CMS Discovers That Insurers Offering Medicare Advantage “Really Know How To Sharp Shoot A Model With Adjusting Risk For Profit”, A Common Everyday Occurrence in Financial Markets…

<p>I’ve written about that topic many times and it’s the fudgy gray areas modeled by Quants usually in their business models and subprime could have never happened without hiding or altering risk to reach desired profit levels.  If you scroll on down to the footer of this blog the 2nd video explains how this works in the financial areas and how banks and hedge funds work it.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="154" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-wDD1585Zn7w/U-RaA0DyOPI/AAAAAAABLDQ/ErRhxNu-au0/image%25255B5%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="187" />  It’s proprietary in the model and thus there’s no way for anyone to really audit the actual procedures and this report took actual numbers and did some analytics.  </p> <p>That’s one way to find a flawed model, whether it was done on purpose or a mistake.  Of course we know if it’s bank, chances are it’s probably altered.  Quants are the business in banks and upper management has usually no clue on what they do and I would suspect the same holds true for insurers.  A couple years ago I wrote about how this is like a regular past time and of course consumers are on the short end of the stick .  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/12/hiding-falsifying-and-accelerating-risk.html">Hiding, Falsifying, And Accelerating Risk Has Become the Achilles Heel of the US Economy As the “Real” World” Clashes With the Values Created From a World of “Fictional Values” Of Formulas and Math</a></h5> <p>This is not the first study done here as the GOA last year cranked out some numbers as well.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/03/gao-states-cms-overpaid-medicare.html">GAO States CMS Overpaid Medicare Advantage Plans During the Years of 2010 to 2012–Flawed Risk Assessment Calculation Errors</a></h5> <p><strong>Insurers are experts at this as they hired of late tons of Quants to really drill down on business models to squeeze out all they can.</strong>  All you have to do is look at job openings and there’s lot of them and with the ACA act and calculated changes for profit required, it’s gone beyond the normal actuary models created and used.  Most actuaries don’t write code, but Quants do with their business models.  Insurers are really right in there too with the financial markets being publicly traded.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/health-insurer-actuary-jobs-becoming.html">Health Insurer Actuary Jobs Becoming More Difficult In the Era of Killer Algorithms, Can’t Function Like They Used To As Information Changes Take Place Daily And Hourly, More Insurance Companies Are Seeking Quants to Create New Math Models, The Next Level Up From Actuary Calculations</a></h5> <p>Anyway back on track the Quants and even some actuaries here went to work on the “risk” factors and figured out how to increase the risk assessments of patients to allow for higher billing.  By applying a higher risk score they could bill more.  It’s funny as in their own business of paying claims they are on the other side of the table, auditing for up coding from doctors and hospitals.  <img align="right" height="59" src="https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRp9TBlvWqtr16ku9oa-uGY_yLITLV9hYmtozmPi5XdbJ5RW7Sm" style="float: right; display: inline" width="149" />In the financial world they don’t change the portfolio, they just change the math and that’s what you have here as well.  What was interesting too was the note in the article that said the longer consumers were on the plan, the higher their risk factor went.  Well that’s a given right there as when more data to work with, there’s more opportunities to build a new risk model as more data can cloud the issue easily enough.  </p> <p><strong>In the financial world you don’t change the portfolio to squirrel around with risk to attain profit, you just change the math.  In the insurance world you don’t squirrel around with the policy, you just change the math, same thing and put people through absolute misery to do this.</strong></p> <p>So now what is CMS going to do about it? It’s a massive project to go back on the individual risk assessments to calculate balance billing the insurers for this too.  As a matter of fact, with the use of quants and data scientists in health insurance, how long before we call “it” a science as I said below.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/how-long-before-we-proclaim-complex.html">How Long Before We Proclaim Complex “Health Insurance” As A “Science”? Some Economists Think “Risk is a Science” And Mistake Laws For Just A Theoretic Framework or Idea…”The Grays”</a></h5> <p>So in essence here CMS would have to call it “fraud” I might guess to audit and collect after a further examination of the “risk factors” used as that’s what one has to look at.  There’s been no cuts in Medicare Advantage D as when that has been proposed, CMS has backed out and instead given increases.  It’s kind of a catch 22 with that as the insurers will react and they are have with narrow networks and assigning new doctors to patients by the algorithms.   <strong>To keep costs down, participants (the humans) have to uproot and go where the algorithms say.  This is the ugly situation we have with United Healthcare right now as they prepare for Medicare Advantage cuts, which may or may not ever happen.</strong></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/08/patients-in-tennessee-speak-out-about.html">Patients In Tennessee Speak Out About United Healthcare Firing Their Doctors As the Effort Continues To Reduce Their Own In House Overhead With Managing Fewer Doctor NPI Accounts, Contracts and Billing…More Killer Algorithms At Work Hurting Seniors</a></h5> <p>So what do you do at this point?  Do go through and try to fight the insurers who put you behind <img align="right" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-sF-hFadgF04/Ulmut0CRSCI/AAAAAAABIHY/0csnQT4IR6s/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" />the 8 ball because they knew how to model and knew all we asleep in the CMS hen house?  It’s a lot of work and then you have the rub from insurers who basically hold the participants in “benefit” hostage situation.  Way back in 2009 when <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2009/02/kathleen-sebelius-kansas-governor-for.html">Sebelius was appointed to HHS,</a> I said things like this would happen as she’s no match for the extremely intelligent profit making models that health insurers use.  When changes took place with the law, insurers just brought out their modelers that know how to work with risk factors for profit. </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/11/president-obamas-decision-to-extend.html">President Obama’s Decision to Extend Insurance Polices Will Help Consumers While Insurers Bring Out Their Quants to Re-Design Their Business Intelligence Profit Models-And Are We Over Segmented In Practice?</a></h5> <p>Sure this is a really hard lesson but until HHS and CMS come into the math modeling 21st century to find items like this sooner, the government will always be eating it and I’m sure that’s what’s going to happen right here.  So what is an algorithm…the video will explain a little bit..hard hat warning…but this will give you an idea of how the math models are made for risk assessments.  </p> <p><iframe style="height: 274px; width: 472px" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/6hfOvs8pY1k" frameborder="0" width="560" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></p> <p>Hire some Quants at HHS and CMS to stay on top of the game as once it’s done there’s no going back when a little Algo Duping has taken place, we know that as consumers as we are chased and under the <a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">Attack of the Killer Algorithms on a daily basis</a>.  Using the example link above those in Tennessee, <strong>Medicare Advantage doctors and patients are all having their lives disrupted due to risk assessment algorithmic math formulas and nothing either doctors or patients have done to contribute to these decisions</strong>, it’s the Quants and business modelers of the health insurers to maximize profits.  There is a <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/03/big-datathe-data-science-code-of-ethics.html">code of ethics for quants and data scientists,</a> but do they follow them, we don’t know.  </p> <p><em><font size="2">“If a data scientist reasonably believes an algorithm will cause harm, the data scientist shall take reasonable remedial measures, including disclosure to the client, and including, if necessary, disclosure to the proper authorities. The data scientist shall take reasonable measures to persuade the client to use the algorithm appropriately.”</font></em></p> <p><strong>Now scroll on down and watch the 4 videos in the footer</strong> and really learn about how unfair all of this really is and how your choices are being taken away from you with math models and algorithmic formulas that execute.  In the link about Tennessee too, there are even flaws in the United algorithms as some seniors were being routed to OBGYNs instead of another family practice doctor, so be a skeptic when you need to be.  BD  </p> <hr />Department of Health and Human Services researchers found that many plans exaggerate how sick their patients are and how much they cost to treat. Medicare expects to pay the privately run plans — an alternative to traditional Medicare —$160 billion this year. <p>The HHS <a href="http://www.cms.gov/mmrr/Articles/A2014/MMRR2014_004_02_a06.html">study</a> does not accuse any specific insurers of wrongdoing or name  the plans that were scrutinized. But the researchers offer the most comprehensive evidence to date that suspect billing practices have been common across much of the Medicare Advantage industry and are likely to get worse unless officials crack down.</p> <p>Medicare pays the Advantage health plans higher rates for sicker patients and less for healthy people using a complex formula called a “<a href="http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/06/04/14840/why-medicare-advantage-costs-taxpayers-billions-more-it-should">risk score</a>.” But the HHS study spells out several ways health plans have inflated those scores, from reporting surprisingly high levels of medical conditions such as alcohol or drug dependence to billing for an inordinately high number of patients with complications of diabetes.</p> <p>Health care fraud expert Malcolm Sparrow, a professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, said the problems with billings based on risk scores reveal how “financial incentives” can improperly influence how medicine is practiced.</p> <p>The new study amplifies the findings of a <a href="https://www.publicintegrity.org/">Center for Public Integrity</a> <a href="http://www.publicintegrity.org/health/medicare/medicare-advantage-money-grab">investigation</a> published in June. The investigation found that Medicare made <a href="https://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/06/04/14840/why-medicare-advantage-costs-taxpayers-billions-more-it-should">nearly $70 billion in “improper” payments</a> — mostly overcharges from <a href="https://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/06/04/14865/how-risk-scores-work">inflated risk scores</a> — to Medicare Advantage plans from 2008 through 2013. The center’s investigation also found that risk scores <a href="http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/06/04/14866/how-risk-scores-changed">rose much faster</a> in some health plans than others and that federal officials repeatedly yielded to industry pressure to minimize efforts to recoup overpayments.</p> <p>“The main issue, now that it has been revealed, is ‘upcoding’, which no one likes to discuss, but the data is in black and white and speaks volumes,” Cassano, CEO of Accucode Consulting, wrote in an email.</p> <p>The Center for Public Integrity has sought similar billing data from CMS for the past year as well as the names of Medicare Advantage plans that have been suspected of overbilling the government — and by how much. In late May, the Center <a href="http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/05/27/14805/center-sues-effort-make-medicare-advantage-files-public">sued</a> the Department of Health and Human Services to make its Medicare Advantage audits and other related records public. The lawsuit is pending.</p> <p><a href="http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2014/August/07/Medicare-advantage-plans-exaggerate-diseases-to-make-money-says-study.aspx?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+khn+%28All+Kaiser+Health+News%29">http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2014/August/07/Medicare-advantage-plans-exaggerate-diseases-to-make-money-says-study.aspx?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+khn+%28All+Kaiser+Health+News%29</a></p>

CMS Discovers That Insurers Offering Medicare Advantage “Really Know How To Sharp Shoot A Model With Adjusting Risk For Profit”, A Common Everyday Occurrence in Financial Markets…

I’ve written about that topic many times and it’s the fudgy gray areas modeled by Quants usually in their business models and subprime could...

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Canadian Drug Stores Still Doing a Booming Business as Some Drugs Are Vanishing from Pharmacy Benefit Managers and Are Too Expensive for Medicare Participants..

