at Hospital Medicine 2007, the Society for Hospital Medicine annual meeting.

"The improved efficiency was observed at both teaching and nonteaching institutions," said Dr. Lindenauer. "These efficiency gains were only partially explained by the higher inpatient volumes of hospitalists compared with the 2 other physician groups. This suggests that the other aspects of the hospitalist model — such as their on-site and often 24-hour presence and the alignment of their incentives with those of the hospital — can result in greater efficiency."

Source: Hospitalist Model May Reduce Costs

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Despite advances, most hospitals are years away from fully computerized systems

Electronic records and accurate information do save lives; however, in the chase to provide the one central location cure all to locate medical records, we somehow left out some of the "baby steps" needed to get there.  Having a practice or hospital using electronic records today is definitely a plus, but I agree on the span it's going to take to provide interoperability for all, and not to mention there are a lot of choices out there.  One thing for sure that has come out of all of this is better health care and more patient involvement in taking a more active role in their own health care.  It may be a while before we see a "one for all plan" but the "baby steps" taken in the meantime are definitely a plus anyway you look at it.  There are a lot of folks in the healthcare industry making this change to a new way of operation and they need training and a little time to digest changes as they occur.  The insurance industry has also provided a few stumbling blocks with consumer trust along the way too.  You still have to know as a patient that "privacy" can and will still exist today with medical care.  Health care is a personal issue and it seems in some areas that has been forgotten.  We have the data today, but now the challenge is there to professionally manage the information in a way that will provide better health care for all.  BD

Hospital records aren't what they used to be at Tri-City Medical Center.
Emergency room doctors record orders for lab tests, medications and treatments on wireless tablet computers. Nurses on the in-patient floors enter vital signs into rolling laptop computers.
And digital X-ray images are available on computer screens throughout the Oceanside, Calif., hospital moments after they are taken.
This kind of technology was a novelty just a few years ago, but now most hospitals across the country use some sort of electronic medical records system - a technological leap proven to reduce medical errors and one that many think is key to slowing runaway health care costs.
Several RAND Corp. researchers predicted that electronic health records could save hospitals and doctors $513 billion over the next 15 years, savings that could be passed along to insurers and patients, according to a 2005 article in the journal Health Affairs.
A trip to Tri-City suggests that the digital age has finally arrived in health care, but looks can be deceiving. Despite undeniable advances, most hospitals and doctors remain years away from full-scale electronic records and for those that do use electronic records, there is little, if any, way to share information.

Source: Greater Paramus News and Lifestyle Magazine - Despite advances, most hospitals are years away from fully computerized systems

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Philanthropy's Struggle in Health Care: Nonprofit Hospitals in America

 Study available - fee required.  BD

Margins are falling, bond ratings are dropping, and competition for patients and reimbursement is sharp.

At the same time, the perceptions of the American public have changed. While a decade ago fewer than one in ten Americans saw no difference between nonprofit and for-profit hospitals, today more than half see nothing necessarily distinguishing about nonprofit providers of care. When public opinion erodes, philanthropic support may follow.

The study links these trends health care, economic, and philanthropic and suggests future implications.  The report is important reading for all executives, directors, chairpersons, Board members and others affiliated with hospitals and healthcare in the United States. It’s also a vital read for major donors and foundation executives, healthcare companies, investors in the sector, government leaders and the media.

Source: onPhilanthropy: Articles: Philanthropy's Struggle in Health Care: Nonprofit Hospitals in America: Lives, Jobs and Philanthropy

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Print to OneNote - Great Organizational tool

For anyone needing to keep their notes, emails, client information in one place, this is a killer application.  I can literally take anything and include it in One Note for easy access and searching.  Why spend all the time digging through the drive of a PC, when this makes the process so very simple and it is not hard to use at all.  If you have a bunch of Word documents relative to a meeting, this makes it so simple.  Need to find the information later, let One Note do the work for you and it will search by keyword.  I use this all the time in my  business and what a huge timeserver it can be.  One Note can be used from a desktop as well as a tablet too.  At the hospital making notes with a tablet can be a really simple task too and you have everything in one place.  Need to share  information with another MD, One Note can do by sharing a selected file.  BD

You may not have noticed it, but when you installed OneNote 2007, you got a new printer: Send to OneNote 2007. If you need to add anything to your notes, you use File Print and select this printer. Short delay (how long depends on how big an item you are printing) and then the item appears in your notes.

