CSRI, eHealth Exchange partner up for TEFCA

CSRI, eHealth Exchange partner up for TEFCA

eHealth Exchange this week announced that it will be partnering with the Consortium for State and Regional Interoperability – comprising the largest nonprofit health data networks in the U.S. – in its anticipated role as a Qualified Health Information Network.WHY IT MATTERSAs one of the nation’s oldest and largest health information networks, eHealth Exchange brings 13 years of experience to its planned QHIN status under the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT’s Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement, or TEFCA.
That includes linking 61 regional and state health information exchanges and five federal agencies, enabling exchange across more than two…

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Geisinger solves behavioral health access problem with telemedicine

Geisinger solves behavioral health access problem with telemedicine

Benjamin C. Gonzales, operations manager II, virtual care, at Geisinger, said the prominent health system has faced a problem that is the biggest problem in behavioral healthcare: access. And while Geisinger’s population certainly has experienced its own challenges with behavioral health access like other communities, the problem has been significantly compounded by three things.THE PROBLEM
“First and most obvious, the pandemic,” Gonzales stated. “Unsurprisingly, we experienced a surge in demand much like other specialties in our system. Before the pandemic, it was common for our department to have a couple hundred outstanding referrals.
“We quickly saw that increase to a maximum of 19,000…

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Vendor Notebook: new tools and acquisitions from OptumRx, ScionHealth, others

Vendor Notebook: new tools and acquisitions from OptumRx, ScionHealth, others

It’s a new year, and healthcare technology vendors are rolling out their latest innovations, market approvals, acquisitions and staffing shake-ups.OptumRx launched Price Edge, a tool that compares pricing for traditional generic drugs to ensure members get the lowest prescription drug prices. A suite of new tools for both patients and providers target aspects of pharmacy logistics that have been known to delay or complicate care, such as getting real-time pharmacy benefits information and obtaining prior authorizations. In October, Optum, UnitedHealth Group’s pharmacy services company, merged with data clearinghouse Change Healthcare. The U.S. Department of Justice tried to block the merger and is appealing the…

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HammondCare beefs up IT monitoring across its aged care network

HammondCare beefs up IT monitoring across its aged care network

Not-for-profit aged care service provider HammondCare has tapped German enterprise monitoring solutions provider Paessler to proactively monitor its IT infrastructure nationwide.With more than 5,100 dedicated staff and volunteers, HammondCare delivers aged care, dementia care and palliative care to around 34,000 clients in over 92 service locations across Australia.
It has rolled out the Paessler PRTG, a round-the-clock network monitoring software, across its 76 care facilities. 
WHY IT MATTERS
“HammondCare’s primary objective in implementing the Paessler PRTG monitoring platform was to provide our team with proactive insights and alerts to minimise the regular incidents that were occurring previously,” infrastructure and cloud manager Kasun Haputhanthri said.
Since deploying…

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SA Health kicks off patient-generated data project with The Clinician

SA Health kicks off patient-generated data project with The Clinician

SA Health, together with the Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Health, will start collecting and analysing patient-reported measures across South Australia through its new programme.The Patient Reported Measures (PRM) programme will support clinical services to deliver “high-quality, patient-centred, and value-driven care” by encouraging patients to report on health outcomes and experiences. 
SA Health and CIEH have chosen digital health company The Clinician via an open tender process to help implement the programme. They will leverage the latter’s ZEDOC platform, which will be integrated with SA Health’s IT systems to automate the distribution, collection, and analysis of patient-reported outcomes and experience measures.
WHY IT…

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Hyndman Area Health Center cuts IT bill in half with the cloud

Hyndman Area Health Center cuts IT bill in half with the cloud

Hyndman Area Health Center – a holistic Pennsylvania-based health center providing family medicine, dental health, behavioral health and more – transitioned from client-hosted servers to eClinicalWorks cloud-based servers to expand its network capacity and meet a rising data demand.Since then, it has experienced a more than 150% increase in patients and has saved hundreds of thousands of dollars over the past few years since it no longer relies on physical servers.
Healthcare IT News sat down with Bill Kurtycz, CEO of Hyndman Area Health Center, to discuss cloud technology, cloud EHRs and telehealth, and how the technologies have benefitted the provider organization.
Q….

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UChicago to launch accelerator for AI and data science companies

UChicago to launch accelerator for AI and data science companies

The University of Chicago this week announced the creation of Transform, an accelerator for early-stage technology companies focused on data science and artificial intelligence.WHY IT MATTERSThe new program – which is part of the Deep Tech Ventures initiative at the UChicago’s Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation – aims to offer a wide array of support to startups: access to business and technical training, industry mentorship, venture capital connections, and funding opportunities
Transform is seeking two cohorts of as many as 10 companies each. Candidates should be focused on information technologies and data science: AI and machine learning, data engineering, analytics and…

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NextGen Healthcare hit by BlackCat ransomware

NextGen Healthcare hit by BlackCat ransomware

The group, also known as ALPHV and suspected to be a successor to BlackMatter, has demanded ransoms as high as $1.5M with affiliates keeping 80-90%, according to the Office of Information Security at U.S. Health and Human Services and the Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center.WHY IT MATTERS
The Russian ransomware group allegedly attacked the EHR vendor NextGen on January 17, The Washington Post reported on Monday. 
“The company says it doesn’t look like the hackers obtained any client data or patient data,” according to the Post.
Healthcare IT News reached out to NextGen for comment and will update this story if it responds.
Claiming responsibility, BlackCat “put…

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What's ahead for health IT policy and legislation in 2023 

What’s ahead for health IT policy and legislation in 2023 

With Congress providing telehealth waivers as part of its omnibus spending bill at the close of 2022, delaying the “telehealth cliff” for two years, HIMSS says it’s now ready to make the case for permanent reimbursement of virtual care.Also on its policy agenda for the year ahead: advocating for data standardization, offering input for interoperability rulemaking and engaging with agencies and states to increase telehealth access. We spoke with the HIMSS government relations team for their thoughts on those priorities and more in 2023 and beyond.
Making telehealth’s case for cost control
Telehealth has proven to reduce burdens on healthcare providers and improve…

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Needle moving on drug monitoring program efficacy, ONC says

Needle moving on drug monitoring program efficacy, ONC says

A new brief from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology data says that one-third of prescribers now access prescription drug-monitoring programs through their electronic health records and 62% reported they used electronic prescribing of controlled substances technologies often – up from 37% in 2019.WHY IT MATTERS
“The use of (PDMPs) and electronic prescribing of controlled substances (EPCS) technology is critical to improving opioid prescribing practices, informing treatment decisions and supporting safe and effective patient care,” wrote Chelsea Richwine and Jordan Everson in a new HealthIT blog post.
They say the new data adds to previous analyses demonstrating the benefits of the systems by…

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