<p>This is a good story right here about Advair.  As mentioned the drug company recovered their R and D cost a long time ago, so what do they do next, patent the inhaler for a longer coverage time, since the drug itself is off patent.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="187" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-DNGZH-vpBWo/U-RBh90Kd9I/AAAAAAABLDA/av9u9Xvq46s/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="199" />  For a 3 month supply the cost was $1036.00 and then the price went up to $1240.00.  Medicare pays most of that price.  The cost of the same in ordering from Canada is $250 for the same amount, even less than the co-pay.  </p> <p>In Canada and in the UK drug companies are somewhat regulated on what they can charge but no in the good old USA and sales of Advair were over 8 billion.  The couple referenced here had to take out a reverse mortgage too because of the cost of their medications, mainly his wife.  Advair is made by GlaxoSmithKline, who by the way is putting some of their older drugs out to bid for private equity firms to bid on and buy.  What’s going to happen then, God only knows with PE firms running and managing pharmaceuticals.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/08/private-equity-firms-exploring-options.html">Private Equity Firms Exploring Options to Buy Old Drug Brands From GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi, Glaxo Has Already Opened the Door Asking For Bids From PE Firms</a></h5> <p>One thing also worth a mention by not going through Express Scripts they don’t have to deal with the predictive analytics data that is created at all the PBMs today either.   Everyone thinks they can predict who’s not going to take their meds and plus a little of this is charged into the cost in the US as well.     </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2010/10/express-scripts-new-program-to-contact.html">Express Scripts- New Program to Contact and Predict Patients Who May Not Be Taking Their Medicine Based On Ingenix Algorithms–We Want the Revenue Please Don’t Stop</a></h5> <p><strong>Consumers are broke and it’s up to the insurers and drug companies to sit down and negotiate, not us.  BD</strong>  </p> <p> <hr />Brent and Henni Christensen consider themselves patriotic Americans and strong supporters of Medicare.</p> <p>Nevertheless, the Huntington Beach couple buy most of their prescription drugs from an online Canadian pharmacy at prices much lower than in the United States.</p> <p>In January, the biggest manager of prescription drug benefits for insurers and drugstores, a company called Express Scripts, said it would no longer reimburse Advair purchases because the drug had become too expensive.</p> <p>This week, Express Scripts said it had cut a new deal with Glaxo and would start reimbursing Advair purchases again next year. It's unclear how the accord will affect prices. Express Scripts said it will classify Advair as a "non-preferred" drug, meaning that patient co-pays will be higher than for preferred meds.</p> <p>What cost $1,240 in the United States ran about $250 in Canada — even less than their U.S. copay.</p> <p>Advair's patent protection expired in 2010, but Glaxo's patent on the inhaler used to administer the drug lasts until 2016. There are currently no generic alternatives for the drug.</p> <p><a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-lazarus-20140808-column.html?track=rss&cid=dlvr.it&dlvrit=52116">http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-lazarus-20140808-column.html?track=rss&cid=dlvr.it&dlvrit=52116</a></p>

Canadian Drug Stores Still Doing a Booming Business as Some Drugs Are Vanishing from Pharmacy Benefit Managers and Are Too Expensive for Medicare Participants..

This is a good story right here about Advair.  As mentioned the drug company recovered their R and D cost a long time ago, so what do they d...

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Patients In Tennessee Speak Out About United Healthcare Firing Their Doctors As the Effort Continues To Reduce Their Own In House Overhead With Managing Fewer Doctor NPI Accounts, Contracts and Billing…More Killer Algorithms At Work Hurting Seniors

<p>This is getting old and it really sucks as when you listen to the video the one doctor asks what he can do to stay in network and will work with United so 100 patients don’t have to change.  You take the CEO of United and put him through the<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="186" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-RAym2RKqILs/U-MYQ63b0hI/AAAAAAABLCw/IDvE0MCpu5I/image%25255B4%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="265" /> same thing, you think?  He wouldn’t like it but he’s wealthy and doesn’t have to live with what the real world goes through here.  Below is the first post I made on this state as as you know the firings have hit in many other states, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Ohio and many more.  <strong>When it comes to human compassion and care, this is really a two faced company.</strong>  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/tennessee-is-latest-state-hit-with.html">Tennessee Is the Latest State Hit with United Firing 500 Plus Medicare Advantage Doctors</a></h5> <p>Even recently the AAFP said “we aren’t going to take it anymore” again reflecting on the insurance business with a primary focus on United Healthcare.  The AAFP has been trying to make some inroads with doctors getting paid at rates less than Medicare with many MDs in the US.  600 doctors are being cut by United and the patients can’t make changes until 2015. </p> <p> So United is trying to shift people to different doctors and that is getting interesting too as instead of getting referred to another family practice doctor,<strong> the United algorithms are messing up and shifting people to OBGYNs and neurologists instead.  Again this is data mix up here when stuff like this occurs</strong>.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/aafp-says-were-not-going-to-take-it.html">AAFP Says We’re Not Going To Take It Anymore With Optimization of Provider Networks - Specifically United Healthcare’s Doctor Dumping That Disrupts Continuity of Care</a></h5> <p><strong>Who do they cut, a doctor who specializes in geriatrics for one.</strong>   He tried to appeal and said he would do anything to stay in network, but the profit making algorithms of United said no.   <strong><u>This corporation is just ripping people’s lives up and this is really bad.</u></strong>  Patients feel their freedom has been taken away and some patients can’t get in to see new doctors for 3 months.  Why don’t we have optimization of people instead of optimization of networks.  They just want less data to work with when it comes to billing, having to keep track of fewer NPI numbers, etc. for billing as well as the status of the doctors.  <strong>If current doctors offer to meet the rates they are paying, there’s no reason to narrow the network and in the end this is all done to make the United Healthcare data less complicated to work with, not about better care so they can hire fewer employees on their end and have less data expenditures.  Let’s also not forget all the data the company buys and sells as well, it’s a ton to include patient credit card transactions.  </strong></p> <p><strong>In the meantime, United continues to guide CMS on their care models and create even more complexities for consumers to deal with so this is totally one sided here when the dollar amounts paid out are the same, they just want less data to manage</strong>, flat out <u>so inconvenience the hell out of consumers for this!</u>  Again if you believe any other reason for this when doctors agree to lower rates and the same that current doctors are getting paid, you better think again on that one and watch video #1 in the footer here, <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">“Quantitated Justifications for Things That Are Not True”</a>   That also seems to fit a lot of the studies we have read from United over the last number of years too about how different technologies will save money in healthcare and flat out, it was all bunk done for marketing purposes.     </p> <p>Let’s not forget <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/how-hard-did-united-have-to-lobby-to.html">Andy Slavitt from United now being the #2 person at Medicare</a> and all these types of business models will be shoved down that pipeline as well over there as they have been quietly behind the scenes for a few years now.  I happened to run across an old article with Senator Rockefeller and the Senator sat there with both the CEO Hemsley and Slavitt (who at the time was CEO of Ingenix)  and basically in so many words told them they were both somewhat less human in their thoughts with their arrogance.  BD   </p> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://wate.images.worldnow.com/interface/js/WNVideo.js?rnd=750365;hostDomain=www.wate.com;playerWidth=430;playerHeight=355;isShowIcon=true;clipId=10407353;flvUri=;partnerclipid=;adTag=News;advertisingZone=;enableAds=true;landingPage=;islandingPageoverride=false;playerType=STANDARD_EMBEDDEDscript;controlsType=overlay"></script> <hr />KNOXVILLE (WATE) - Thousands of patients in Tennessee won't be able to see their doctors after United Healthcare makes a change in their Medicare plans. A concerned relative contacted 6 News this week worried her mother's health would suffer. And we soon found out, she is not alone.  <br />It turns out this is happening all over the country. About 600 doctors in Tennessee alone are finding out that they're being cut this year from the United Healthcare Medicare network. With no option to change insurance companies until 2015, that leaves all those patients without a doctor they know and trust for the rest of this year. <p>Like most of the patients, Griggs has been with Dr. Mire since he started his practice 30 years ago and she has numerous health problems. Most of the letters the patients got from United Healthcare last week recommend a new primary care doctor. Griggs says hers turned out to be a neurologist, not primary care.</p> <p>"Q. Why is UnitedHealthcare making these changes now, when members can’t switch to a new plan?</p> <p>"A. We feel these changes will have a positive effect on the overall quality of our health plan and our member experience. The timing of these changes was driven by our desire to make these improvements as quickly as possible and to ensure beneficiaries have a clear understanding of our physician network before open enrollment in the fall. We understand the concern this may cause our members, and we are prepared to help them make any necessary transition and, most importantly, prevent any disruption to necessary care they are receiving from their doctor."</p> <p><a href="http://www.wate.com/story/26116922/knoxville-medicare-patients-upset-about-having-to-change-doctors">http://www.wate.com/story/26116922/knoxville-medicare-patients-upset-about-having-to-change-doctors</a></p>

Patients In Tennessee Speak Out About United Healthcare Firing Their Doctors As the Effort Continues To Reduce Their Own In House Overhead With Managing Fewer Doctor NPI Accounts, Contracts and Billing…More Killer Algorithms At Work Hurting Seniors

This is getting old and it really sucks as when you listen to the video the one doctor asks what he can do to stay in network and will work ...

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FDA Authorizes Use of Non Approved Ebola Virus Test - Special Emergency Use Provision

<p>A vaccine doesn’t look to be on track until the end of 2015 but at least the test is available.  The outbreak in the US would be extremely rare but at hospitals where patients are being treated, like Emory they will need the test to be available just in case someone was accidentally exposed, etc.  Around 55% of those infected end up dying.  BD <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="126" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-OE6UojQNycM/U-MMN55pGyI/AAAAAAABLCg/bLLJaYbke9s/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /></p> <p> <hr />The FDA has authorized use of an unapproved Ebola virus test under a special emergency-use provision, although efforts to develop a vaccine for the deadly illness are unlikely to bear fruit until 2015, officials say.</p> <p>The test-tube diagnostic test was developed by the U.S. military and is used to detect the Zaire strain of Ebola, which has infected at least 1,711 and killed 932 in West Africa.</p> <p>"The test is designed for use in individuals, including Department of Defense personnel and responders, who may be at risk of infection as a result of the outbreak," FDA spokeswoman Stephanie Yao said in a statement.  </p> <p>"Two other companies, Tekmira and BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, receive funding from the Department of Defense's Defense Threat Reduction Agency and have therapeutic candidates for Ebola in early development," read a <a href="http://www.phe.gov/Preparedness/mcm/Pages/ebola-factsheet.aspx">statement</a> from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.</p> <p><a href="http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-ebola-vaccine-20140806-story.html">http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-ebola-vaccine-20140806-story.html</a></p>

FDA Authorizes Use of Non Approved Ebola Virus Test - Special Emergency Use Provision

A vaccine doesn’t look to be on track until the end of 2015 but at least the test is available.  The outbreak in the US would be extremely r...