What can you print to OneNote? Well, I haven’t found anything I can’t print to OneNote 2007 this way. Big documents take a long time, but they do get there.

Where? Oh - by default, the new notes will end up on a page in the Unfiled Notes section. You can change that by going to Tools–> Options and checking out the Send to OneNote options:

Once you print something to OneNote, it automatically becomes searchable. If the item is long or large, there may be a short delay before the content is searchable, but it will be indexed. In addition, once you print to OneNote, you can right click the object and “Copy the text” from the current page of the printout or the entire printout. What a great way to create copies of stuff, huh?

Source: Print to OneNote Hints ~ Vitamin CH - The cure for all computer ailments

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Blues Plans Are Introducing More E-Prescribing Pilots, Initiatives

Is one of your health plans sponsoring NEPSI?  We will always maintain a permanent link on this site for physicians to get started as it is free to anyone who decides to participate.  There is a short webinar to attend before getting started that is an introduction on how to use the software, which is sent after the initial enrollment.  BD 

WellPoint, Inc. is joining other Blues plans in sponsoring e-prescribing for providers, partnering with General Motors Corp. (GM) in an Ohio-based e-prescribing pilot and co-sponsoring the National ePrescribing Patient Safety Initiative (NEPSI). Meanwhile, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida (BCBSF) is initiating an effort with four major health plans in that state to promote e-prescribing to members. According to another plan, e-prescribing sponsorship has sped adoption of such tools, which are helping to reduce drug-related medical errors and improve cost savings for health plans, enrollees and payers.

They have a vested interest in improving patient safety and reducing health care costs," he says. NEPSI is "exciting as well, and there are health plans that are sponsoring it as well. It's a win win win," he asserts. "If the doctor uses [e-prescribing], studies show it improves efficiency and reduces medication errors," he explains.

Source: Blues Plans Are Introducing More E-Prescribing Pilots, Initiatives

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BlueCross BlueShield Of South Carolina Launches Subsidiary To Facilitate Medical Tourism

This is the first type of service I have seen combining local health services and tourism in one package to speak...allowing 2 visits with local physicians...BD

BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina recently launched a subsidiary, Companion Global Healthcare, to help U.S. patients plan trips to Thailand for lower-cost medical procedures, the Charleston Post and Courier reports. BCBS will cover patients' procedures organized through Companion Global if their BCBS plan allows the travel, according to spokesperson Elizabeth Hammond. Hammond said the insurer also will cover two follow-up visits with physicians at Doctors Care centers in the state.
While the subsidiary was created several months ago, no South Carolina resident has outsourced any procedures yet, the Post and Courier notes. The company is "one of the first efforts of its kind" in the nation and "reflects several trends," such as an increase in medical tourism, increasing health care costs and rising health standards in Asian countries, according to the Post and Courier.

Source: BlueCross BlueShield Of South Carolina Launches Subsidiary To Facilitate Medical Tourism

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Heart congestion - share the revenue , better healthcare for the patients

This can certainly make the decision process much easier for the patient and hopefully ends up with fair compensation for all physicians involved.   BD

To reduce patients' confusion, increase revenue, and improve care, the 50 Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center doctors who work in the cardiology, cardiac surgery, and vascular surgery departments, along with senior hospital executives, have formed an independent corporation. For the first time, the doctors plan to share some of the revenue they generate. They say the new Cardiovascular Institute will increase cooperation, because they will be collectively responsible for the institute's success.

