About 50% of parents say they would like to communicate electronically with their child’s physician office about clinical and administrative services, according to a new National Poll on Children’s Health, Modern Healthcare reports.
For the poll, C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital surveyed 1,612 parents of children ages 17 or younger about how they communicate with their child’s health care provider (Conn, Modern Healthcare, 5/18).
The survey found that about half of parents would like to use Web-based communication to:
The poll also found that less than 15% of parents said they currently have the ability to communicate with physician offices via e-mail or the Internet.
Matthew Davis, director of the NPCH, said many physicians are hesitant to use electronic communication because of concerns about reimbursement and medical liability issues.
The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus one to four percentage points (United Press International, 5/18).
Source: iHealthBeat
Seventeen months after launching a pilot project to test whether Medicare beneficiaries will use personal health records, HHS is going back to Utah and Arizona to ask PHR users what they think about the systems.
HHS last week published official notice in the Federal Register of its intent to conduct an evaluation this fall of the pilot program, including a survey of 500 Medicare beneficiaries to assess user satisfaction, as well as barriers or facilitators of PHR use.
Mathematica Policy Research has been hired to conduct the evaluation and survey.
According to the HHS statement of purpose in its notice, “Current PHR business models represent broad and varied uses, from disease management to health promotion, with sponsors consisting of commercial vendors, heath plans, employers and healthcare providers. We know very little about why consumers, and specifically Medicare beneficiaries, elect to use PHRs and what functionality they want from a PHR.
“Understanding these needs will be critical if HHS and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services are to pursue PHRs as a tool to empower consumers to manage their health and have the capability to link to their provider’s EHR,” according to the HHS statement.
In January 2009, the CMS launched what it called the Medicare Personal Health Record Choice Pilot program in Utah and Arizona, the first-of-a-kind pilot program to offer a choice of PHRs to Medicare fee-for-service patients. Medicare beneficiaries could choose a PHR from any one of four vendors: Google Health, HealthTrio, NoMoreClipboard.com and PassportMD.
According to a CMS spokesman, 1,362 beneficiaries had signed up for PHRs by the end of March 2010.
According to the recently released results of a survey conducted in December and January by the not-for-profit California HealthCare Foundation, just 7% of Americans used a PHR in 2009, up from 2.7% in 2008.
In April, HHS announced it was commissioning a study of public attitudes about privacy and security in health information exchange. RTI International will conduct that survey. A final report is expected Oct. 1.
Source: ModernHealthcare.com
“When I add new procedures to my practice, it adds new life to my practice,” Westmoreland said. “Honestly, it’s adding time and effort to our procedure right now, but I hope that that will be time invested for benefit down the road. We want to be able to offer a full spectrum of minimally invasive surgery. If somebody’s doing it, we want to be doing it Murfreesboro.”
Source: Nashville MedicalNews
These days, many health centers—from smaller clinics to the largest hospitals—are focused on measuring patient satisfaction. Beyond the normal desire of any business to keep customers happy, health centers that get government funding are required to deploy regular surveys to gauge how patients rate their services. Scores depend on the quality of care the entire staff provides, from operators and administrators to nurses and physicians, and is often measured using metrics, such as how long patients must wait to be treated or how many transfers each patient must go through when calling their physicians or administrative offices. After all, nobody wants to keep dialing various numbers or wait a long time on the phone to make an appointment or inquire about a bill.
Such specific measurement mechanisms obviously pressure practices to act efficiently. Unified communications and voice-over-IP (VoIP) technologies can help healthcare IT organizations make service improvements in these areas while realizing cost savings. These systems let clinics serve patients faster by enabling quick and easy call transfers among buildings or departments while providing robust information about callers; for example, a UC system can provide screen pops in which administrators, doctors, nurses and operators can post comments to the notes section as part of the call record. Unified messaging can enhance employee productivity via dozens of time-saving features and by efficiently recording patient data, making paper trails a thing of the past. These systems also help the organization make up-to-the-minute staffing decisions based on logging and reporting on call volume.