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MMRGlobal Files 3rd Brief, Court Hearing Coming Up In A Couple Weeks Regarding Patent Infringements

<p>The MMRGlobal patent disputes have been continuing for a couple of years now and I was curious to take a look and see if I could understand some of this a little better by looking at the court document filed.  I read through it and there’s several sections where the “terminology” is questioned and sometimes disputed.  This is a lot of work and a lot of legal time spent it appears<img align="right" height="101" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-4WX5T_BYj3M/UpOsF-LH5NI/AAAAAAABIrc/-u7x3Z1xW4Y/image%25255B8%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="170" /> to me.  Now to bring you up to date, some of the license cases have already been settled.  Below are a couple back links for the history on this case.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/mmrglobal-day-federal-court-along-with.html">MMRGlobal-A Day Federal Court Along With Quest Diagnostics, Jardogs, Allscripts and WebMD - Patent Testimony Information</a></h5> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/09/mmrgbobal-mymedicalrecords-files-patent.html">MMRGlobal(MyMedicalRecords) Files Patent Infringement Against Allscripts Medical Records Relative To the Universal Health Record Technologies in Use</a></h5> <p>MMRGlobal has already settled with some of the other parties and here’s a couple examples at the links below.  As I understand the settlement values are confidential so I can’t offer any additional information there other than the fact that the cases settled.   A <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markman_hearing">Marksman Hearing</a>  is a pretrial hearing in  US District Court where a judge examines evidence from all parties relevant to key words in patent claims and this is where we are at here with the 3rd brief filing.  A Marksman Hearing is also known as a “Claim Construction Hearing” and this is where this lies at present.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/mmr-global-and-cerner-reach-patent.html">MMR Global and Cerner Reach Patent Agreement</a></h5> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/walgreens-and-mymedicalrecords-reach.html">Walgreens and MyMedicalRecords Reach Settlement Agreement Related to Patent Infringements</a></h5> <p>In reading the brief filed with the courts here we have a small company like MMRGlobal as a “David” figure going up against the Goliath’s if you will and this certainly makes some kind of statement today for the value of intellectual properties.  MMRGlobal’s original patents go back to 2005 with their initial filings.<strong>  I’m amazed at the “staying power” that the full investigation seems to have</strong>.  </p> <p>From the other side of the coin you might ask too “why in the world are the big corporations spending all this time and money”?<strong>  Could not one of them just come in and offer to buy MMRGlobal and be done with all of this?</strong>  I don’t know what the costs of the legal fees are here nor could I even say that the idea of an offer might have even crossed anyone’s mind but you do begin to wonder.  Again after seeing the other two settlements being a done deal, why is the exact language that’s shown in the document some kind of a sticking point and is this yet another example of some dire complexities that drag things out further?  </p> <p>I guess you could say too that if the patents are in fact legal and binding and in place, this stands to say something about the use of a full investigation to get to the bottom of what is valid intellectual property.  So in a couple weeks the next, <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="74" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-RzzY9guRVp4/U-JIG6phDjI/AAAAAAABLCM/SPYzZjWTfCk/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="187" />and I believe final hearing with a judge will take place as a Marksman Hearing and then it’s the legal system’s case to make the final decision.  The legal brief cites Walgreens and others but when you get down to the bottom of the document below, it appears verbiage here is more specific to Allscripts and Quest.  </p> <p><strong>Anyway, again the time and effort big corporations are spending here seems to be intense and expensive.</strong>     So again, why doesn’t one of these companies just put themselves out their legal misery and make MMRGlobal a buy offer and end it all, or maybe that’s a tough decision call, as then the two could dispute the value of the intellectual property patents among themselves and debate about who could get to buy MMRGlobal as well:)   Stay tuned…..BD  </p> <p style="font: 14px helvetica,arial,sans-serif; margin: 12px auto 6px; display: block; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; -x-system-font: none"><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/235999581/MMR-Coordinated-Cases-Plaintiff-s-Reply-Claim-Construction-Brief" style="text-decoration: underline" title="View MMR - Coordinated Cases - Plaintiff_s Reply Claim Construction Brief on Scribd">MMR - Coordinated Cases - Plaintiff_s Reply Claim Construction Brief</a> </p> <iframe id="doc_80827" class="scribd_iframe_embed" height="600" src="//www.scribd.com/embeds/235999581/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&access_key=key-SG65Hc62z0kaX5kSzMh9&show_recommendations=true" frameborder="0" width="100%" scrolling="no" data-auto-height="false" data-aspect-ratio="0.7729220222793488"></iframe>

MMRGlobal Files 3rd Brief, Court Hearing Coming Up In A Couple Weeks Regarding Patent Infringements

The MMRGlobal patent disputes have been continuing for a couple of years now and I was curious to take a look and see if I could understand ...

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Craig Venter Hires Top Computer Scientist From Google To Decipher Hundreds of Thousand of Human Genomes

<p>The quest here is to help with the tremendous amounts of data with examining microbiomes t<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="158" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-1ga81YeI5ik/U-HcJx_ldBI/AAAAAAABLB8/MD7kxXEzkD8/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />o determine how they affect our health.  The data scientist will not even have to move and will stay in Mountain View.  Ok so when we are talking machine learning I have to include my episode with Google Machine learning as well, so you can see every algorithm doesn’t always get it right, still programmed by humans.  BD </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/01/im-sorry-your-google-plus-name-does-not.html">“I’m sorry Your Google Plus Name Does Not Comply With Google “Names Policies”…Barbara “Duck Algorithm” & Was Using My Real Name All Along…Killer Algorithms Chapter 52</a></h5> <p><em>“Venter’s announcement came on the same day that Google revealed it is launching Baseline Study, an ambitious effort to collect extensive genetic and molecular information from at least 175 people in an effort to better determine the profile of healthy humans.</em> “</p> <p> <hr />La Jolla geneticist J. Craig Venter announced Tuesday that he has hired one of the world’s top computer scientists in a bid to prolong and improve people’s lives by deciphering hundreds of thousands of human genomes.</p> <p>Franz Och was lured away from Mountain View-based Google, where he has been guiding Google Translate, a service capable of translating more than 80 languages. The software, which has more than 200 million active users, translates everything from Yiddish to Swahili to English.</p> <p>Och will help discover ways to make it faster and easier for scientists to sift through the extraordinary amounts of data produced by genomic sequencing. He will serve as chief data scientist at Human Longevity Inc., a company in La Jolla that Venter co-founded this year to conduct the largest sequencing effort ever undertaken. The company plans to initially sequence 40,000 genomes a year, then ramp up to 100,000 annually. </p> <p><a href="http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/jul/30/tp-venter-hires-top-computer-scientist-for-genome/">http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/jul/30/tp-venter-hires-top-computer-scientist-for-genome/</a></p>

Craig Venter Hires Top Computer Scientist From Google To Decipher Hundreds of Thousand of Human Genomes

The quest here is to help with the tremendous amounts of data with examining microbiomes t o determine how they affect our health.  The data...

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Community Health System To Pay $98 Million For Charges of Systematically Over Admitting Patients

<p>A nurse and a doctor were the whistle blowers here and worked in the ER room at a hospital in Philadelphia and at a medical center in Tennessee.  The lawsuit was filed in 2011 and stated that routinely people were admitted who did not need to be there.  This practice picked up additional dollars for the hospitals from both Medicare and Medicaid.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="58" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/--OyQbph60nc/U-GpHMs7nDI/AAAAAAABLBs/HgtDwHzGoEc/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />  BD</p> <p> <hr />WASHINGTON, Aug 04, 2014 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Community Health Systems, Inc. (CHS) has agreed to pay over $98 million to resolve allegations that it overbilled the federal Medicare and Medicaid systems by unnecessarily admitting patients to more than 100 of its hospitals across the country. The settlement was announced today by the U.S. Department of Justice. </p> <p>Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, along with co-counsel Grant & Eisenhofer and Barrett, Johnson, Martin & Garrison, represented plaintiff-relators Dr. James Doghramji and Sheree Cook in their False Claims Act lawsuit against CHS, one of seven lawsuits resolved by today’s settlement. Dr. Doghramji has served as an emergency room physician at Philadelphia’s Chestnut Hill Hospital and Cook worked as a nurse at Heritage Medical Center in Shelbyville, Tenn. In May 2011, they filed United States ex rel. Doghramji v. Community Health Systems Inc. in the U.S. District Court in Nashville, Tenn. The complaint alleged that CHS routinely admitted patients whose conditions were not severe enough to justify admission, and then billed Medicare and Medicaid for those admissions. </p> <p>In addition to specific allegations about CHS’ admission practices, Dr. Doghramji and Cook also provided a comprehensive statistical analysis showing admission rates that were significantly higher than expected at more than 70 CHS hospitals nationwide. </p> <p>“CHS unnecessarily hospitalized patients so that it could make more money through larger Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements. </p> <p><a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/community-health-systems-to-pay-98-million-to-settle-charges-of-submitting-false-medicare-and-medicaid-claims-by-systematically-over-admitting-patients-2014-08-04">http://www.marketwatch.com/story/community-health-systems-to-pay-98-million-to-settle-charges-of-submitting-false-medicare-and-medicaid-claims-by-systematically-over-admitting-patients-2014-08-04</a></p>

Community Health System To Pay $98 Million For Charges of Systematically Over Admitting Patients

A nurse and a doctor were the whistle blowers here and worked in the ER room at a hospital in Philadelphia and at a medical center in Tennes...

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Biggest Healthcare Real Estate Deal in 3 Years as NorthStar Reality Acquires Griffin-American Healthcare REIT - $4 Billion in Cash

<p>The properties consist of doctor’s offices and senior facilities.  Big corporations are going to own all<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="155" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-TtZJ8qyH7Zc/U-Gi2IYFBeI/AAAAAAABLBc/ui1By0TQs1U/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="244" /> of those too and Griffin is the largest company in the industry.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />New York-based property investment company NorthStar Realty Finance Corp. has agreed to buy Griffin-American Healthcare REIT for $4 billion in a cash-and-stock deal.</p> <p>Nearly 75 percent of Griffin-American’s holdings are comprised of medical office buildings and senior housing facilities in the United States and the United Kingdom, according to a statement from NorthStar. The purchase follows NorthStar’s $1 billion acquisition of senior housing and nursing home buildings in March.</p> <p><a href="http://therealdeal.com/blog/2014/08/05/northstar-to-buy-griffin-america-healthcare-reit-for-4b/">http://therealdeal.com/blog/2014/08/05/northstar-to-buy-griffin-america-healthcare-reit-for-4b/</a></p>

Biggest Healthcare Real Estate Deal in 3 Years as NorthStar Reality Acquires Griffin-American Healthcare REIT - $4 Billion in Cash

The properties consist of doctor’s offices and senior facilities.  Big corporations are going to own all of those too and Griffin is the la...

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Cerner Buys Siemens Health Services for $1.3 Billion