The most complicated aspect of the arrangement is how to share revenue. Traditionally, insurers make separate payments to a doctor and the hospital where a procedure is performed. Under the new setup , any growth in revenue paid to the hospital for cardiovascular procedures and testing will be shared with the Cardiovascular Institute. The institute also plans to use new formulas to share payments made to doctors. Until now, individual departments and their doctors have kept the fees they generate and decided how to distribute them.

A major stumbling block is pay disparity: Surgeons generally earn more money than other physicians, so sharing revenue equally could reduce their incomes. But the hospitals are testing the idea among smaller groups of doctors. At Brigham and Women's, radiologists and cardiologists who do cardiac imaging are pooling their professional fees, as are Mass. General specialists who do noninvasive procedures, such as ultrasound testing, in the vascular center.

"The best thing is to take the patient out of the middle and even the playing field in some way," said Dr. Andy Whittemore, the Brigham's chief medical officer.

Source:  http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/05/29/heart_congestion/

Hat Tip:  Kevin MD

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Partners TeleStroke Center

Using mobility to get the technology to hospitals that may not be able to afford this service otherwise and saving lives at the same time...BD

One form of treatment is to administer Tissue Plasminogen Activator (tPA), a clot busting drug that can greatly reduce the disability resulting from a stroke. tPA must be administered within 3 hours of symptom onset.

Unfortunately, some hospitals lack the resources to make this determination and cannot physically transfer the patient quickly enough to enable them to receive this therapy if warranted. This is where TeleStroke comes in. Subscribing hospitals can receive acute stroke care for patients without physically transferring the patient for an exam.

"I can examine someone very interactively with the help of a physician or a nurse on the other end and I can make a determination of the stroke severity and the type of stroke by looking at the patient and at the brain image," Dr. Schwamm said.

"It's almost like being in the room."

Source: Partners TeleStroke Center : About TeleStroke

Related Article:  New York Times

To have a neurologist always available, the hospital would have to hire the equivalent of two and a half neurologists, said Timothy Walsh, the hospital’s chief executive. They would be idle most of the time while costing more than a half-million dollars.

“We wouldn’t be able to handle it financially,” Mr. Walsh said. Ideally, the hospital would also use an M.R.I. machine, the most accurate brain scan for strokes. But keeping the $1.5 million machine near the emergency department “could never be justified by the business” in diagnosing strokes, Mr. Walsh said. The hospital’s only M.R.I. scanner comes in by ferry on Saturday morning and leaves Sunday night.

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The Watch Phone is almost here....

For those of us that remember Dick Tracy and his phone...well many years later it has arrived or will arrive shortly...BD 

Features:
Time/Date, Last Number Redial, Recent Calls, Missed Calls, File Manager, 199 Contacts, SMS Messages, Multi Languages, Flight Mode, Email.
Accessories:
USB Travel Adapter and Charger, Bluetooth Wireless Headset and Spare Battery .

Specification:
:: Model M500 Quad Mode, Touches, Java and WAP enabled
:: Weight: 60g
:: Color: Silver or Black with Leather Strap
:: Screen: TFT 1.5 - inch colour touchsreen 120 x 160
:: Frequency: GSM850/900/1800/1900Mhz (GPRS), SIM
:: SMS: Full SMS and MMS functionality
:: MP3: Support AAC/MP3 and
:: MP4: Support Video Playing
:: Touchscreen with Built-in Stylus
:: Memory: 128MB Built-in Memory
:: Battery: 400mAh, Talk Time 200 Minutes, Standby Time 80 Hours
:: USB: For Data Transfer and Recharging
:: Bluetooth 2.0

Source: SMS Technology Australia

Hat Tip:  Engadget

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When Health Coverage Doesn't Hold Up - Providers Can Deny Big Claims

CBS has a good storyline about medical insurance and this is just one of the stories featured.  This so much reminds me of the recent Blue Cross settlement here in California where the carrier did settle.  This is scary to think that when someone is in dire need of medical assistance that when it comes down to billing, the "bean counters" are put to work to scrub and research the data bases looking for any type of mere scan of a chance to deny paying services.  

