From MGMA 10/25/11

Monday

At the suggestion of a reader, I walked through the exhibit hall this morning, intent on identifying what HIT vendors may be talking about this year in addition to EHR and Meaningful Use. So, in no special order:

• Connecting. For example,  connecting physicians to each another; connecting physicians with hospitals, labs, pharmacies, and payers; connecting providers with patients.
• Improving EHR adoption. Obviously the EHR vendors were talking about this, but so were document imaging vendors, transcription services, and companies that offer ancillary tools that feed information into EHRs (speech recognition, card scanners, automated charge and code capture technologies, and HIE type offerings.)
• Patient communication tools. Examples include kiosks, patient portals, personal health records, and automated patient reminders.
• Revenue enhancement tools. Definitely not the sexiest of topics, but practices still care about products and services for RCM, code scrubbing, and ICD-10 conversions.

Most annoying entertainer: the singing Elvis on stilts at the Sage booth. I think he was at least as old as the real Elvis would be, but I doubt he ever had Elvis’s voice. I pitied the vendors surrounding Sage’s booth.

Speaking of Sage, an employee told me the company is changing its name. He says it won’t be Medical Manager.

I was pleasantly surprised by the morning keynote speaker, Marcus Buckingham. He has written a few books, including First Break All the Rules and Now, Discover Your Strengths, and was scheduled to discussed what the world’s best managers do differently. He covered the topic well and was very funny and entertaining. I thought he was a great pick for MGMA’s target audience.

I am in a bit of a time crunch, so I am unable to cover all the highlights of my day (including the presentation by the bowtie-adorned Dr. Mostashari) but a few highlights in pictures:

Before I gave it all back to the Hilton.

John Hallock (on right) is director of communications for athenhaealth. He assured me that his boss, Jonathan Bush, hadn’t been drinking when he selected today’s outfit.

That’s me on the right, posing with a George Clooney lookalike. Wish I had been smiling.

In the hotel gift shop. I wonder if Mr. H will notice if I happen to add this to my expense report?

I find this knight creepy, regardless of the marketing message it’s suppose to be sending.

E-mail Inga.