<p>In case you missed this today and here’s a couple back links I have about Siemens below, so I guess Cerner now has access to the the implantable chip, yikes(grin).  A few years ago IBM has signed a contract to help finance medical records with Siemens<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="74" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-whCTuTRgn_g/U-F7Wzr3_6I/AAAAAAABLBE/XkIftbVBPyM/image%25255B6%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="195" /> and boy are the money circles changing today with technology and if you dig back a little further we had the big Pentagon investigation of Siemens so they have had some “rolls” over the last few years.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2011/01/positiveid-chip-people-are-back.html"><strong>PositiveID The “Chip” People are Back-an Agreement with Siemens To Expand Wireless Body Monitoring With A Chip Implant</strong></a></h5> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2012/11/siemens-to-release-first-wireless.html"><strong>Siemens to Release the First Wireless Ultrasound –Announced at RSNA the Acuson Freestyle–Scan From Up to 9 Feet Away With Direct Line of Sight</strong></a></h5> <p>One thing for sure between the two of the big companies they have sure must have a lot of IP Patents and <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/mmr-global-and-cerner-reach-patent.html">one small company settled</a> with Cerner earlier this year on a dispute.  Here’s another fairly recent partnership of Cerner’s with add<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="69" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-XDnuHZJFVPs/U-F7XrJpVvI/AAAAAAABLBM/HJp5mdSHCRA/image%25255B5%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />ing genomic information to patient medical records.  There’s been a few interesting people come from Cerner too who have gone on to other businesses such as David Cummings who started the BATS stock exchange, it all code.  Cerner was founded in 1979.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/cerner-and-claritas-genomics-announce.html">Cerner and Claritas Genomics Announce Partnership With Adding Sequencing Information to Electronic Medical Records With Molecular Diagnostics Labs While Subsidiary Cerner Capital Becomes a Minority Shareholder</a></h5> <p>And then there’s “Cernerville” the office part being developed…</p> <p><strong><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/08/cernervillea-new-office-park-at-site-of.html">“Cernerville”–A New Office Park at the Site of a Former Shopping Mall Being Developed by Cerner Medical Records</a></strong></p> <p>In recent years as have many software companies Cerner has made a decent number of acquisitions as well stemming from genomics to business intelligence as well.  So read below if you want to see the official word from Cerner and a couple of paragraphs from <a href="http://acquisitions.cernernews.com/pdfs/Frequently%20Asked%20Questions%20080514.pdf">their FAQ page</a> on the site.  Siemens AG employees and 5000 sites will transfer over to Cerner.  Overseas in German Cerner will keep the Siemens Health Services locations in Berlin, Erlangen and St. Wolfgang.  BD <hr /></p> <p> <br /><em><strong><u>What are the solution names?</u></strong> <br />Cerner is acquiring the following solutions families: <br />Soarian®, Invision®, MedSeries4®, Eagle2000®, Healthcare Intelligence, OPENLink™, Pharmacy/Med Admin Check – Linux, Advanced Interoperability Service, Patient Identification Check, ePrescribing, Novius® Lab, Enterprise Document Management, Signature, HDX®, MobileMD®, CareXcell™, MedSuite, medico®, clinicom®, i.s.h.med®, i.c.m.health®, Melior, DocuLive, Aurora, Selene, Obstetrix, syngo® share, sense, and proAct.</em></p> <p><strong><u><em>What solutions and services is Cerner acquiring?</em></u></strong></p> <p><em>Cerner will acquire the following Siemens Health Services’ offerings through this acquisition: EMR, Ambulatory, Behavioral Health, Clinical Portal, EDI, Emergency Department, Enterprise Document Management, Enterprise Solutions, Workflow Optimization, Health Information Exchange, Healthcare Intelligence, Patient Portal, Laboratory, Long-term Care, Population Health, Revenue Cycle, Surgery, and Workforce Management solutions.</em> <hr /></p> <p>Press Release as follows: </p> <p><strong><u>Cerner and Siemens AG to combine strengths to deliver new solutions through $100 million strategic alliance</u></strong></p> <p>KANSAS CITY, Mo., Aug. 5, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Cerner Corporation</p> <p>(Nasdaq:CERN) and Siemens AG today announced they signed a definitive agreement for Cerner to acquire the assets of Siemens' health information technology business unit, Siemens Health Services, for $1.3 billion in cash. By combining investments in R&D, knowledgeable resources, and complementary client bases, the acquisition creates scale for future innovation. As part of the agreement, Cerner and Siemens will form a strategic alliance to bring new solutions to market that combine Cerner's health IT leadership and Siemens' strengths in medical devices and imaging.</p> <p>"We believe this is an all-win situation for the clients of both organizations and all of our associates and shareholders," said Neal Patterson, Cerner chairman, CEO and co-founder. "Through more than $4 billion of cumulative investments in R&D, Cerner has established a strong market standing and is positioned for continued growth. Siemens'</p> <p>health care IT assets provide additional scale, R&D, an impressive client base, and knowledgeable and experienced associates who will help Cerner achieve our plans for the next decade. In addition, the alliance we're creating will drive the next generation of innovations that embed information from the EMR inside advanced diagnostic and therapeutic technologies, benefitting our shared clients."</p> <p><strong><u>Based on 2014 estimates, Cerner and Siemens Health Services have combined totals of more than:</u></strong></p> <p>-- 20,000 associates in more than 30 countries</p> <p>-- 18,000 client facilities, including some of the largest health care</p> <p>organizations in their respective countries</p> <p>-- $4.5 billion of annual revenue</p> <p>-- $650 million of annual R&D investment</p> <p>The transaction is expected to be more than $0.15 accretive to Cerner's non-GAAP diluted EPS in 2015, and more than $0.25 accretive in 2016.</p> <p>Non-GAAP earnings are expected to exclude share-based compensation expense, one-time transaction costs, and acquisition-related amortization and deferred revenue adjustments.</p> <p>"We are excited to join with one of the most competitive companies in health IT today, and a recognized leader in innovation," said John Glaser, Ph.D., CEO of the Health Services business unit of Siemens Healthcare. "Siemens cares deeply about its clients and believes Cerner is the best organization to fully support their health IT needs going forward. The knowledge and strength of our combined resources opens up great possibilities for future collaboration and development, which is exciting for all of us. And our clients will benefit from our alignment with a company that has such a strong historical and future commitment to rapid innovation."</p> <p>Cerner has a 35-year history of creating value for clients by providing innovative solutions and services that help health care providers around the world increase safety, improve quality and reduce waste.</p> <p>Cerner is well-positioned to help clients be leaders in health care delivery and population health management today and tomorrow. The company's competitive market position, combined with significant investments in R&D, understanding of advances in science and IT, as well as health care regulatory and industry shifts, enable it to help clients succeed.</p> <p>"We have tremendous respect for Siemens' clients, their markets and their needs," said Patterson. "We look forward to bringing them into the Cerner family, especially as they face increasingly complex clinical and regulatory environments, with mandates to improve quality and pressures to lower cost. We pride ourselves on helping clients navigate changing times so they can be leaders in providing care to their communities. We're committed to supporting Siemens' clients, and we want them to have confidence that we have the vision, scale and resources to help them achieve their plans for building their organizations' futures."</p> <p>Following the acquisition, support for Siemens Health Services core platforms will remain in place. Current implementations will continue, and Cerner plans to support and advance the Soarian platform for at least the next decade. Cerner will work with all clients to support their short-term and long-term business needs.</p> <p><strong><u>Global Alliance</u></strong></p> <p><strong>Cerner and Siemens will create a strategic alliance to jointly invest in innovative projects that integrate health IT with medical technologies for the purpose of enhancing workflows and improving clinical outcomes. Each company will contribute up to $50 million to fund projects of shared importance to both companies and their clients.</strong></p> <p>The alliance has a three-year initial term. Advanced workflows along with medical images and their unique role in diagnostic and therapeutic decision-making, will be an early focus of the joint work.</p> <p>"Siemens is very innovative around imaging, diagnostic and therapeutic technologies and processes," said Patterson. "Medical technologies generate mountains of images and other data that must be stored, accessed, visualized and interpreted intelligently. In addition, advanced diagnostic and therapeutic processes are enhanced by presenting EMR data at just the right moment and in the right context.</p> <p>Together we will innovate at the edge where IT, processes and technologies meet."</p> <p><strong><u>Transaction Summary</u></strong></p> <p>Cerner intends to finance the acquisition with cash on hand. The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of 2015, subject to regulatory approval and other customary conditions. The transaction has been approved by the boards of Cerner and Siemens.</p> <p>Greenhill & Co. is acting as financial advisor to Cerner, and Latham & Watkins LLP is acting as its legal counsel. JP Morgan is acting as financial advisor to Siemens, and Clifford Chance LLP is acting as its legal advisor.</p> <p><strong><u>About Cerner</u></strong></p> <p>Cerner's health information technologies connect people, information, and systems, at approximately 14,000 facilities worldwide. Recognized for innovation, Cerner solutions assist clinicians in making care decisions and enable organizations to manage the health of populations.</p> <p>The company provides clients with a wide range of in-house services, as well as an integrated clinical and financial system to help organizations manage revenue. Cerner's mission is to contribute to the systemic improvement of health care delivery and the health of communities. (Nasdaq:CERN) For more information about Cerner, please visit <a href="http://www.cerner.com">www.cerner.com</a>, check out our blog at <a href="http://www.cerner.com/blog">www.cerner.com/blog</a> and connect with us on Twitter at <a href="http://www.twitter.com/cerner">http://www.twitter.com/cerner</a> and on Facebook at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/cerner">www.facebook.com/cerner</a>.</p> <p><strong>Certain trademarks, service marks and logos set forth herein are property of Cerner Corporation and/or its subsidiaries. All other non-Cerner marks are the property of their respective owners.</strong></p> <p>All statements in this press release that do not directly and exclusively relate to historical facts constitute forward-looking statements. Statements relating to the expected benefits of the proposed transaction and Cerner's post-transaction plans, objectives, expectations and intentions are examples of such forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on the current beliefs, expectations and assumptions of Cerner's management with respect to future events and are subject to a number of significant risks and uncertainties. It is important to note that Cerner's performance, and actual results, financial condition or business could differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. In many instances, the words "plans," "estimates,"</p> <p>"intends," "believe," "position," "expects," "will" or the negative of these words, variations thereof or similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include, but are not limited to: risks inherent with business acquisitions and integrations such as difficulties and operational and financial risks associated with integrating Cerner and the acquired business; the occurrence of any event, change or other circumstances that could give rise to the termination of the transaction agreements; the risk that the necessary regulatory approvals may not be obtained in a timely manner or may be obtained subject to conditions that are not anticipated; the risk of uncertainty as to timing of the consummation of the acquisition; risks that any of the closing conditions to the proposed transaction may not be satisfied or may not be satisfied in a timely manner; risks related to disruption of management time from ongoing business operations due to the proposed transaction; failure to realize the synergies and other benefits expected from the proposed transaction; risk that the assets and business acquired may not continue to be commercially successful; the effect of the announcement of the proposed transaction and the transaction itself on the ability of Cerner to retain customers and retain and hire key personnel and maintain relationships with key suppliers; unexpected costs, charges or expenses resulting from the transaction; and litigation or claims relating to the transaction or the acquired assets and business. Additional discussion of other risks, uncertainties and factors affecting Cerner's business is contained in Cerner's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The reader should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, since the statements speak only as of the date that they are made.</p> <p>Cerner undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect changed assumptions, the occurrence of unanticipated events or changes in future operating results, financial condition or business over time.</p>

Cerner Buys Siemens Health Services for $1.3 Billion

In case you missed this today and here’s a couple back links I have about Siemens below, so I guess Cerner now has access to the the implant...

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Wearables Again, Consumers Are Not Going There Until We Get Some Transparency and Privacy Efforts As We Know There’s Data Being Collected But We Don’t Know Where It Goes…

