Population Health Management News Weekly Wrap Up 9/13/15

Population health, precision medicine, and chronic-care management company Persivia acquires clinical-decision software vendor IHM Services for an undisclosed sum. The acquisition will enhance Persivia’s inpatient offerings for infection control, chronic-care management, and quality improvement. The company, which spun out of Alere Analytics earlier this year, plans to launch a Bundled Payment Management and Analytics tool for hospitals participating in the Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement payment model when it becomes mandatory on January 1, 2016. (You can read my June 2015 interview with Persivia CEO Mansoor Khan here.)

IBM Watson Health announces a population health solution that integrates Watson Health with Apple’s HealthKit and ResearchKit. The new business, which tapped former Philips Healthcare CEO Deborah DiSanzo as GM, also announced collaboration with Boston Children’s Hospital and Columbia University.

Chicago-based Oak Street Health implements Lightbeam Health’s population health solution to manage value-based contracts across its 15 primary care practices in Illinois and Indiana.

Partners HealthCare and Health Catalyst will create the Partners HealthCare Center for Population Health, which will train employees of both organizations on care management and population health. Health Catalyst will license Partners intellectual property, while Partners has signed an enterprise-wide Health Catalyst subscription. Partners has been a Health Catalyst investor since 2013 and will increase its equity stake.

3M is exploring the sale or spinoff of 3M Health Information Systems, expecting to reach a decision by early next year. The business generates $730 million in annual revenue in sales of technology for coding, population health management, clinical documentation improvement, transcription, and revenue cycle management.

Send me your population health management news for potential inclusion in future weekly wrap ups.

Sponsor Updates

• EClinicalWorks will exhibit at the International Vision Expo & Conference September 17-19 in Las Vegas.
• Leidos Health will exhibit at InSight 2015 Annual Conference September 15-18 in Nashville.

Blog Posts

• Demonstrating the Power of Analytics in Population Health (Medicity)
• An “Ideal” Arrangement for Radiologists: Proving Innovation and Low Cost Can Come As a Pair (GE Healthcare)
• Coming Soon: Meaningful Use Final Rule … Will You Be Ready? (Greenway Health)
• Infusing Health Content Into an Integrated Member Engagement Strategy, Part 2 (Healthwise)
• Increase Front Desk Revenue, Step 4 of 5 (AdvancedMD)
• Quippe Increases Nursing Satisfaction at Bumrungrad International Hospital (Medicomp Systems)
• Embracing Change: Four Steps to an “A-Ha!” Moment (PerfectServe)

Contacts

Jennifer,  Mr. H, Lorre, Dr. Jayne, Dr. Gregg, Lt. Dan

More news: HIStalk, HIStalk Connect.

Get HIStalk Practice  updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

Readers Write: ICD-10 Gets Physicians Engaged in Dallas

ICD-10 Gets Physicians Engaged in Dallas
By Robb Verna

The Greenway Health annual Engage user conference, held last week in Dallas, focused on the value of the insights shared by its 75,000 physicians out on the front lines of care. By comments from some of the 2,500 attendees, it was a well-received educational and networking event that more than met their expectations, especially on the eve of the ICD-10 transition.

Greg Wolverton, CIO of ARcare/KentuckyCare (AR), enjoyed hearing about the failures and successes of healthcare thought leaders during morning keynotes. “By the end of the conference,” he explains, “everyone on my team had a new charge to push healthcare to the next level. Exciting times are upon us for sure.” Wolverton is no stranger to change, having ushered ARcare through an EHR implementation and utilization that has earned the two-state FQHC the Nicholas E. Davies Award of Excellence and Stage 7 recognition from HIMSS. (You can check out the HIStalk Practice interview with Wolverton here.)

Wolverton was one of four panelists in the second day’s general session, which discussed the increasing need for providers to improve efficiency and utilize new tools and processes to meet Internet-savvy patient expectations for convenient, personalized, and individual care. They also tackled the imminent start of ICD-10 coding October 1 — definitely one of the conference’s hottest topics. “We feel comfortable that ARcare is ready for ICD-10,” Wolverton added. “We’ve been coding in ICD-9 and -10, as well as SNOMED. We feel prepared. We just hope our payers are as well.”