Why did this potential record take 3 years to surface?  Why did the insurance company not question this 3 years ago?  I'm sure they willingly collected his premium payments for the last 3 years as well.  This could happen to anyone. 

I am a programmer and create data bases and they are helpful and informative and lead to better healthcare, however, some tend to forget that this is still the "people" business and that human bodies are not the same as data and statistics and we do not all fit into "tables" and our ultimate healthcare is not just the matter of another "structured query" to determine whether or not our body justifies claim payments based on the criteria returned.   People have afflictions and illnesses due to no fault of their own - they are born with many of them! 

If we continue with the current system, then something has to be done to create an "assigned risk" category and pro-rate those folks and assign them to insurance companies for coverage.  The car insurance business has assigned risks, so I ask, why can't something along this line be accomplished with medical insurance?  Myself, I would much rather see pro-active direction with the insurers rather than the government make the decision for everyone as to what will occur, but if pro-activity is not taken, then the latter will more than likely be the ultimate decision for all. 

When a member of the Los Angeles Insurance Commission is denied coverage, you have to ask, where does that leave the rest of us?????   BD  (see the related story below)

__________________________________________________________________________________

Walking along a stretch of road last summer, 54-year-old Tod Smith felt an intense burning in his chest and tightness in his arm — signs of a heart attack he never saw coming.
"I was in good health," Smith said. "No major health problems or conditions."
For Smith, an illustrator of children's books, his heart attack was the first shock. The second: more than $40,000 in medical bills his insurance company refused to cover — after he figured the company, Assurant, would pay.
"I certainly figured that a heart attack was a catastrophic event. So I figured I was covered," Smith said.
A two-month CBS News investigation of the individual insurance market found that Smith's experience was far from unique. Because it was expensive, his claim was investigated for fraud by Assurant Health, his insurance company.
After examining his medical records, the company refused to pay based on a 3-year old-reference to an "angina episode." Assurant said those words proved his condition was pre-existing, despite the fact that follow-up tests in the same file diagnose his "episode" as a case of acid reflux and ruled out a heart condition.

Assurant refused to discuss its denials of claims on camera, but it issued a statement saying it continually evaluates its claims process "to ensure it is fair, equitable and consistent with state laws and industry standards."

Source: When Health Coverage Doesn't Hold Up, CBS News Investigates How Individual Health Insurance Providers Can Deny Big Claims - CBS News

Related story:  http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/23/cbsnews_investigates/main2843007.shtml

MEMBER OF CALIFORNIA INSURANCE COMMISSION DENIED COVERAGE 

Scott Svonkin, an active 41-year-old, never thought he'd be one of them.
"Pacificare rejected me because I'm an expectant father. Blue Shield rejected me because I got a spider bite. And then this one rejected me because of asthma," Svonkin said.

Not for Svonkin. Ironically, he's a member of Los Angeles County's Insurance Commission.
"I never imagined it would be so hard to get health care," Svonkin said. "It's not a matter (that) I can't afford it. It's a matter that they won't give it to me at any price."

Insurers find all that information — and much more — in a massive, little-known data base called the MIB, or Medical Information Bureau. Insurers have even been known to question "friends and neighbors" about "morality and lifestyle" — using all of this information to decide who they will cover and who they won't.
"They can check your morals and your lifestyle?" asks Keteyian.
"Exactly," says Liang. "And they are going to judge you on this."

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Doctors' list puts a price on care

I am guessing competition from the retail clinics may have some influence here with this decision and perhaps there will be more posted in time.  BD 

A lot of other providers don't want to compete on price because they think it cheapens the medical field.