<p>Every day there’s at least 2-20 articles about wearables and here’s one more.  If I have to sit down and read some complex privacy statement from a website on the apps, I’m just not going there to get trapped by a data selling algorithm.  In the real world outside the web I’m finding a lot of folks saying the same thing and I tell them if you don’t understand the privacy statement well <img align="right" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-plWlwjvBCt0/U6kBronT5FI/AAAAAAABKqg/d6g94Sk0OII/image%25255B7%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" />enough to feel comfortable, pass it on as it will bug you. <strong>I keep promoting my cause here to form and index and license all data sellers so we know who they are.  We’re tired of this behind the scenes routine.  In addition, the data collected can go to some “scoring” effort and then later, somewhere along the line we get denied something so what’s the incentive here?</strong>  </p> <p>In addition you have to make a commitment to react with the data as well.  We’ve seen it with some of the fitness devices and after a few months people get tired of it and it ends up in the drawer.  Sure people may be getting healthier, doing better things in life <strong>but you do not “have to wear a device” to accomplish that.  It’s still a choice and the wearable folks,</strong> insurers and pharma need to remind themselves of that and there’s no real proof that this creates better health outcomes, just more data to sell.  <strong>A personal trainer is more apt to impact your health outcomes than a wearable.</strong>  </p> <p>With all this undue pressure with devices that collect data that we really don’t know where it goes, <strong>folks are headed for the exits to stay out of the radar</strong>.  Let’s face it, we are not all salivating for wearables right now and it’s not a model that people will run to either in flocks.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-quiet-and-unspoken-consumer.html">The Quiet and Unspoken Consumer Movement to Stay Off the Radar - Contrary To All You Read About Sensors, Apps and Wearables, More Folks Are Running for the Exit Doors…</a></h5> <p>People don’t work that way and all these models that are dreamed up look wonderful written up in text reviews but that’s where most of it ends.  You take our data and sell it, we won’t like you if you are not transparent so why not put out a list of what kind of data you sell as a company and who you sell to.  We need that now that data selling has progressed to “data flipping” to where your data is bought and sold and re-queried over and over.  <strong>We don’t like it and when there’s errors we need to fix, hell there’s no reference on where to go or who has the data after a few flips.</strong></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/people-dont-work-that-way-world-of.html">“People Don’t Work That Way” A World of Broken Software Models That Don’t Align To the Human Side,Too Much Push At Times With Only A Proof of Concept That Fails in the Real World..</a></h5> <p>I talk to people in the “real world” and listen to what they say as what’s on the web is not the same all the time and how I write as well as I’m one who does recognize the difference between the virtual and real worlds.  <a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0"><img align="right" border="0" height="153" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-pDkERQGCavs/U7CCFhJ-lRI/AAAAAAABKtI/kXyumQqvSoM/Privacy_GoFundMe%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="197" /></a>We have too many living in <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/virtual-worlds-real-world-we-have.html">“The Grays”</a>“The Grays” and the real world always come back, no matter how long your “virtually” escape.  </p> <p><a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0">Click here and help the campaign</a> out if you will so we can get a law passed to index and license all data sellers, it’s a huge epidemic.  <strong>Read the link below where the rest of the world is watching “The Scoring of America” as no other country is doing all of this data selling and scoring to this extent, just the US</strong> and that’s inequality is accelerated as you get denied access and your “secret score” gets sold as well, and you never knew you were scored at all, the big secret.  Fix some transparency here and maybe consumers might begin to trust again but now we’re all having our asses chased off daily by tons of algorithms no matter where we go.  BD   </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/world-privacy-forum-report-scoring-of.html">World Privacy Forum Report - The Scoring of America: How Secret Consumer Scores Threaten Your Privacy and Your Future - One Big Element that Fuels the Continued Attack of Killer Algorithms & Demise of the Middle Class Creating Profiteering And/Or Denial of Access</a></h5> <hr />Some observers have sounded a note of caution however, suggesting that access to wearable technology could eventually evolve healthcare towards a two-tier healthcare system. The digitally-literate could use the technology to demonstrate a commitment to health - securing preferential access to new medicines and enjoying favorable insurance rates - while others miss out. <p>It remains to be seen whether wearable technology goes mainstream, let alone has a fundamental impact on society in the way that the internet and mobile devices have, although the early signs are good. </p> <p>Pharma has been talking for years about moving away from a product-oriented business model to one more closely focused on serving the needs of patients - perhaps wearables could become a pillar of that new approach.</p> <p><a href="http://www.pmlive.com/pharma_news/wearing_it_well_the_potential_of_wearable_technology_in_healthcare_589546">http://www.pmlive.com/pharma_news/wearing_it_well_the_potential_of_wearable_technology_in_healthcare_589546</a></p>

Wearables Again, Consumers Are Not Going There Until We Get Some Transparency and Privacy Efforts As We Know There’s Data Being Collected But We Don’t Know Where It Goes…

Every day there’s at least 2-20 articles about wearables and here’s one more.  If I have to sit down and read some complex privacy statement...

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Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield of California Going to Create “Yet Another Big Data Base of Patient Medical Records” - Be Ready for Premiums to Go Up As Health IT Eats Up the Healthcare System

<p>Will this reduce costs?  Heck no as it will be expensive to maintain and there will be down times and besides so many doctors are on electronic medical records so I <strong>guess the state HIEs are not going fast enough for these two.</strong>  We are on a huge data base kick and this is expensive and will serve to make the cost of healthcare grow.  </p> <p>I have no problem with having good data and relative data ready and at hand for decision making.<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="185" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-tgLlQWsGma8/U-BkdraLtQI/AAAAAAABLA0/xn-wz-Ju2y4/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="249" />  If the two insurers can kick out $80 million in just seed money, just imagine what the next line of funding will be.  Let’s see maybe Optum as a competitor won’t be getting this contract(grin) or who knows as they all stick together on some issues.  This is to be run by a non profit and called Cal Index.  Oh boy wait until the IT Infrastructure fun begins with this one. <strong> It will have the history of 1 in 4 residents of California, so will doctor’s offices bother?</strong>  </p> <p>They might and they might not as in a busy office they do what they have time for as guess what, we have a “Healthgrades scenario” going here as <strong>the files will have claim information but they want providers to enter clinical data!!  So in other words they put out the skeleton files and want everyone else fill it up!</strong></p> <p>As a patient you will be able to opt out and this is a weird model for a make shift HIE.  </p> <p>So let’s circle around back to the hot post of the day today on my blog, a Clarity Server that can connect medical records with each facility and there’s no data warehouse.  When one can connect to other locations in this fashion why do warehousing?  Besides the Zoeticx system can connect to existing HIEs that are built and working.  See link below.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/zoeticx-clarity-server-middleware-hie.html">Zoeticx Clarity Server - Middleware HIE Will Save Millions Maybe Billions With HIE And Has 3-6 Year ONC Compatible Time Line, Works Using APIs, Web Apps Where Nobody Has to Swap Out Their EHR…</a></h5> <p><strong>So expect your premiums to go up as Health IT continues to eat up the healthcare system with lack of coordinated efforts and this looks like one more expenditure that is somewhat duplicated</strong> if you will and may offer more information and take more time than what is really needed to deliver good care.  BD  </p> <hr />Two of California's largest health insurers are partnering to create a massive database of patient medical records. <p>With just a few strokes of a keyboard, doctors and nurses will be able to access the medical histories of about one in four California residents.</p> <p>Supporters say the effort by Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of California could mean faster, cheaper and better healthcare. But the system faces significant technological challenges and privacy concerns.</p> <p><a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-insurance-database-patient-records-20140804-story.html?track=rss&cid=dlvr.it&dlvrit=52116">http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-insurance-database-patient-records-20140804-story.html?track=rss&cid=dlvr.it&dlvrit=52116</a></p>

Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield of California Going to Create “Yet Another Big Data Base of Patient Medical Records” - Be Ready for Premiums to Go Up As Health IT Eats Up the Healthcare System

Will this reduce costs?  Heck no as it will be expensive to maintain and there will be down times and besides so many doctors are on electro...

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VA Is Not Going to Lose Their Bonuses After All - But A Cap of $360 Million Annually Will Be Applied

<p>$360 million is still a good size dollar amount to pay out a lot of bonuses.  This was the compromised bill with the House and Senate after the House voted 426-0 to ban the bonuses.  You kind of wonder about the entire bonus deal here and maybe paying doctors some of that money who are underpaid in many areas anyway, could have been another idea?  One <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="104" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-QWBpYRHgdXM/U971GAvfvBI/AAAAAAABLAg/BwWn8XwZJ0Q/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="273" />thing for sure I bet there’s some additional auditing in place on bonuses next time around.  </p> <p>If you look back this was part of the problem at the VA to where all were living in their stat rat world and not focusing on giving good care with nobody able to make a left turn to save a life.   So it appears things cooled down a bit from the original vote to suspend bonuses.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/va-crisis-should-be-huge-wake-up-call.html">VA Crisis Should Be A Huge Wake Up Call , We Have Turned Into a Nation of “Stat Rats”, Losing Touch With the “Real” World As Virtual Values Confuse, Collide and Wreak Havoc As Models & Formulas Fail</a></h5> <p>We have the White House as well stuck in the virtual world too and I knew the day I saw the selfie with Obama and Biden, well that kind of told me we’ve lost them too into being stuck in virtual values and living in “The Grays”.  You can read the link below if you want and it’s odd with quoting some predictive statistics that nobody can predict and sad to see this gilded and “suckered in “ perceptions all the way at the top.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/junk-science-appearing-everywhere-even.html">Junk Science Appearing Everywhere, Even The White House “PR Templated” Correspondence Creates Spurious Correlations…</a></h5> <p>It’s called <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">“quantitated justifications”</a> for things not true and video #1 in my footer does a good job showing and explaining how we can all get duped, just “put a math formula in it” and people suck it all in.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />A House-Senate agreement on how to reform the broken Department of Veterans Affairs will let the VA hand out up to $360 million in bonuses to its employees each year, even though the House voted just weeks ago to strip all VA bonuses through 2016.</p> <p>The compromise bill announced Monday by the chairmen of the House and Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committees says VA bonuses will be capped at $360 million annually for the next ten years. But that cap is just 10 percent below the $400 million in bonuses the VA has distributed in recent fiscal years, and will allow up to $3.6 billion in bonuses to be awarded over the next decade.</p> <p>“In each of fiscal years 2015 through 2024, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall ensure that the aggregate amount of awards and bonuses paid by the Secretary in a fiscal year… does not exceed $360,000,000,” the bill says.</p> <p>A description of the bill adds that members expect the VA to implement this cap in a way that does not “disproportionately impact lower-wage employees,” although the legislation itself does not include any restriction on how to award the money.</p> <p><strong>The bill stripping VA bonuses was </strong><a href="http://www.theblaze.com/blog/2014/06/10/house-votes-to-strip-va-bonus-money-and-it-is-a-whole-lot-of-money/"><strong>so popular</strong></a><strong>, the House held the vote again because some members missed the vote — members approved it later the same day 426-0.</strong></p> <p>The House-Senate agreement includes Senate-passed language that says senior officials can be fired or demoted, but also gives these officials access to an <a href="http://www.theblaze.com/blog/2014/07/28/fired-va-workers-will-get-appeals-process-under-house-senate-bill/">appeal process</a>. Specifically, the final agreement gives officials seven days to appeal firings or demotions to the Merit Systems Protection Board, which much decide these cases within 21 days.</p> <p><a href="http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/07/29/va-officials-will-get-millions-of-dollars-in-bonuses-under-house-senate-agreement/">http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/07/29/va-officials-will-get-millions-of-dollars-in-bonuses-under-house-senate-agreement/</a></p>

VA Is Not Going to Lose Their Bonuses After All - But A Cap of $360 Million Annually Will Be Applied

$360 million is still a good size dollar amount to pay out a lot of bonuses.  This was the compromised bill with the House and Senate after ...