No wonder, then, that when healthcare organizations look to make technology upgrades, the phone system is often a prime target. In this InformationWeek Analytics Best Practices report, we’ll cover best practices for health clinics and medical practices looking to choose and implement UC systems that will improve patient satisfaction while saving money.
Source: InformationWeek
Recent studies have found that consumers increasingly are turning to the Internet for health information.
In addition to health care Web sites, such as WebMD, consumers are turning to user-generated health content, such as physician and hospital rankings, blogs and chat groups.
While the Internet’s influence on consumers’ health care decisions is outpacing traditional channels, such as television, radio and print media, physicians still are the biggest influence on consumer health behavior, according to Monique Levy, senior director of research at Manhattan Research.
In an iHealthBeat Special Report by Mina Kim, experts discuss the growing use of the Internet for health information.
The segment includes comments from:
Google and Microsoft’s Bing recently refined their search engines to provide consumers with more credible and relevant information
Source: iHealthBeat
Primary care physicians spend a significant amount of time answering e-mails and performing other tasks that provide them with limited reimbursement, according to a new study conducted by evaluating electronic health records, the Washington Post reports.
The results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine (Brown, Washington Post, 4/29).
Study Details
Richard Baron — an internist in a five-provider practice in Philadelphia with roughly 8,500 patients — conducted the yearlong study using his practice’s EHR system to track the average daily workload of a primary care physician (Rubin, USA Today, 4/29).
Baron found that on an average workday, each primary care provider in his practice:
Reimbursement Issues
Baron said the results show the need for a new payment method that accurately reimburses primary care physicians for the amount of care they provide.
Baron acknowledged that reimbursing for each phone call or e-mail a physician handles would be impractical, but he suggested that adopting capitation — in which physicians would receive an annual lump sum per patient — would better cover the amount of time primary care physicians actually spend on patients (USA Today, 4/29).
EHRs: A Possible Remedy?
Some experts suggest that EHRs could help primary care practices improve care coordination and workflow efficiency, thus reducing the time burdens on physicians.
National Coordinator for Health IT David Blumenthal said the study results highlight “the enormous strain” on primary care doctors but also show “a pathway toward escaping at least some of those burdens; the electronic health record combined with changes in workflow and payment” (Lohr, New York Times, 4/28).
Source: iHealthBeat
Fifty-five percent of consumers report using the Internet to find treatment information, according to a new Deloitte Center for Health Solutions survey.
According to the survey, 53% of seniors, 55% of baby boomers, 57% of Generation X and 56% of Generation Y look up treatment information online.
The survey also found that one in four respondents reported searching online for physician care quality information and that 12% looked up provider cost information online. About 10% of respondents reported using the Internet to compare hospital treatment options.
Results are based on a nationally representative survey of 4,008 U.S. adults conducted from Dec. 28, 2009, to Jan. 5, 2010.
Source: Deloitte, “2010 Survey of Health Care Consumers”
Alair System Treats Asthma by Delivering a Type of Thermal Energy to Airways
April 29, 2010 — The FDA has approved the first non-drug, device-based treatment for adults with severe asthma whose medications aren’t providing enough relief.
The device, called an Alair Bronchial Thermoplasty System, uses a catheter with a tip that delivers a form of thermal energy to the airways, the FDA says in a news release.
The FDA says the procedure is aimed at helping people ages 18 and older whose severe, persistent asthma is not controlled well enough with inhaled corticosteroids and long-acting beta-agonist medications.
The catheter delivers radiofrequency energy directly to the airways, heating lung tissue and reducing the thickness of smooth muscle, thus improving the ability of asthmatics to breathe.
“The approval of the Alair system provides adult patients suffering from severe and persistent asthma with an additional treatment option for a disease that is often difficult to manage,” says Jeffrey Shuren, MD, JD, director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health.
Approval of the procedure was based on data from a clinical trial of 297 patients who suffer from severe and persistent asthma. The trial showed a reduction of severe asthma attacks with use of the Alair system, the FDA says.
The agency says it is requiring a five-year study of the device to determine its long-term safety and effectiveness.
Asthmatx Inc., the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based manufacturer, will follow many of the patients who took part in the clinical trial and enroll 300 new patients at several medical centers across the country, the FDA says.
