IWatch news reports on this emerging issue while Modern Healthcare notes that a New Mexico Telehealth Project May Be National Modelrecent developments regarding health information technology.
IWatch News: Excluded Groups Want In On Health Information Technology Providers frozen out of a $27 billion federal fund for conversion of medical records to electronic form are now fighting back in an effort to qualify for the money and possibly increase the size of the pot. The results of these multi-front battles are uncertain — but they are representative of a larger war. A
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The Washington Post: Defense, VA To Share Health Record System For Service Members And VetsMembers of a Senate committee expressed concern Wednesday that reforms taken by the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs have done little to cut the maze of bureaucracy experienced by many service members and veterans trying to navigate the military health-care system (Vogel, 5/25).
The Boston Globe reports on Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, which is one of the facilities that received one of these grants.
Bloomberg: U.S. Pays $158 Million to Doctors to Adopt Digital Records The U.S. government has paid more than $158.3 million to hospitals and doctors this year to encourage adoption of electronic health records, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said today (Engleman, 5/26).
The Boston Globe: BIDMC Receives Medicare Award For Electronic Health Records The federal government today awarded its first payments from a Medicare program designed to push hospitals and individual health care providers to adopt electronic health records.
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Shefali S. Kulkarni compiled this selection of recently released health policy studies and briefs:
Pediatrics: Disparities In Child Access To Emergency Care For Acute Oral Injury — This study looked at the “impact of insurance status on dental practices’ willingness to schedule an appointment for a child with a symptomatic fractured permanent front tooth.” Six researchers posed as mothers of 10-year-old boys who all had the same injury but different coverage: Medicaid/Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) or private Blue Cross dental insurance. T
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News outlets report on telemedicine, drugstore software problems and the effort to protect patient privacy.
The New York Times: Breaches Lead To Push To Protect Medical DataFederal health officials call it the Wall of Shame. It’s a government Web page that lists nearly 300 hospitals, doctors and insurance companies that have reported significant breaches of medical privacy in the last couple of years.
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