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Private Equity Firms Exploring Options to Buy Old Drug Brands From GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi, Glaxo Has Already Opened the Door Asking For Bids From PE Firms

<p>When talking about “older” drug brands, most of what we are seeing here are drugs have expired patents so there’s generics available.  Some of the drugs in question include Imitrex, a migraine treatment, Zofran, for nausea , and Seroxat, an antidepressant.  <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="105" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-GLBDXnqXTa0/U97DwCdFT9I/AAAAAAABLAQ/nZOGPy0kUPQ/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />Private Equity firms have never played in this game before and interested parties include Blackstone, KKK, Bain and a few others.  </p> <p>There’s a lot of restructuring going on with pharmaceutical companies and it would be interesting to see how a PE firm would manage such an asset, and that’s not to say it can’t be done but when ownership type changes, the assets enter a whole new portfolio to where pharmaceuticals are not the only vertical represented.  In addition other Pharma companies are making specific acquisitions with one or two product lines.   At the end of May of this year is when Glaxo had officially put out invitations to bid on their older drugs and they especially want to dump the American and European mature markets.  </p> <p>This could get interesting with having PE firms that are not drug companies owning pharmaceuticals.  BD  </p> <p> <hr />Private equity groups are exploring a $10bn plan to buy hundreds of older drug brands from <a href="http://markets.ft.com/tearsheets/performance.asp?s=uk:GSK">GlaxoSmithKline</a> and Sanofi and merge them, highlighting the continued intense deal activity sweeping the pharmaceuticals sector.</p> <p><a href="http://markets.ft.com/tearsheets/performance.asp?s=us:KKR">KKR</a> and Warburg Pincus are among those weighing bids for the GSK and Sanofi assets – and looking at a possible combination of the two portfolios, according to several people familiar with the matter. KKR and Warburg Pincus declined to comment.</p> <p>GSK said last week that it had received “very significant” indicative bids from private equity companies and midsized drugmakers in a <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2f795102-e750-11e3-8b4e-00144feabdc0.html">portfolio of mature products</a> with annual sales of about £1bn.</p> <p>Sanofi, meanwhile, is considering the sale of about 200 older drugs with annual revenues of at least €2.1bn. Those assets alone have an enterprise value of €6.3bn, according to internal Sanofi documents leaked by a labour union last month.</p> <p><a href="http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/6138309c-17d8-11e4-a82d-00144feabdc0.html?ftcamp=published_links%2Frss%2Fhome_us%2Ffeed%2F%2Fproduct">http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/6138309c-17d8-11e4-a82d-00144feabdc0.html?ftcamp=published_links%2Frss%2Fhome_us%2Ffeed%2F%2Fproduct</a></p>

Private Equity Firms Exploring Options to Buy Old Drug Brands From GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi, Glaxo Has Already Opened the Door Asking For Bids From PE Firms

When talking about “older” drug brands, most of what we are seeing here are drugs have expired patents so there’s generics available.  Some ...

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“It’s A Big Club And You Aint In It” George Carlin - How the US Economy Works Today…

<p>Watch for the “F” Bombs and when you watch this again, it’s amazing how in tune George Carlin was.  This is exactly what we have out there today, “the game is rigged”.  </p> <p>He was ahead of his time and sure wish he was still around!  BD  </p> <p><iframe style="height: 280px; width: 490px" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/i5dBZDSSky0" frameborder="0" width="560" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/08/transparency-and-privacy-campaign-need.html">Transparency And Privacy Campaign - Need to License All Who Sell Data So We Know Who They Are - Why All Privacy Laws have Failed, We Have No Index…Please Help..</a></h5> <p>Visit the <a href="http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/">Killer Algorithms page</a> with videos that also explain “why we aren’t in it”.  BD  </p>

“It’s A Big Club And You Aint In It” George Carlin - How the US Economy Works Today…

Watch for the “F” Bombs and when you watch this again, it’s amazing how in tune George Carlin was.  This is exactly what we have out there t...

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Transparency And Privacy Campaign - Need to License All Who Sell Data So We Know Who They Are - Why All Privacy Laws have Failed, We Have No Index…Please Help..

<p>Think of it if you will of all the different entities that have to be licensed and this makes sense.  What if stock brokers were not licensed?  Could you imagine the havoc we would live with on top of what we already experience?  My campaign here does not stop data distribution and selling but rather is in the interest of transparency.  <strong>We have NONE right now</strong> and it’s getting worse all the time.<a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0"><img align="right" border="0" height="275" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-pDkERQGCavs/U7CCFhJ-lRI/AAAAAAABKtI/kXyumQqvSoM/Privacy_GoFundMe%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="355" /></a>  The problems lie when others reference flawed data about us and I’ve been there and now that the concept of “data flipping” has taken hold it’s worse.  Company A sells a data base with you in it to Company B.  Company has an in house data base and they query and merge it with the data base they bought from company A.  Now you have a new data base.  If this data base contains “scoring” of consumers, well you have new data to sell. Read up on the concerns of the World Privacy Forum and see their warning as this is not happening in the huge numbers that it is in the US, and thus they called their report “The Secret Scoring of America”.  It’s all companies do anymore is buy and sell data and there’s not a lot of interest in manufacturing any more. </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/world-privacy-forum-report-scoring-of.html">World Privacy Forum Report - The Scoring of America: How Secret Consumer Scores Threaten Your Privacy and Your Future - One Big Element that Fuels the Continued Attack of Killer Algorithms & Demise of the Middle Class Creating Profiteering And/Or Denial of Access</a></h5> <p>Back to company B now they sell this new data base to Company C and they merge it with data that they have on hand or have purchased.  You’ve already been flipped twice now.  See how this works and the process just keeps repeating itself over and over and over and the data gets flawed.  If you have erroneous entries you are on your own ticket to try and trace this back and once you have been flipped a couple times, good luck as you can’t do it, been there done that.  At least a couple weeks ago I did get Senator Warren’s office reading about the hospital that wants doctors to rummage through your Master Card records.  It’s an addiction as people think they can never get enough data and just keep collecting it and don’t know when they have enough to make a decision.  </p> <p><img align="left" alt="clip_image001" border="0" height="98" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-V9ma7vlwk5I/U921SuhYeEI/AAAAAAABK_4/eUtLOExa9yc/clip_image001%25255B5%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: left; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="clip_image001" width="704" /></p> <p><strong></strong></p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/mastercard-as-well-as-other-financial.html">Master Card is on a real tear to make money selling data</a> and last year they were bragging about it a couple of times in the news about their ecommerce center.  I wrote it up and warned all what was coming.  Do you wonder why credit cards are easier to get?  They have a side business of selling data that makes up for losses so the defaults are not that risky.  There’s other credit cards doing the same and they make billions selling data.  <strong>Even Walgreens pulls in at least a billion a year of revenue from just selling data.</strong></p> <p>What we need is a law that requires folks to buy a license and along with that some transparency with a list of what kind of data they sell and distribute and to who, as we at least need a look up capability somewhere along the line as consumers.  It will also pull some folks out from under the carpet as well.   Here’s a guest post from a doctor recently on the same topic <a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0"><img align="right" border="0" height="309" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-FXEGyEhRSk8/U614j51gJoI/AAAAAAABKr0/oFC4pIILflo/image%25255B13%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" width="407" /></a>and they know what’s going on as they get shorted on credit cards too from the other side.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/why-patients-cannot-trust-their-insurer.html">Why Patients Cannot Trust Their Insurer, Government, Hospital or Credit Card Company - guest post</a></h5> <p><a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0">That’s what this campaign is all about</a>, transparency and giving consumers some information so we know where to go when the data gets flawed and we get “scored” and denied access.  This is not just about data brokers, they are part of it but we have banks, companies, etc. all cashing in and why build manufacturing plant when you can make big profits with no risk selling data?  That’s what’s going on.  </p> <p><a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0">You can read more here</a> and I’ve been working on this for a couple of years already with writing to a lawyer at the FTC and some members of Congress to make this happen.  Again this is about transparency and indexing who’s selling data.  With all the security breaches we do need an index and again now that “data flipping” is getting larger, it will get worse and it keep the rate of inequality accelerated. </p> <p><strong>VCs fund companies all the time that have a data selling business model as they want to see an ROI as fast as they can</strong> a lot of times and data selling is it.  </p> <p><strong>Please kick in a few dollars as it would really help me out</strong> to keep this going as believe me, it will get worse and the transparency move here is to license and identify the sellers and give us a look up so when things get flawed we<a href="http://thedataexchange.com/"><img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="82" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-Emns2xKsMGQ/U921TUiGW-I/AAAAAAABK_8/Zf1l-kLJmF4/image%25255B4%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="414" /></a> know where to start looking, we don’t have that now at all and the flawed data is growing as well as proprietary garbage models that score you as well and so much of it’s a secret.  I would much rather look at a list of folks that some apps sells the data to rather than to look at the stupid privacy statement that nobody can understand on some of the sites, and keep in mind, it’s designed that way on purpose, to make money.  Click on the image at the right, and see what’ that’s all about too, see why a license is needed as that will be all secret.  </p> <p><a href="http://www.gofundme.com/auyxd0">Here’s the campaign</a> and pitch in and help me get this going faster so we can get a law on the books for transparency sakes.  BD  </p>

Transparency And Privacy Campaign - Need to License All Who Sell Data So We Know Who They Are - Why All Privacy Laws have Failed, We Have No Index…Please Help..

Think of it if you will of all the different entities that have to be licensed and this makes sense.  What if stock brokers were not license...

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Doctors With Serious Sanctions Running Clinical Trials in the US And Sites Such As Healthgrades and Vitals Show No Sanctions at All So You Can Get Fooled Easily

<p>This is a <a href="https://medium.com/matter/why-are-dope-addicted-disgraced-doctors-running-our-drug-trials-aff6d20843bf">great in depth long article</a> but well worth reading.  I included just a few paragraphs below and this is a big problem with doctors who have sanctions and either known or unknown to those look for backgrounds on them hire them <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="118" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/--vBweAo4xg0/U91lvmod-_I/AAAAAAABK_o/XmUmA7_9yVQ/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />for drug trials which have had some nightmare results.  <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/texas-doctor-working-with-ebola.html">As of last week too,</a> you could even find the doctor from Dallas coming back from Africa with the Ebola infection listed as still practicing in Dallas and taking new patients.  </p> <p>One thing to note as well that all sanctions are not the same either while one might be minor and one might very serious too and then we had the bogus sanctions against a doctor in Missouri with the medical board there who basically accused the doctor of doing a good job, go figure that one out.  Here’s where the VA hired a doctor that was banned in New York to practice in Florida.  Again I’m not diving in here but it is what it is and the charges in New York were serious.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/top-doctor-for-miami-va-healthcare.html">Top Doctor For Miami VA Healthcare System Lost Medical License in New York, Had Issues With Florida Board of Medicine, But On the Internet He Still Works and Takes New Patients in New York With Plenty of Insurers…</a></h5> <p>Look at this link below…according to the site the facility still has some fake spinal screws available:)</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/02/operation-spinal-cap-former-owner-of.html">Operation Spinal Cap-Former Owner of Orthopedic Hospital Admits He Bribed California State Senator Calderon-Hospital Closed And Sold But Still Listed on HealthGrades</a></h5> <p>Again this is a good in depth read on a few doctors here and all the details that go with it.  Remember too that Healthgrades and Vitas get their records they publish from state boards, so tuck that thought away.  On the other hand just brace yourself for the exciting Sunshine report so you can see the $15 gift from a drug company a doctor may have received…lol.  This is how bad the news can be today as it’s as obnoxious as the <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/hhs-to-release-data-from-cms-on-what.html">Medicare Payment data base</a> the media tossed out there, I would rather see data on bad guys doing trials rather than what umpteen doctors received from Medicare that were not out of the ordinary.  BD  </p> <p> <hr /></p> <p>At around 7 p.m. on February 28, 2003, a 66-year-old woman showed up at the Pioneers Memorial Hospital in Brawley, a small Californian town not far from the Mexican border. She was seen by one of the doctors on duty in the emergency room that night, a man named Michael Berger. He learned that the woman, identified as “B.P.” in a later investigation, was in pain. A cramping sensation in her right thigh was radiating down her calf. Records show that she had a weak pulse in the same leg, and was short of breath. Her right foot felt numb.</p> <p>Berger had options. He might have reviewed B.P.’s medical records, or tried to reach her primary care doctor to learn more about her history. He might have ordered an ultrasound or an x-ray. Either scan could have revealed the blockage in the artery in B.P.’s right leg. But Berger didn’t do those things. After consulting with a colleague, he sent B.P. home, with instructions to rest, drink plenty of fluids and take painkillers and blood-thinning meds. When she returned to the ER two days later, her leg was pale and cold—too far gone to save. She was flown to a larger hospital in San Diego, where surgeons removed the limb above the knee.</p> <p>Berger’s career did not improve much afterwards. One day in 2004, he turned up for work impaired, a situation he blamed on taking sleeping pills. Other problems were noted when his employers asked a team of doctors to review his performance: failing to properly monitor patients after prescribing them dangerous drugs; prescribing excessive amounts of painkillers to his wife; a series of incidents while driving, which may have been related to his own drug use.</p> <p>In 2008, the Medical Board of California put Berger on a seven-year probation. It was an unusually lengthy sanction, and it included limits on his ability to prescribe narcotics, and a requirement that he take regular blood tests to check for drug abuse. By then his career as an ER physician was effectively over: The California Emergency Physicians Medical Group, which employs ER doctors at Pioneers and dozens of other hospitals across the state, had handed him an indefinite suspension. Already his mid-60s, you might imagine that Berger would have taken these sanctions as a cue to slip into retirement.</p> <p>But that’s not what happened. Instead, Berger secured a position at the helm of two high-stakes, high-tech cancer therapy trials. Dozens of patients with life-threatening cancers were entrusted to him. So was the responsibility for carrying out the complex procedures used to test the therapy. When the company involved—Immunovative Therapies—announced the first of these trials, its CEO enthused about the therapy’s potential to eliminate “every last” cancerous cell. In a photo accompanying the press release, members of the trial team stand in pristine white lab coats outside a building of concrete and tinted glass in Carlsbad, California, where the patients would later be treated. Next to the beaming CEO is Berger, wearing sandals and medical scrubs, a stethoscope slung over his shoulders.</p> <p><a href="https://medium.com/matter/why-are-dope-addicted-disgraced-doctors-running-our-drug-trials-aff6d20843bf">https://medium.com/matter/why-are-dope-addicted-disgraced-doctors-running-our-drug-trials-aff6d20843bf</a></p>