Gabriel de Paz, vice president of financial systems for 21^st Century Oncology (FL), the nation’s largest radiation oncology practice and one of the largest groups of urologists in the US, admitted that, “I’m concerned about what payers are going to do about ICD-10. I’m hoping for the best but I think you need to prepare for the impact and set some money aside.”

Nancy Brown, practice administrator at The Veranda (GA), left the event with a renewed sense of optimism around the October 1 transition. “I left the conference feeling great about our practice’s ICD-10 readiness,” she says. “I took away just a few additional tips to implement, including a final 20-day daily email educational sequence for staff covering the basics of ICD-10 coding guidelines as they vary from that of ICD-9.”

Tiffany Waite, IT manager at Western Slope Cardiology (CO), particularly appreciated the breakout sessions devoted to ICD-10 prep. “I was really able to look at ICD-10 from a different perspective and think of things that I’m missing, which I thought I’d covered,” she explains. “I learned Windows programs I can install that will enhance Prime Suite and that I know our doctors will love. I had meaningful conversations with other providers and managers about how they do things within the system and certain things I can try back at our practice.”

Catering to the Consumer (and Population)
Panelists also discussed the challenges of meeting the desires of the emerging healthcare consumer who is accustomed to 24/7 online convenience in banking, retail, and other aspects of their lives. “Consumers are redefining healthcare,” says Allegro Pediatrics (WA) COO Josephine Young, who is also founder and head of Greenway’s pediatric user group. “It’s no longer sufficient that there’s quality healthcare. That’s a given. An office visit is a given. Now they’re looking at: ‘What else can you give me?’”

They also touched on the desire to participate in population health initiatives without incurring significant cost to gather and report data, or divulging even de-identified patient information that can inadvertently be used against them by their competition to remove a competitive advantage, especially for organizations with a significant market footprint in their area.

Looking at the World in a Different Way for a Good Cause
Artist and motivational speaker Erik Wahl brought attendees to a standing ovation after his keynote about looking at things differently to embrace and celebrate change. Wahl went from a corporate career to reinventing himself as a skilled artist who merges lightning-fast and dynamic painting strokes with his talk and multimedia presentations that inspire audiences like that in Dallas. Two of the paintings Wahl created during his hour-long presentation — of Albert Einstein, painted upside down and flipped around at the end to surprise the audience even more and the Statue of Liberty in vibrant red, white and blue – were auctioned off throughout the day. A total of $12,500 was raised for the nonprofit Rapha Clinic, which provides free healthcare services to the underserved of southwestern Georgia and eastern Alabama. Greenway Health has long supported the clinic, and hopes with its customers to enable more such clinics to be open in other areas in coming years.

“We were literally blown away by the gracious bidding of our customers, partners, and staff,” says Eric Grunden, Greenway’s vice president of professional services who sits on the Rapha Clinic board. “While the paintings are wonderful and Erik’s presentation was truly inspirational, it’s the support of our customers to serve others that really inspires us. We’re proud to be associated with people who share our commitment to serve, connect, and care, as Greenway’s motto states.”

Motivation and ‘Missing the Mark’
“These conference keynoters also motivate us in so many ways,” says attendee Mona Engle, RN, CEO and practice administrator of Drs. May•Grant Associates (PA). “You can often come to healthcare conferences somewhat defeated by how the industry is changing, but you leave on a ‘high’ knowing we are doing what we need to be doing for the betterment of healthcare and that we CAN continue on.”

“The Engage conference is one that we put on our calendars year after year,” she adds. “There are so many things that we as a private practice learn from so many different avenues. It all begins from the minute you arrive and start interacting with your peers, hearing their challenges and their successes they’re willing to share. The heart of Greenway is shared by its CEO, Tee Green. We always appreciate his candor in what the company has accomplished and how in some regards it ‘missed the mark’ the previous year, while sharing the strategic, thoughtful steps that have been put in place to correct issues and always keeping its customers as the primary focus.”