Some critics, however, say the value of prices for consumers is limited because physicians treat conditions — and don't sell procedures. Without knowing the steps necessary to diagnose and treat a condition ahead of time, patients are unable to get a good estimate of probable charges.

"Before, if you had a $10 or $5 co-pay, it didn't hit your pocketbook," he said. "But if now you have to pay the first $2,000, the cost of an office visit matters to you a lot more."

Patients can go on the group's website and find that a chest X-ray runs $61 and that a physical examination for a middle-aged patient ranges from $140 to $160. Flu vaccinations are listed at $15,........HealthCare Partners' effort could prompt other physician groups to follow suit, given the competitive nature of Southern California's healthcare market, some experts said.

Still, the idea might take a while to catch on in markets where physicians don't have to compete for patients, said Maribeth Shannon, a California Healthcare Foundation program director.

Source: Doctors' list puts a price on care - Los Angeles Times

Link to the list (pdf)  http://www.healthcarepartners.com/brochures/BasicFees_Web.pdf

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Doctors sue hospital firm IHHI

 Everybody seems to be suing everyone in this story...BD

Shareholder physicians want to boot key managers, saying the company that controls 12 percent of O.C.’s hospital beds could go out of business.

Doctors who own a majority of Integrated Healthcare Holdings Inc. have filed suit in an attempt to oust the company's top management, saying the executives are preventing the money-losing hospital owner from refinancing expensive loans.

The suit sheds light on a battle for control of a company that owns 12 percent of the hospital beds in Orange County. "The very survival of IHHI is in the balance, as well as its ability, to provide adequate healthcare to the community," the suit says.

Separately, IHHI has filed a suit against OCPIN, Anderson said. The suit was filed under court seal and can't be viewed by the public. It concerns a dispute over lease agreements on the hospitals' real estate, which is majority-owned by OCPIN and rented to IHHI, he said..

Source: Article - Money - Doctors sue hospital firm

The doctors remain upset about the treatment of Dr. Michael Fitzgibbons, a former chief of staff at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana. After the sale by Tenet, he sent e-mails to other doctors expressing doubts about IHHI's financial viability. The company sued him for defamation and lost.

Related Story:  Orange County Register

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Changes mean less care, more profits: HMO Business in Florida

Is it getting any better anywhere?  BD

Before reform, about 95 percent of Florida doctors participated in Medicaid. Now a survey conducted by Georgetown University indicates that more doctors are dropping out of Medicaid and those that remain are seeing fewer patients. Most doctors stay in the system only out of loyalty to their patients with whom they've enjoyed an established relationship. Feeling overwhelmed by the harrowing challenges of just complying with arcane regulations and realizing that reimbursements are inadequate, many doctors are simply quitting. And there is little likelihood that things will get better since payment to doctors is down while paperwork is up.

While doctors are being paid less, the 15 HMOs and networks are being paid more. Prior to reform, HMO profit was a staggering 18.6 percent. Despite this, the Florida legislature is planning to increase their payments 11.7 percent! The securities firms CIBC World Markets and Goldman-Sachs reported that WellCare -- a major Florida Medicaid HMO -- has been shifting money to the Cayman Islands in the form of reinsurance premiums. Goldman-Sachs spokesman Carl McDonald stated that "Florida appears to be overpaying its Medicaid plans, and it would seem to be only a matter of time before the state figures this out." Florida's stated objective was to improve both access and care while saving money. Medicaid reform has accomplished little except enriching privately-held HMOs.

Gone are the days when a doctor just provided care. The doctor has become an uncompensated agent for the HMO............

Source: Changes mean less care, more profits: South Florida Sun-Sentinel

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CMS to Stop Paying Hospitals for Medical Errors

I am not sure I totally agree with this methodology, but I can certainly add that in my travels, the "old school" hospital administrators do exist and I have experienced this first hand myself, even with walking in with a "Tablet PC".  In today's world of evolving medical technology, I would think that administrators would at least 'look" at new developments and embrace at least some of the more simple techniques in their own daily use as this really helps IT administrators with bringing new technology to table. 

