News 4/28/11

eClinicalWorks joins Office Ally as a preferred vendor for the HIT Extension Center for Los Angeles (HITEC-LA).

EncounterPRO chooses Intuit Health’s patient portal to offer its 300 pediatric practice EMR customers. Intuit Health, by the way, intends to add 10-15 new jobs this year at its Cary, NC headquarters.

The New Mexico HIT-REC names six initial vendors as "appropriate and qualified" EHR partners. In return, Allscripts, athenahealth, eClinicalWorks, Greenway, NextGen and Sage agree to standard contract provisions for NM providers and discounted pricing.

CaroMont Health (NC) selects athenaCollector, athenaEHR, and athenaCommunicator for its 200 providers. I hear that CaroMont is replacing its legacy NextGen system.

The Florida House passes a bill requiring urgent care clinics owned by hospitals to post the prices for their 50 most frequently provided medical services. The bill also allows primary care providers who voluntarily post their prices to skip two years’ worth of CME requirements.

Odd: Greater Chicago Urology files a lawsuit against one of its doctors and asks a judge to evict him from the practice. The practice claims Dr. Leon Lome’s “intentional outbursts and fits of anger” have caused the office to lose patients and have created a hostile workplace. The suit states he takes medical supplies belonging to the office at large, shouts at employees in front of patients, and throw patients’ prescriptions on the floor in front of them. Furthermore, he insists on displaying a calendar with images of male genitalia in the common area. Other than that, he is a really great guy.

digiChart introduces PracticeSmart, a new integrated, single database EHR/PM solution for OB-GYN practices. The product combines the company’s original digiChart OB-GYN EMR with the digiChart’s proprietary PM platform.

Office Ally adds an automated eligibility checking service to its Web-based offerings.

EDI clearinghouse provider Availity appoints Jon Zimmerman SVP and GM of clinical solutions. He was previously SVP of solutions management at Allscripts and SVP of enterprise solutions at CareFusion.

The Center for IT Implementation Assistance for South Carolina (CITIA-SC) names SuccessEHS one of its preferred EHR vendors.

NIH launches a Web site to give providers access to evidence-based information on complementary and alternative medicine. The site includes information on safety and effectiveness of such therapies as natural products, dietary supplements, herbs, meditation, massage, and acupuncture. Patient fact sheets are also available.

Practice Fusion says it now serves over 10 million patients and 80,000 medical professionals and is adding 350 new users each day. CEO Ryan Howard says PracticeFusion is now the largest EHR community in the country, surpassing Kaiser and the VA. In case you missed it, here’s my interview with Howard from a few months back. I noticed that in the last week, readers have posted a few new comments about the interview.

OCHIN, a non-profit provider of HIT products and parent of Oregon’s HIT REC (O-HITEC), enters an agreement with Gateway EDI to provide EDI services for OCHIN/O-HITEC members.

Integrated Medical Professionals, a 100-urologist practice in New York, partners with PatientPoint to use its self-service check-in technology for data collection and reporting.

The state of New York promises AmkaiSolutions over $434,000 in tax credits and $100,000 in sales tax breaks for moving its operations from Connecticut to New York. AmakaiSolutions, which provides software solutions for surgical practices and ambulatory surgery centers, pledges to create 103 new jobs over the next five years,  including 35 this year.

Six organizations issue the 2011 edition of A Clinician’s Guide to Electronic Prescribing, which gives guidance to providers transitioning from paper to e-prescribing systems. Collaborating partners include the AMA, MGMA, AAFP, e-Health Initiative, ACP, and the Center for Improving Medication Management.

E-mail Inga.