Robb Verna is director of Carrollton, GA-based Greenway Health’s Customer for Life Program.

Contacts

Jennifer,  Mr. H, Lorre, Dr. Jayne, Dr. Gregg, Lt. Dan

More news: HIStalk, HIStalk Connect.

Get HIStalk Practice  updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 9/10/15

Top News

Cox Communications acquires Trapollo, a Sterling, VA-based company that deploys and manages telemedicine and remote health monitoring programs for chronic disease management, home health, and employer health and wellness programs. The acquisition is the latest in the broadband and media company’s efforts to gain a stronger foothold in healthcare. It formed an alliance with Cleveland Clinic and became an investor in HealthSpot (also a Cleveland Clinic partner) earlier this year.

HIStalk Practice Announcements and Requests

The lazy days of summer are behind us, which means the healthcare IT news will be flying fast and furiously between now and the holidays. Take advantage of special rates on HIStalk Practice sponsorships (HIStalk sponsors get an extra discount) to make sure your message stands out. Contact Lorre for details.

Webinars

September 22 (Tuesday) noon ET. “Just Step on the Scale: Measure Ongoing EHR Success and Focus Improvements Using Simple but Predictive Adoption Metrics.” Sponsored by The Breakaway Group. Presenters:  Heather Haugen, PhD, CEO and managing director, The Breakaway Group; Gene Thomas, VP/CIO, Memorial Hospital at Gulfport. Simple performance metrics such as those measuring end-user proficiency and clinical leadership engagement can accurately assess EHR adoption. This presentation will describe how Memorial Hospital at Gulfport used an EHR adoption assessment to quickly target priorities in gaining value from its large Cerner implementation, with real-life results proving the need for a disciplined approach to set and measure key success factors. Commit to taking that scary first step and step onto the scale, knowing that it will get measurably better every day.

September 22 (Tuesday) 5 p.m. ET. “Laying the Groundwork for an Effective CDS Strategy: Prepare for CMS’s Mandate for Advanced Imaging, Reduce Costs, and  Improve Care.” Sponsored by Stanson Health. Presenters: Scott Weingarten, MD, MPH, SVP and chief clinical transformation officer, Cedars-Sinai; Anne Wellington, VP of informatics, Stanson Health. Medicare will soon penalize physicians in specific settings who do not certify that they consulted "appropriate use" criteria before ordering advanced imaging services such as CT, MRI, nuclear medicine, and PET. This webinar will provide an overview of how this critical payment change is evolving, how it will likely be expanded, and how to begin preparations now. A key part of the CMS proposal is clinical decision support, which will help meet the new requirements while immediately unlocking EHR return on investment. Cedars-Sinai will discuss how they decreased inappropriate utilization of diagnostic tests and treatments, including imaging.

Announcements and Implementations

PMD adds an ICD-10 conversion tool to its charge-capture app.

Medent integrates the CoverMyMeds electronic prior authorization solution into its EHR/PM platform.

Patient education media company AccentHealth launches an exam room tablet featuring interactive decision guides from Harvard Medical School.

Center for Arthritis and Rheumatism implements iPatientCare’s EHR, PM, and patient portal system.

Pursuant Health (fka SoloHealth) partners with Cleveland Clinic Wellness to offer interactive health-risk assessments and wellness coaching programs at its self-service care kiosks. The new features seem especially suited to employer and payer health and wellness programs. The Atlanta-based company launched in 2007 and seems to have gone through a low-profile rebranding this spring,

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

New York-based Excellus BlueCross BlueShield reports that a December 2013 cyber attack has exposed the demographic and medical claims data of up to 10.5 million customers including those of Lifetime Health Medical Group, which operates several clinics in the region.