According to the FDA, side effects during treatment may include asthma attacks, wheezing, chest tightness or pain, partially collapsed lungs, coughing up blood, anxiety, headaches, and nausea.
The Alair system, the FDA says, is designed to reduce the number of severe asthma attacks over the long term and is not for use in patients with implantable devices such as pacemakers or internal defibrillators.
Patients known to be sensitive to lidocaine, atropine, or benzodiazepines also shouldn’t use the device, the FDA says.
The agency says asthma patients considering use of the Alair system should not be treated while experiencing an active respiratory infection, a bleeding disorder, asthma exacerbations, or if they’ve had changes to their corticosteroid regimen in the past two weeks.
The company says in a news release that bronchial thermoplasty is an outpatient procedure that reduces airway constriction, allowing patients to breathe easier.
It says the FDA granted the company expedited review because of its potential to address unmet needs of asthma patients.
A study on the effectiveness of the device was published Jan. 15 in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
The study showed:
SOURCES: News release, FDA.
The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society will permanently lease at least 25,000 square feet in a proposed Nashville Medical Trade Center to feature an “interoperability showcase,” the Nashville Business Journal reports.
Project officials hope HIMSS will serve as an “anchor tenant” for the trade center and will attract other tenants to the space (Gee/Wortham, Nashville Business Journal, 4/28).
The showcase will serve as an interactive demonstration of health IT products.
HIMSS President and CEO Stephen Lieber described the venture as a “permanent, year-round destination for [health IT] activity and innovation.” He added, “By joining the trade center we are able to reach more participants, demonstrate ‘meaningful use’ more completely and offer more flexibility than ever before” (Monegain, Healthcare IT News, 4/28).
The center, slated to open in 2013, would devote its top two floors to providing showroom space for health IT firms (Ward, Tennessean, 4/29).
Source: iHealthBeat
A new survey finds that people who use a personal health record (PHR) are likely to learn more about their health, have a better understanding of the care doctors give them and those with two or more chronic illnesses ask more questions to improve their health compared to when they didn’t use a PHR.
Published by the California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF), the study interviewed 1,849 people and found that 7% of adults used a PHR, which entails using a Web site to record health information online. That’s more than double the proportion identified as users of a PHR two years ago.
The report showed that 56 percent of respondents said using a PHR made them feel they knew more about their health and 52 percent said they better understood their doctor’s decisions.
The survey also indicates that older, less educated people who have more than one chronic illness are more likely than others to say they are more knowledgeable about their health as a result of using a PHR.
Sixty-one percent of respondents who are 45 years-of-age or older and 61 percent of those who don’t have a college degree were more likely than others to say they know more about their health care as a result of using a PHR.
Additionally, 58 percent of respondents with two or more chronic conditions said they know more about their health compared to 44 percent of those with one or no chronic conditions.
“People with lower incomes, less education and those who are living with multiple chronic illnesses have the most to gain from PHRs,” said Veenu Aulakh, senior program officer in the Better Chronic Disease Program at CHCF. “This reinforces our assertion that getting a PHR in the hands of more consumers could positively impact the health of the country,” Aulakh added.
With regard to non-users who may be interested in adopting a PHR, the survey showed that 58 percent said they would be interested in using a PHR if it were from a hospital or medical practice they use. Fifty percent identified insurance companies as desirable sources of PHRs; and 25 percent expressed interest in using a PHR developed by companies like Google or Microsoft.
According to Aulakh, it’s a difficult task to get people with lower incomes, less education, and those with multiple chronic illnesses to go online and get access to a PHR. One of the barriers, Aulakh said, is that providers who care for patients with lower incomes are less likely than their peers to have an electronic health record system in place with the option of a personal health record.
“Since Internet use is significantly lower among lower income populations, effort must be taken to increase access and develop applications that work on cell phones, since cell phone penetration is high among all populations,” Aulakh said. “It is important for the general public to better understand the value of personal health records to improve communication, increase convenience, and improve care,” Aulakh added.
Source: InformationWeek Healthcare
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