Doctors With Serious Sanctions Running Clinical Trials in the US And Sites Such As Healthgrades and Vitals Show No Sanctions at All So You Can Get Fooled Easily

This is a great in depth long article but well worth reading.  I included just a few paragraphs below and this is a big problem with doctor...

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Population Health, How It’s Really Supposed to Work Using Logic, Clinical Data And Patient Dignity To Improve Care, ACO Money Is Optional…

<p>Population Health is part of an Accountable Care Organization and when used properly without folks going off the cliff analytics it can work well.  We don’t see enough of this out there.  Also below is a video to where the Doctor’s group runs the ACO and not an insurance company. It gives a very realistic approach and there’s not big pay for performance hanging over anyone’s<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="147" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-VVSuH2QK24U/U91BUH0RkHI/AAAAAAABK_Y/vvPOX6YkIdA/image%25255B4%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="251" /> head either.  Again in my opinion, I think peer pressure is enough as when big dollars with P4P come into the picture, so does the tendency to cheat a bit.  We have seen that and most doctors are in the business to provide good care as that’s their profession.  </p> <p>Where population health gets distorted is when you have the over zealous folks that want to go further and dig even deeper with patient information as we all read with the idiotic hospital thinking they needed to have all the patient MasterCard data on file.  You have to treat people with dignity and I’m sorry that’s not dignity but rather more of “control” situation to where one thinks if “I have all this data I’m going run out and get into the face of those patients” and what happens next?  We resent it.  You do have bone head executives that think this is the answer to “get the data on the patients and then roll out the Spanish Inquisition”:)  Read the link below for how that thinking works and realize that this is someone who doesn’t believe in dignity if you will.  Education is always best.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/oh-crap-now-hospitals-are-now-buying.html">Oh crap, Now Hospitals Are Now Buying Data From Acxiom - Data Selling Epidemic Continues to Evade on Personal Privacy As “Algo Duped-Stat Rat” People Try to Implement Virtual Models That Won’t Work…</a></h5> <p>What ends up occurring in situations as such as spelled out in the link above is <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-quiet-and-unspoken-consumer.html">patients and consumers start heading for the exit doors</a> and work to stay outside the radar and then the whole concept doesn’t work anymore as the algorithmic <img align="right" height="65" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-4yKeXZOGJWY/U2hj_S1gpvI/AAAAAAABKL4/8L1D77wzoQY/image%25255B20%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="174" />chase is on and nobody likes that at all.  It’s all about money when you go to those extremes too.   Because of the incentives to make money people try to rationalize care with no dignity and it just won’t work very well when money takes the place of dignity.  I just think some of the folks are just flat assholes at times when I read some of what’s in the news with <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">quantitated justifications for things that are not true.</a>   Insurance companies can act like assholes too on occasions with little thought for dignity.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/people-dont-work-that-way-world-of.html">“People Don’t Work That Way” A World of Broken Software Models That Don’t Align To the Human Side,Too Much Push At Times With Only A Proof of Concept That Fails in the Real World..</a></h5> <p>See here’s another example of the extremes being explored in New England too with patient data, and again we as patients will hate your for it as you strip our dignity.</p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/new-england-quality-care-alliance-next.html">New England Quality Care Alliance, Next Up Duped On Consumer Credit Card Data And Web Information..As The Scoring of America Rolls On..</a></h5> <p>But back on target here Dr. Biggs who I have known for a few years now does a great job with his explanation of how their ACO works and his group is physician run versus an insurance company and we all know when insurers run an ACO, well watch out for the analytics as they are going to be geared first off the foremost for profit as shareholder interest really comes before patient care, and we all know that and it’s not hard to figure out as all you have to do is read the news and watch their behaviors, it’ no secret.  In Dr. Biggs group you don’t have that and he shows some modest savings but more so it’s the working together for better care that comes through in this video and not some pay for performance nonsense, which is the way it should be.  The group has been through their challenges as I remember I think it was a couple years ago they lost Blue Cross as an insurer and that may be changed by now as well but they held their ground at the time.  </p> <p><strong>So again it’s nice to hear about an ACO and population health program with analytics that are being used<img align="right" height="103" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-3A8wtvz6at8/U27YpPGUCWI/AAAAAAABKPs/ZEssnu7w_mA/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="float: right; display: inline" width="198" /> with common sense and at the same time still giving patients the dignity they need as well as the care.</strong>  By comparison I watch the big United Healthcare owned Monarch IPA in the OC with their ACO and there’s no comparison as I hear complaints all the time about it with doctors in that group getting paid at rates less than Medicare in order to participate and is that a real ACO?  Of course too we know that insurers are buying up and selling our data like crazy and also <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/.../insurance-companies-are-buying-up.html">they purchase patient credit card records</a> (as <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/mastercard-as-well-as-other-financial.html">MasterCard makes big money</a> from insurers for our data) and <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/this-call-may-be-recorded-for-quality.html">analyze your voice</a> with call centers too, so like yeah, where’s the trust there with an insurer running an ACO and also owning the doctors group?   Consumer are also <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/united-healthcare-rolls-out-mobile-app.html">getting leery of using insurer apps too</a> as we all know they capture and mine that data too and who knows where it will <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/04/world-privacy-forum-report-scoring-of.html">show up to “score” us</a> down the road.  </p> <p><iframe height="281" src="//player.vimeo.com/video/92358497" width="500" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen"></iframe></p> <p><strong>Would it be nice if all ACOs could work like what Dr. Biggs is doing with his group?</strong>  </p> <p>He also told me he uses the eClinicalworks HEALOW phone app to communicate with patients and this app has privacy and there’s no consumer data grabbing going on with the app at all, thus patients keep their dignity, they engage and it all works.   This is what can be done with a doctor’s group with no health insurance intrusion which is really a goo thing.   BD </p> <p><a href="http://www.eclinicalworks.com/ccmr-overview.htm">http://www.eclinicalworks.com/ccmr-overview.htm</a></p>

Population Health, How It’s Really Supposed to Work Using Logic, Clinical Data And Patient Dignity To Improve Care, ACO Money Is Optional…

Population Health is part of an Accountable Care Organization and when used properly without folks going off the cliff analytics it can work...

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FDA Approves Another New Diabetes 2 Drug

<p>There’s no shortage on the attack of diabetes 2 and drugs that are used to combat it.  Just recently we had another drug approved and both are to be used with changed lifestyles and this drug, Jardiance does not depend on<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="141" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-DnyuPfll1r8/U9xy0bzZRRI/AAAAAAABK_I/uFm_EKnxvWM/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" /> insulin levels to work.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/01/fda-approves-new-drug-for-diabetes-2.html">FDA Approves New Drug For Diabetes 2 - Farxiga</a></h5> <p>The drug was also approved in Europe as well.  The drug is not for people with diabetes one.  BD  </p> <hr /> <p>Federal regulators have approved a new treatment from U.S. drugmaker Eli Lilly and Co. and its German counterpart, Boehringer Ingelheim, for the most common form of diabetes .</p> <p>The Food and Drug Administration said Friday it will permit Jardiance tablets to be used by adult patients with type 2 diabetes who also are trying to control their condition with diet and exercise.</p> <p>The drug is designed to be taken once a day to reduce a patient's blood sugar levels by blocking glucose reabsorption in the kidneys and removing excess glucose through urine. Unlike other diabetes treatments, it does not depend on a patient's insulin levels to be effective.</p> <p><a href="http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2014-08-01/fda-approves-lilly-boehringer-diabetes-drug">http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2014-08-01/fda-approves-lilly-boehringer-diabetes-drug</a></p>

FDA Approves Another New Diabetes 2 Drug

There’s no shortage on the attack of diabetes 2 and drugs that are used to combat it.  Just recently we had another drug approved and both a...

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The Four Models of Bundled Care - 3 Year CMS Algorithmic Patient Care Improvement Initiative, Yet One More Model To Enrich Health IT Profits With Complexities, Variables Will Kill This Model In Time…