Athenahealth CEO Jonathan Bush shares with Cohealo CEO Mark Slaughter what he would have done differently in taking the company public: “I would not have used investment banks, because they have such a strong incentive to screw you. But being public I like a lot. Being visible and transparent helps with your awareness, it helps you with your stature. It makes you be more credible and careful with the way you operate. And as a CEO, you can be rich without exiting. You can sell a few shares every month and buy a boat, or, you know, take a vacation. Before I was CEO of a company, I was theoretically rich, but not the kind that you could spend.” The full interview is actually quite entertaining. It’s always interesting to see healthcare IT go-getters riffing off of one another’s experiences.

People

Deborah DiSanzo (Philips Healthcare) joins IBM as general manager of its new Watson Health unit.

Leidos promotes Tom Aikens to deputy group president of Leidos Health.

Research and Innovation

A JAMA study of 41 certified EHRs finds that many did not perform testing with physician end users, resulting in a barrage of usability issues once the systems were clicked on in clinical settings. The EHRs were tested by an average of 14 participants of which few, if any, had clinical backgrounds.

Fast Company profiles Scott Thomas, the design brains behind the 2008 Obama campaign who is now focused on Scanadu’s much-hyped Scout medical device. Thomas is assembling a team to help with industrial design, branding, and software for the device, which measures temperature, heart rate, blood pressure, and hemoglobin via a 10-second head scan and accompanying smartphone app. Lt. Dan covers the company’s ramp up to FDA approval here.

A Kaiser Permanente study of older diabetic patients from a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds finds that medication adherence increases when patients order prescription refills online. While adherence increased as a whole by 4 percent, researchers found that African-Americans were less likely to refill prescriptions online, and that all ethnic and minority groups had lower statin adherence compared to their white peers. Researchers note that, “While the consistent benefit in medication adherence across racial and ethnic groups in this study is promising, we also need to better understand the reasons for differences in use of online portals across groups to help promote a more uniform use of these health technologies and tools.”

Other

EHNAC and the Healthcare Billing & Management Association partner to offer the Healthcare Network Accreditation Program for Medical Billers to companies that handle sensitive data as part of their coding and billing services.

Yelp continues to break the mold when it comes to customer reviews: Ex-inmates take to the site to review their former places of incarceration, with more than a few citing the practice as an economical alternative to therapy. “Jail did its job for me: scared the hell out of me, so I will never go back,” says Travis County Jail reviewer Jennifer Vekris. “So four stars for a great place that fulfilled its promises that were advertised.”

Contacts

Jennifer,  Mr. H, Lorre, Dr. Jayne, Dr. Gregg, Lt. Dan

More news: HIStalk, HIStalk Connect.

Get HIStalk Practice  updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

Readers Write: ICD-10 Optimism Overshadows Lack of Provider Prep

ICD-10 Optimism Overshadows Lack of Provider Prep
By Jim Denny

Some people always see the glass half full and aren’t too worried, despite the circumstance. Keys locked in the car? They say, “It’s such a pretty day, and now I get to enjoy the weather while I wait for the locksmith.” Favorite football team on a losing streak? They think, “Hey, maybe our season tickets will be cheaper next year!”

Within the healthcare industry, many glasses seem more than half full when it comes to ICD-10 preparation. Navicure’s latest ICD-10 readiness survey found that respondents from healthcare organizations are overwhelmingly optimistic about being ready for October 1. While 85 percent are confident they will be ready for the transition, 57 percent indicated their organization is not on track with preparations. Despite their upbeat attitudes, survey respondents did identify specific concerns they need to address in advance of the deadline.

For example, 94 percent anticipate an increase in their denial rate on October 1. Only 30 percent, however, have improved denial-management processes to help cope with this increase. In addition, 56 percent identified cash flow as their greatest concern related to ICD-10, yet a relatively small percent have improved revenue cycle processes to promote better cash flow. Over a third have improved patient collections processes, while 17 percent have improved patient price-estimation processes.