Many IT managers rely on someone above their position to create budgets for this and if the folks at the top don't have at least an interest, many good and relatively inexpensive solutions are tabled with some of the reasons listed below.  By far, one of the most common responses I have heard is "we can't afford it", and that sometimes stated even before even exploring new avenues and closes the door immediately to new technology.  Perhaps as CMS expands their requirements, the "old school" administrators may someday take another view on what technology can do to save lives.  Even "baby steps" in the right direction can prove beneficial and sometimes are not that expensive to deploy.  On the flip side of the coin, there are the innovative hospitals that are taking big strides in this direction as well, taking time to share the knowledge with physicians on staff to ensure everyone is on the same team.  Sharing knowledge today is one of the biggest tools we have to benefit all.  BD

The proposed deadline is October 2008, so there's time left before new guidelines appear and perhaps some of the "Old School" administrators may have time to wake up to entertain revenue growth and place less emphasis on cost reduction to bring some real win-win solutions to the table for all and help saves lives at the same time.  One of the best ways for an "old school" administrator to benefit is to begin adapting new technology in their personal lives, as this brings a whole new understanding to the table with familiarity and use. 

Overall patient safety in hospitals is not improving. The latest HealthGrades report on patient safety in U.S. hospitals showed the PSI (AHRQ's patient safety index) rate increased 8% between 2003 and 2005 (more here). The lack of significant progress with patient safety has caused some to ask why payors reimburse hospitals for the additional care necessary after a patient suffers a preventable adverse event. It seems payors are starting to ask themselves this very question - according to this Indianapolis Star story:

Late next year Medicare plans to stop paying hospitals for costs incurred from some of the most common and preventable medical errors suffered by patients.
[...]

The federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which operates Medicare, is taking public comment on the proposal through June. The changes are scheduled to take effect in October 2008.

Medical mistakes are deadly and expensive. Infections acquired in hospitals account for about 90,000 deaths and $4.5 billion in extra spending each year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Unfortunately, most hospital administrators are more focused on cost reduction than revenue growth, and (if recent reports on patient safety "improvements" are to be believed) the stick - reduced reimbursement - will probably offer an incentive than the carrot.
CMS is starting with a subset of the list. Here are the 13 "never should happen" adverse events that CMS is considering for no reimbursement:

1. Catheter-associated urinary tract infections
2. Bed sores
3. Objects left in after surgery
4. Air embolism, or bubbles, in bloodstream from injection
5. Patients given incompatible blood type
6. Bloodstream staph infection
7. Ventilator-associated pneumonia
8. Vascular-catheter-associated infection
9. Clostridium difficile-associated disease (gastrointestinal infections)
10. Drug-resistant staph infection
11. Surgical site infections
12. Wrong surgery
13. Falls

Starting to withhold payment for adverse events will impact the health care industry as much as DRGs and capitation did years ago. Many "old school" hospital administration management techniques will fall from favor because doing things like increasing nurse to patient ratios have been repeatedly shown to result in more adverse events. This change will also eliminate the need to regulate nurse to patient ratios, like they have in California and a few other states - hospitals that operate at unsafe ratios this will go out of business (as they should).
Every hospital wants to make improvements that are easy and cost next to nothing. One of the frustrations of being a consultant is doing the needs assessment, the cost justification, and the implementation plan only to hear that, "that's really too much trouble - we don't want to do it." Of course it's even worse if you're employed by the hospital (or vendor) as part of a LEAN team or innovation workgroup.

Source: Medical Connectivity Consulting

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Medicare pay-for-reporting: How to get your 1.5% ...

Get those registry modules up to date in any EMR to make this task easy.  If you are currently using an EMR or EHR program that incorporates this, reporting will be as simple as creating a spreadsheet from the data entered while doing your daily charting.  BD 

Next month, Medicare will take a big step toward becoming a more active health care purchaser, by launching its first program-wide quality reporting initiative for physicians.