<p>This is a new initiative from Medicare and if you thought coding was complex now, wait until this kicks in.  Of course we all want to save money and provide better care and try to get away from fee for service and it’s tough to<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="299" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-W-oFjOy2_78/U9xppTx9sEI/AAAAAAABK-4/5DMnqDPvb_Y/image%25255B3%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" title="image" width="394" /> create a new model, especially when the existence of the old model depends on it as well as the elements used.  Of course ICD and CPT codes are here to stay but they do play a role here as having to know what codes initiate an episode.  We’re playing with more algorithms here, long and short of it.</p> <p>You can read about the 4 basic models below and one is pretty simple but when you go beyond to the next levels is where the fun begins.  Now as a patient, you want to be sure you understand all of this right?  Just when you thought it couldn’t become anymore complex, well it does.  So now you doctor can explain to you if you are a one, two, three or even a four, but remember this will save money:)  Model three is after you go home.  The difference between one and four is that one is acute and four is just inpatient which will more than likely comprise most of the what concerns you. </p> <p>Disputes are going to get interesting here too and they will come up and providers will quit or will be terminated as well.  So this is the next thing your doctor needs to be aware of with your care if they are a CMS participant.  It’s all about a math process that keeps the cost down and somewhere in her you’re supposed to get improved care, well that’s up to the humans after they figure out the process here as the algorithms are not be responsible for your care, they just do the formulas for the money:)   </p> <p>By the way did you know there are 38 government agencies that can fine or close down your doctor’s practice?  For many years it was four but has ballooned to this number in recent years so keep that in mind as well when your doctor is determining which bundle you are as well and which code needs to be entered.  This initiative will go for three years.  Here’s an <a href="http://nashvillepost.com/news/2014/7/14/medsolutions_chosen_for_cms_bundled_payment_program">article that talks</a> about the extra nurses one hospital chain will hire to <a href="http://nashvillepost.com/news/2014/7/14/medsolutions_chosen_for_cms_bundled_payment_program">accommodate bundled payments on behalf of CMS as a partner.</a>  </p> <p>You have to hire more humans to chase the codes around and audit everything as the “bundle” and you move through the process.  Frankly, I see this as a waste and little money saved as there’s too many variables for this to really work.  The model sounds good but not all models work in the real world and<strong> the Health IT folks are the ones cashing in here, with CMS buying in to it.</strong>  It’s more over all complexities and in this case<strong> MedSolutions make some money carving out a piece in the middle for some profit.</strong> </p> <p>In the meantime maybe the hospital was paid a visit from MasterCard too and they are going to rummage through all your credit card transactions too and see what you have been up to there, if you bought any candy bars, etc. and so hey let’s dump this little profit machine right in there too, and now we have 2 elements built for IT profits but not better care.  CMS is not smart enough to see these other elements at work either, and that’s a given but it sure has an impact on the doctors and patients that have all of this headed in their direction.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/oh-crap-now-hospitals-are-now-buying.html">Oh crap, Now Hospitals Are Now Buying Data From Acxiom - Data Selling Epidemic Continues to Evade on Personal Privacy As “Algo Duped-Stat Rat” People Try to Implement Virtual Models That Won’t Work…</a></h5> <p>As I have said before, link below “people don’t work that way” and we have a bit of <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/12/quantitated-justification-for-believing.html">quantitated justifications</a> for things that won’t work that way.  This is just one more chaotic algorithmic process and model that will disappoint and drive everyone nuts for 3 years.  <strong>It’s not that hard to see in the making because it’s making an initial model more complicated and I’m guessing these might be some models CMS may have obtained from United Healthcare is it resembles pretty much what models you see coming from their studies and reports these days.  </strong></p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/05/people-dont-work-that-way-world-of.html">“People Don’t Work That Way” A World of Broken Software Models That Don’t Align To the Human Side,Too Much Push At Times With Only A Proof of Concept That Fails in the Real World..</a></h5> <p><em>“The company plans to hire an unspecified number of nurses to work on site at hospitals as case managers, said Yvonne Daugherty, MedSolutions' vice president of marketing. MedSolutions has committed to cost savings of two percent from discharge to 90 days post-discharge and will be responsible for both risk and reward.”</em></p> <p><strong>Is it any wonder why doctors want to take back medicine?</strong>  The link below has some good videos that give you some insight into the other side of what’s happening today with doctors, maybe some stuff you are not aware of, but they are.  BD  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/07/taking-back-medicine-maintenance-of.html">“Taking Back Medicine”, Maintenance of Certification/Licensing, And the Haunting “EHR Trojan Horse”-Doctors Speaking Up…</a> <hr /></h5> <strong></strong> <p><strong>Model One</strong> will apply to an episode of care encompassing only acute inpatient care hospitalization. </p> <p>Under <strong>Model Two,</strong> an inpatient stay plus 30, 60 or 90 days of post-discharge service is covered. Payment results from a retrospective comparison of a budget with actual "fee for service" payments. </p> <p><strong>Model One</strong> will pay only for the services billed by the hospital. <strong>Model Two</strong> may include a bulk payment to a hospital and a rehabilitation facility.</p> <p>The payment arrangement for <strong>Model Three is</strong> the same as Model Two, but only covers post-discharge care. </p> <p>Finally, <strong>Model Four</strong> offers prospectively set payments for episodes consisting solely of inpatient care.</p> <p>Practices should plan ahead for operating under such arrangements, focusing on certain provisions. First, understand rules that trigger, break or expire an episode.<strong> The payment contract should specify which CPT or ICD codes initiate each type of episode</strong>, what<strong> events may nullify the payment process,</strong> and when an episode has come to an end so that payments cease. Be clear about what providers and services are included in an episode budget.</p> <p>Another issue to address includes learning how disputes between providers and payers can be appealed. Inquire into the mechanisms for resolving disputes among providers and pay attention to the governance structure of the provider network. It will influence decisions on qualifications for joining the network, adding new classes of providers, changing the formula for allocating bundled payments among providers or renegotiating the budget for an episode<strong>. Also, you will want to understand what happens when an episode costs more than what was budgeted as well as how risk is allocated among participants and what happens if a provider leaves the network in midepisode.</strong></p> <p>Finally, identify the process by which providers may voluntarily terminate participation in the network or be involuntarily terminated from it. Determine what steps will be taken if two providers claim the same share of an episode budget. Possibilities include simple negotiations or a decision by a tribunal.</p> <p><a href="http://www.mondaq.com/unitedstates/x/330982/Healthcare/Want+To+Join+A+Bundled+Payment+Network">http://www.mondaq.com/unitedstates/x/330982/Healthcare/Want+To+Join+A+Bundled+Payment+Network</a></p>

The Four Models of Bundled Care - 3 Year CMS Algorithmic Patient Care Improvement Initiative, Yet One More Model To Enrich Health IT Profits With Complexities, Variables Will Kill This Model In Time…

This is a new initiative from Medicare and if you thought coding was complex now, wait until this kicks in.  Of course we all want to save m...

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MyMedicalRecords, PHR In A Box Now Available at Drugstore.Com (Subsidiary of Walgreens)

<p>If you read here at the Medical Quack then you might remember MMRGlobal not too long ago settled a patent dispute with Walgreens and part of the licensing agreement was that MyMedicalRecords PHR would be marketed and sold on Drugstore.Com , which Walgreens purchased a while back.  Read below what the contents of the box contains.  MMRGlobal is a valued sponsor at the Medical Quack.  In the meantime we have <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/walgreens-suing-cvs-rite-aid-wants.html">Walgreens suing CVS and Rite Aid</a> for patent violations.  Also from a last news update, it appears <a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/06/mmrglobal-day-federal-court-along-with.html">a settlement may be in the works soon</a> for MMRGlobal with Quest, Allscripts and WebMD, reflecting from the notes from the last day in court.  </p> <h5><a href="http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2014/03/walgreens-and-mymedicalrecords-reach.html">Walgreens and MyMedicalRecords Reach Settlement Agreement Related to Patent Infringements</a></h5> <p>As I also understand the PHR will be available in retail stores soon as well.  BD  </p> <p><a href="http://www.drugstore.com/mymedicalrecords-personal-health-record-kit-12-month-free-concierge-service/qxp530332?catid=184044">From Drugstore.com:</a> <img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="220" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-tjnxgm3yGBM/U9xNeckJHPI/AAAAAAABK-o/rixYGIKJOd8/image%25255B4%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="355" /></p> <p>Instant Access to Your Medical Records Whenever & Wherever You Need Them <br />Secure online access to your medical records & important documents 24/7 - from anywhere in the world.  </p> <p>Includes:</p> <ul> <li>Activation Instructions</li> <li>Quick Start Guide </li> <li>User Guide </li> <li>20 Authorization Stickers for Your Doctors </li> <li>10 Emergency Health Record Access Cards</li> </ul> <p>First Responders Can View Potentially Life-Saving Information in an Emergency</p> <ul> <li>Great for Families, Travelers, Caregivers, Pets, and Those with Chronic Conditions </li> <li>Safe, Secure, Private Online Access to your Medical Records for You and Your Entire Family </li> <li>Integrated Voice, Fax & Lifeline Telephone Number at No Additional Cost </li> <li>Checks for Adverse Reactions Between More Than 30,000 Drugs, Supplements & Foods </li> <li>Calendar Medication Reminders & Appointments </li> <li>Easily Renewable Online or In-Store</li> </ul> <p>Perfect for:  Family medical history, birth certificates, passports, allergy information, powers of attorney, prescription records, kids immunization records, senior care records, insurance policies, wills & advance directives, lab reports, military service records, photos of family, pets, & personal property, and more! <hr /></p> <p>Activate account with PIN shown inside box.  The Quick Start Guide shows you hot to get started using your Personal Health Record.  Fill out the Emergency Wallet Stickers and Emergency Cards so doctors can access your records in a medical emergency.  Fill out the Authorization Stickers so your doctors can fax your medical records into your account.  Fill out the Request for Protected Health Information release form to submit to your providers and to obtain copies of your medical records and other personal health information.  The enclosed User Guide has everything you need to the most out of your account. <hr /></p> <p><a href="http://www.drugstore.com/mymedicalrecords-personal-health-record-kit-12-month-free-concierge-service/qxp530332?catid=184044">http://www.drugstore.com/mymedicalrecords-personal-health-record-kit-12-month-free-concierge-service/qxp530332?catid=184044</a></p>

MyMedicalRecords, PHR In A Box Now Available at Drugstore.Com (Subsidiary of Walgreens)

If you read here at the Medical Quack then you might remember MMRGlobal not too long ago settled a patent dispute with Walgreens and part of...

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Molina Healthcare Buys Up Healthy Palm Beaches HMO in Florida

<p>Molina Healthcare is located in Long Beach, CA and has had some rough bumps with contracts and much of it related to technology with losing a few contracts over the last few years but of late it seems to have calmed down.  Healthy Palm Beaches l<img align="right" alt="image" border="0" height="87" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-KnKfDv34XmQ/U9w-isJC_hI/AAAAAAABK-Y/mcO_uPnhOqs/image%25255B2%25255D.png?imgmax=800" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" title="image" width="187" />ost almost $ 2 million in 2013 and Molina Healthcare of Florida lost over $ 5 million and about half the business was from Medicaid premiums.  Molina also owns health clinics in Florida and in California.  Overall other areas of Molina made up for the losses in Florida with revenue and profits.  BD</p> <h4><font style="font-weight: bold"><a href="http://www.molinahealthcare.com/members/common/en-us/abtmolina/business/mms/Pages/mms.aspx">Molina Medicaid Solutions</a> </font></h4> <p><em>“Through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Molina Medicaid Solutions, Molina’s Medicaid management information systems’ design, development, implementation and operation expertise provide the technological foundation needed by state agencies to meet current and future Medicaid Information Technology Architecture (MITA) business process and regulatory health care requirements.”</em></p> <p> <hr />Healthy Palm Beaches sold its Medicaid HMO business, with about 11,500 members, to Molina Healthcare.</p> <p>The Long Beach, Calif.-based health insurer (NYSE: MOH) paid $7.5 million for the acquisition, said Thomas Cleare, chief program officer at the Health Care District of Palm Beach County. The district owns Healthy Palm Beaches, which retained ownership of its Vita Health plans for individuals and families.</p> <p>“The combination of Healthy Palm Beaches and Molina Healthcare of Florida’s existing Palm Beach County membership confirms our commitment to Palm Beach County,” said David Pollack, president of Molina Healthcare of Florida, in a news release. “We are well-prepared to care for these additional members as Florida’s new Managed Medical Assistance program rolls out.</p> <p>Healthy Palm Beaches lost $1.9 million on premiums of $51.2 million in 2013, according to the <a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/profiles/company/us/fl/tallahassee/florida_office_of_insurance_regulation/853655">Florida Office of Insurance Regulation</a>. Of that, $23.7 million in premiums came from its individual and family plans and $27.7 million came from its Medicaid plans. It had 13,217 members in its individual and family plans and 14,069 members in its Medicaid plans on Dec. 31.</p> <p><a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/news/2014/08/01/palm-beach-hmo-sells-medicaid-business-to-molina.html?page=all">http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/news/2014/08/01/palm-beach-hmo-sells-medicaid-business-to-molina.html?page=all</a></p>

Molina Healthcare Buys Up Healthy Palm Beaches HMO in Florida

Molina Healthcare is located in Long Beach, CA and has had some rough bumps with contracts and much of it related to technology with losing ...

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