Reading these statistics, it’s easy to wonder how providers are remaining so optimistic despite the fact they’re not completely prepared. Their positive attitudes can likely be attributed to the hard work and dedication they’ve seen from physicians and staff. For instance, survey results show how much progress providers have made with end-to-end testing, an especially critical component of ICD-10 planning. A January 2015 ICD-10 survey found that 38 percent planned to participate in end-to-end testing, but only 11 percent had begun. The most recent survey revealed that 25 percent of respondents had participated in end-to-end testing, and of those, 60 percent also achieved positive results. Progress in perhaps the most challenging aspect of ICD-10 planning shows their degree of hard work and preparation in recent months.

And on another glass-half-full note, the number of providers on track with ICD-10 preparations more than doubled since the previous iteration of the survey. In January 2015, only 21 percent of respondents were on track with their readiness plan, a number that jumped to 43 percent in the most recent results. This amount of progress is promising, and providers will undoubtedly continue to use their remaining time to its fullest.

When you think about it, overwhelming provider optimism about ICD-10 isn’t all that surprising. More than other industries, healthcare requires a perpetually positive outlook. Providers not only treat challenging cases on a daily basis, but also care for an increasingly aging population with higher incidences of multiple chronic conditions. They’re tackling an array of initiatives due to health reform, from Meaningful Use requirements to value-based care. Through all of these challenges, both clinicians and staff remain dedicated to providing the best possible care for each individual patient. Nearly everyone in a provider organization, whether they’re a surgeon or a revenue cycle manager, considers their work a vocation rather than a job. This outlook, along with a healthy dose of optimism, will serve the industry well as we embark on the challenge of adapting to ICD-10.

Jim Denny is president and CEO of Atlanta-based Navicure.

Contacts

Jennifer,  Mr. H, Lorre, Dr. Jayne, Dr. Gregg, Lt. Dan

More news: HIStalk, HIStalk Connect.

Get HIStalk Practice  updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 9/9/15

Top News

Apple unveils the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, iPad Pro (it’s biggest tablet to date), updates to the Apple Watch, and new accessories like the Pencil. (I’m surprised they didn’t call it the iPencil.) The biggest healthcare technology tie-in came at the beginning of the event, when AirStrip Technologies co-founder Cameron Powell, MD demonstrated the company’s app for the Apple Watch, which enables physicians to monitor the health of pregnant women and their babies.

HIStalk Practice Announcements and Requests

The lazy days of summer are behind us, which means the healthcare IT news will be flying fast and furiously between now and the holidays. Take advantage of special rates on HIStalk Practice sponsorships (HIStalk sponsors get an extra discount) to make sure your message stands out. Contact Lorre for details.

Pandora celebrates its 10th anniversary with an ad-free day of listening, which is always music to my ears. The realization that I’ve been listening to the streaming-music website for that long makes me stop and think about the last time I bought an actual CD. I honestly can’t remember, though I’ll never forget the day I bought my first – Duran Duran’s The Wedding Album. Current favorite Pandora stations include Rend Collective, Laid Back Beach Music, and Early Jazz. Am I missing anything by not jumping over to Spotify or Apple? Share your two cents and favorite music sources in the comments below.

Webinars

September 22 (Thursday) 12:00 ET. "Just Step on the Scale: Measure Ongoing EHR Success and Focus Improvements Using Simple but Predictive Adoption Metrics." Gene Thomas, CIO of Memorial Hospital of Gulfport, will share how his organization used an EHR adoption assessment to quickly target priorities in gaining value from its large Cerner implementation. Thomas and Heather Haugen, CEO of the Breakaway Group, will also share real-life results that prove the need for a disciplined approach to setting and measuring key success factors. Commit to taking that scary first step and step onto the scale, knowing that it will get measurably better every day.

Telemedicine

This article points out the strong “bite” telemedicine is taking out of primary care thanks to a shortage of PCPs and an expanding pool of vendors. The bite may turn into a mouthful once Anthem, UnitedHealth, and retail clinics like Walgreens expand their telemedicine programs in the coming months.

