News 9/29/09

The North Shore-LIF Health System (NY) announces it is subsidizing up to 85% of the EMR implementation and operating costs for over 7,000 of its affiliated physician. Participating doctors can received subsidies of up to $40,000 each over five years to implement Allscripts EHR. One analyst suggests the deal is worth $20 million to Allscripts and is one of its largest sales ever. North Shore’s subsidy program includes a unique twist: physicians will be subsidized at a rate of  either 85% or 50%, depending on whether or not they are willing to allow North Shore to use the EHR to report and share their performance data and allow them to compare it against a set of nationally care and outcome metrics.

A California physician supports his practice’s move to EMR, believing the practice “can improve outcomes”once it is fully implemented. However, the executive director of the 12-provider group also says they experienced productivity losses when first getting on the system, having to cut out 2,000 patient visits and losing $200,000 in revenue.

The newly opened Jane Pauley Community Health Center (IN), a collaboration between Community Health Network and the local school system, is using the GE Centricity EMR, merging physical and behavioral data.

Amazing Charts is named the fastest growing private company in Rhode Island by Inc. Magazine’s list of “5000 Fastest Growing Private Companies in America.” The company has grown sales 277% over the last three years.

Genesis Physicians Group (TX), a Dallas-based IPA, partners with ProSperus to launch GenPro Practice Management Solutions. The joint venture will help practices to capitalize on stimulus money for EHR adoption and while working to improve a practice’s financial and clinical performance.

The British Columbia Medical Association is pushing for physicians to be paid for phone consultations involving H1N1 influenza cases. The Association is arguing the doctors should take patient calls and encourage them to stay home and risk infecting others, but, receive half ($14.74 Canadian) of their normal office charge.

Newly announced Davies winner Urban Health Plan (NY) was able to create alerts and clinical decision support rules on its eClinicalWorks EMR the same day that CDC issued its H1N1 guidelines.

The Dallas Morning News takes a look at Scott & White Healthcare, a physician-run health system in Central Texas with 800 physicians, nine hospitals, and 50 clinics. The company has reduced much of its competition by merging with it, which has proved appealing to many small-practice physicians. One doctor was drawn to the health system, in part because of the company’s IT infrastructure, which includes a system-wide EMR. He believes it is “impossible” for individual private practices to run EMRs: “You can buy the best system in the world, [but] you have no one to maintain the computers. The best I could get was if I had somebody on a retainer, they might come within a day.” Scott & White’s management model is interesting and is in a stark contrast to more traditional models that reward doctors for running as many patients through the clinic as possible and ordering lots of images and tests.

Hudson Headwaters Health Network, a network of community health centers in upstate New York, receives a $7 million grant to finance HIT and a medical centered home initiative.

Odd lawsuit: a patients’ family sues an ER doctor, claiming the physician allowed the man die so he could steal the patient’s Rolex watch. The family claims the doctor stopped resuscitation efforts, then took the watch and put it in his pocket. A couple of nurses noticed the watch was gone, saw it bulging from the doctor’s pocket, and called security. Last month a grand jury also indicted the doctor for grand theft.

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