Not every physician will decide that participating in the Physician Quality Reporting Initiative is worth the money. Collecting data for the quality measures and passing it on to the government, for instance, will require extra work by doctors and their staff.

First, physicians must consult the CMS-approved list of 74 quality measures to decide how many to report and determine how many of their Medicare patients fit into those categories. To be eligible for the bonus, doctors must report on at least three measures and apply each one to at least 80% of the patients who fit that category.

Physicians who see a significant number of diabetic patients, for example, might decide to keep special tabs on whether these patients maintain their blood pressure control -- one of the CMS quality measures. To meet this requirement, a doctor would have to share with the government the individual blood pressure ranges of at least 8 out of 10 under-control diabetic patients during one or more of their follow-up office visits in the last half of the year.

Source: AMNews: June 4, 2007. Medicare pay-for-reporting: How to get your 1.5% ... American Medical News

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Physicians say PPO network's fax masked 25% pay cut

 Be sure to read any faxes these days from your neighborly PPO.  BD

The AMA and several state medical societies are engaged in ongoing discussions with a PPO network that sent a fax to physicians that appeared to be a routine request for tax information -- but also bound physicians to having their reimbursement cut by 25%.

San Diego-based Three Rivers Provider Network sent the fax to physicians who had treated member patients, but who were not part of any TRPN network. TRPN not only has direct contracts with physicians, but also rents networks from other PPOs -- a practice which organized medicine has criticized as a "silent PPO" because physicians never negotiate rates with a plan, yet find themselves in it because they have signed a deal with a PPO that has rented out its network to someone else.

However, the TRPN fax also contained a paragraph stating that physicians would agree "payment of services will be 75% of provider's total billed charges for covered services." Physicians would sign one form; there was no opportunity to opt out of or negotiate the cut.

It's not uncommon for Howard H. Rosenblum, MD, an ophthalmologist in Nashville, Tenn., to receive a random fax from an insurance company asking him to fill out a W-9, so when Dr. Rosenblum received the TRPN form, he said he signed the document without much hesitation. Several months later, while conducting a spot check of his claims receipts, Dr. Rosenblum noticed he wasn't getting his normal fee from the insurance companies with which he contracts.

Source: AMNews: June 4, 2007. Physicians say PPO network's fax masked 25% pay cut ... American Medical News

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Videoconferencing services for hospitals and clinics

 

Hospitals and clinics are exploring the alternative with non-English speaking patients, but experts say the cost must drop before it makes sense for private practices.

Translation services are pitching -- and some hospitals are buying -- videoconferencing technology as a way to improve communication with patients who don't speak English.

Emergency physician Michael Sayre, MD, who regularly uses a videoconferencing interpretation system at the Ohio State University Medical Center, said having the visual component makes "a huge difference." Because the system can be moved, translating can happen just about anywhere a patient might be

Source: AMNews: June 4, 2007. Videoconferencing services offer language translators ... American Medical News

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Xiagara - over the hill, take the little blue pill

Cute animation and spoof on Viagara...

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LSU jumps on the PHR bandwagon - online personal health records

 

By the time the 2008 hurricane season rolls around, the LSU Healthcare Network hopes its patients will be well on their way to having portable personal electronic health records they can access in case of a catastrophe.
LSU picked Medem’s™ iHealth to generate the free health records for patients, said Dr. Frank Opelka, CEO of the LSU Healthcare Network and associate dean for clinical affairs at LSU Health Sciences Center School of Medicine at New Orleans. The effort has only recently begun.
“The iHealth record is not the physician’s e-health record of his or her patient. It is the patient’s personal health record,” Opelka said. “It is a Web-based system that carries the patient’s complete medical history. It can be updated by each patient.”
If LSU’s patients evacuate the city or state and need healthcare, they can go to the Web and obtain their personal health records, Opelka said. Many of the LSU network’s patients don’t have computers or access to the Internet, so LSU will help them enter their information.