And speaking of the growing telemedicine market … Greenville, SC-based Arcpoint Labs launches Arcpoint MD, a telemedicine subscription service geared to employers and individuals. The company, which seems to be best known as a franchisor of medical screening businesses, offers consumers unlimited usage for $18 a month, well below the typical $40-$50 charged per consultation by bigger name telemedicine vendors.

TeleCommunications Systems releases the VirtuMedix mobile telemedicine app.

Announcements and Implementations

Hallmark Healthcare Solutions partners with ECG Management Consultants to develop cloud-based software that assists providers in developing, managing, and evaluating physician compensation plans.

Zotec Partners launches an ICD-10 educational microsite for physicians.

People

Neil Solomon, MD (Blue Shield of California) joins MedZed as co-founder, chief strategist, and CMO.

Jacque Sokolov, MD (SSB Solutions) and Conrad Prusak (Vistage International) join GlobalMed’s new Board of Directors. CEO Joel Barthelemy will also take a seat on the BoD.

Athenahealth promotes Tim O’Brien to chief marketing officer, Dan Haley to general counsel, and Kyle Armbrester to chief product officer. Former CMO Rob Cosinuke will move to a new role with the company’s Leadership Institute.

Government and Politics

CDC releases a 2014 snapshot of EHR utilization by office-based physicians, finding that half of those surveyed had installed at least a basic system. Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, North Carolina, North and South Dakota, Utah, and Wisconsin had higher utilization rates than the national average, while New Jersey and Tennessee had the lowest. It would be interesting to correlate these findings with the presence and assistance of the 62 government-funded RECs in each state.

ONC’s Health IT Policy Committee focuses its last meeting of the year on draft recommendations for interoperability goals, and the EHR-switching habits of EPs and hospitals. You can’t argue with the data: The rate at which physicians changed all their vendors quadrupled from 2 percent in 2013 to 8 percent in 2014, proving the rip-and-replace market is alive and well.

Research and Innovation

An EHealth Initiative study finds that the inability of ACOs to access data outside of their own networks is their biggest challenge, followed by a lack of data integration and issues around change management. Nearly half of the 69 ACOs surveyed reported difficulty in engaging patients despite having the bells and whistles associated with EHRs and care-management software. One-fifth of the respondents reported having telemedicine programs in place – a percentage that will likely rise as providers attempt to keep patients out of retail clinics and off of consumer-friendly telemedicine apps.

Other

Savannah, GA-based Mercer Medical College debuts its Culinary Medicine program this fall in an effort to help future physicians better understand and communicate the benefits of healthy eating to patients. The program combines cooking classes, research, and community engagement, including providing free health screenings at local farmers markets. “In medical school, there’s the concept of ‘see one, do one, teach one,’” says second-year medical student Kevin Jiles. “They’re talking about procedures, but we’re using it to take what we learn in the kitchen and bring it to others.”

Australian oncologist Ranjana Srivastava shines a troubling spotlight on the role health illiteracy plays in misunderstood diagnoses, treatment directives, and overall patient engagement:

“[A]s medical advances reward us with ever more sophisticated drugs and interventions, there is little to suggest that patients are any more engaged about what it means for them. Evidence abounds as to how little our patients understand of what we tell them. Many don’t know what it means to take pills on an empty stomach or have a fasting cholesterol test. Health illiteracy is associated with poor surveillance, delayed diagnosis, problematic compliance and worse outcomes. Health-illiterate patients ask fewer questions, visit doctors less, and rely more on anecdotes and myths. These patients are poor at self-care and they make for poor carers. Culturally and linguistically diverse groups fare worse in every way.

“Health education must start in school. We need to teach children the importance of understanding how the body works. When a woman is health literate the whole family benefits. But simply producing more material won’t do if it’s not well thought out or presented in a way that fails to engage diverse groups.”

Contacts

Jennifer,  Mr. H, Lorre, Dr. Jayne, Dr. Gregg, Lt. Dan

More news: HIStalk, HIStalk Connect.

Get HIStalk Practice  updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.