Source: LSU Launches E-health Records for Patients on Louisiana Medical News

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10 Educational Hours at the ER

 

May 25, 2007 - Having spent a sleepless night with a bit too much pain in my abdomen, I informed my wife I was suffering from another bout with diverticulitis.  I was also forced to admit I had consumed a bag of microwave popcorn, a definite no-no for someone with no intestinal fortitude.

We asked the doctor how to avoid spending a day in the ER just to get antibiotics.  She explained that had I arrived in an ambulance, I would have received immediate treatment; ambulances were handled immediately. After 10 hours at the hospital, I left with a prescription and a first-class education in the ER crisis. 

Source: My Turn: 10 Educational Hours at the ER - To Your Health - MSNBC.com

Hat Tip:  Kevin, MD

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Hospitals taking a cue from retailers to reduce on meds errors

 

Virtually the same kind of technology used to ring up merchandise at the checkout counter is being put to a new use by some hospitals to help prevent medication mistakes for patients.

You already know how it works in stores: A clerk runs the bar codes on your merchandise across a scanner, and the price rings up on the cash register.

Now nurses in hospitals are scanning new bar code labels on medications, then scanning the bar codes being placed on patients' wristbands to make sure the right drugs are going to the right people.

"It's amazing that this technology has been in the grocery stores for 20 years, but it's just now getting into health care," said Jerry Esker, director of pharmacy for Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Center in Mattoon.

Hospitals aren't required to use bar code scanning equipment. But the FDA points out those that do stand to reduce their medication errors and liability insurance costs.

Provena United Samaritans Medical Center in Danville plans to roll it out this fall, and Provena's five other hospitals, including Covenant Medical Center in Urbana, will add the technology later, one hospital at a time, according to Jim Witt, Provena vice president for clinical integration.

Source: The News-Gazette.com:Hospitals taking a cue from retailers to reduce on meds errors

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Chapter 8, "Are you still just using your cell phone for phone calls?"

Cell Phones made simple for seniors...good idea..BD 

There's a reason Jitterbug has just won
recognition as the best new company in
the cell phone industry. Before we spoke,
we listened. We listened to the kind of
simple cell phone experience you wanted for
yourself and those you care about. The result
is Jitterbug. The best cell phone experience
you've ever had. Wouldn't you or someone you
love enjoy a comfortable, easy to use cell
phone to stay in touch with friends and family?

Source: Jitterbug Phones: Easy Emergency Cell Phones

Hat Tip:  http://www.goldagers.com/2006/11/14/cellphones-for-older-adults/

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UC Davis Medical Adds SmartPill GI Monitoring System

Check out the link below for the full story.  The site is still working on a "find a physician" list at this time wh uses the SmartPill.  BD

SmartPill aids in the evaluation of GI motility disorders, which can affect up to 50 percent of all diabetics

Buffalo, N.Y. and Sacramento, Calif. — Thursday, May 10, 2007 – Dr. Juan Carlos Garcia, M.D. and Dr. Amar Al-Juburi, gastroenterologists with UC Davis Medical Center, will offer the SmartPill GI Monitoring System to patients, introducing an innovative technology to the region. The SmartPill pH.p Capsule is the first medical device capable of providing segmented transit times for gastric emptying, combined small and large bowel, and total gastrointestinal (GI) tract transit.

The SmartPill pH.p Capsule

The SmartPill pH.p Capsule transits the intestines by peristalsis, or the normal rhythmic contraction of the intestinal muscles, and is capable of transmitting data continuously for greater than 72 hours. The single-use capsule is excreted naturally from the body, usually within a day or two.

Will the SmartPill Capsule replace current invasive procedures?

A logical compliment to Endoscopy, the SmartPill pH.p Capsule has the potential to replace gastric emptying scintigraphy.

Source: SmartPill | Press Releases

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