News 2/13/23

Top News

Garrison Women’s Health (NH) attributes a cybersecurity incident that rendered it unable to access its appointment scheduling software and some medical records in mid December to a data breach at Global Network Systems, which manages the practice’s IT applications and infrastructure, including hosting its EHR. Some EHR data, including physician notes and encounter and scheduling data, was not retrievable due to corruption and back-up issues.

Webinars

February 28 (Tuesday) 1 ET. “Words Matter: Simplifying Clinical Terms for Patients.” Sponsor: Intelligent Medical Objects. Presenters: Whitney Mannion, RN, MSN, senior terminologist, IMO; David Bocanegra, RN, nurse informaticist, IMO. The language of medicine can be confusing and contradictory to patients, challenging their ability to prepare for a procedure or pay their bills. This webinar will explore how the words that are used to communicate – online, in print, and in person – must be chosen carefully to allow patients to comprehend their diagnoses, treatments, and care plans. The presenters will also describe how the ONC Final Rule for the 21st Century Cures Act will make clinical and technical language more directly accessible through patient portals.

March 7 (Tuesday) noon ET.  “Prescribe RPA 2.0 to Treat Healthcare Worker Burnout.” Sponsor: Keysight Technologies. Presenters: Anne Foster, MS, technical consultant manager, Eggplant; Emily Yan, MPA, product marketing manager, Keysight Technologies. Half of US health systems plan to invest in robotic process automation by the end of this year, per Gartner. The concept is evolving to help with staff burnout and physician productivity. The presenters will introduce RPA 2.0, explain how to maximize its value, demonstrate how to quickly start on RPA 2.0 and test automation in one platform, and answer questions about healthcare automation.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present your own.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Women’s virtual healthcare provider Twentyeight Health raises $8.3 million.

People

Infina Connect promotes Joe Francis to CEO. Company founder and acting CEO Sin Tong will remain chairman.

Announcements and Implementations

Doximity develops DocsGPT, a ChatGPT-inspired workflow automation tool that offers users a selection of medical prompts, such as “Certificate of Medical Necessity,” they can then flesh out with pertinent details. The tool, currently in beta, works with the company’s free digital fax service.

Research and Innovation

Black Book Research surveys of a combined 10,000-plus end users rate Surgical Information Systems the top ambulatory surgical center technology vendor and ModMed the top comprehensive health IT vendor for integrated practice management, RCM, and EHR solutions.

Sponsor Updates

• Nordic releases a new Designing for Health Podcast featuring UCHealth CMIO Dr. CT Lin.
• PerfectServe publishes a new case study, “How Savannah Neurology Specialists Reinvented Their Medical Answering Service Workflows.”

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

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News 2/8/23

Top News

CVS Health will acquire Oak Street Health, a Medicare-focused primary care provider based in Chicago, for $39 per share in a deal valued at $10.6 billion.

Oak Street will become part of CVS Health’s Health Care Delivery unit, and will remain under the leadership of CEO Mike Pykosz. It employs 600 physicians across 170 clinics in 21 states, and anticipates opening an additional 130 by 2026. The company leverages its homegrown Canopy platform to power its clinical and operational workflows.

Oak Street patients account for about two-thirds of Aetna’s Medicare Advantage membership, according to Reuters. CVS Health acquired Aetna in 2017 for $68 billion.

Webinars

March 7 (Tuesday) noon ET.  “Prescribe RPA 2.0 to Treat Healthcare Worker Burnout.” Sponsor: Keysight Technologies. Presenters: Anne Foster, MS, technical consultant manager, Eggplant; Emily Yan, MPA, product marketing manager, Keysight Technologies. Half of US health systems plan to invest in robotic process automation by the end of this year, per Gartner. The concept is evolving to help with staff burnout and physician productivity. The presenters will introduce RPA 2.0, explain how to maximize its value, demonstrate how to quickly start on RPA 2.0 and test automation in one platform, and answer questions about healthcare automation.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present your own.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

CVS Health beats analyst expectations for Q4 revenue and earnings, posting $83.85 billion in revenue and earnings of $1.99 per share.

Announcements and Implementations

CareCloud integrates the Quippe Clinical Data Engine from Medicomp Systems with its EHR to ensure providers have the most relevant, usable data at the point of care.

Complete Care implements EHR software from EClinicalWorks across their 31 facilities in Central Florida.

Research and Innovation

Researchers at the University of Missouri School of Medicine determine that site-specific EHR usability testing can help improve user efficiency, effectiveness, and satisfaction before software goes live for patient care. During their EHR user testing event, more than 70% of the 33 usability concerns identified were found to be correctable.

A medication adherence survey of 1,023 patients finds that 49% say they’ve had conversations with their doctors about saving money on their prescriptions; 83% of those say that led to more affordable options being made available.

Other

Regal Medical Group (CA) notifies patients of a December ransomware attack that enabled hackers to access some patient data.

Russell Johnson, MD bemoans the frenzied pace of EHR inbox alerts he must cope with on a daily basis, and shares the ways in which he has begun to manage patient messaging:

“To preserve my sanity, I have stopped responding to messages from patients that require more than a one-line response from me, and instead ask my assistant to schedule them for visits. I take the same approach for abnormal laboratory and imaging results. That way, the time I spend seeing patients is just that, and I’m not trying to juggle my time between my inbox and my patients, even if that means I’m overbooked.”

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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News 2/6/23

Top News

Athenahealth will lay off 178 employees, re-deploy 100 to more high-priority areas, and consider making changes to its office space in Watertown, MA, according to paywalled reporting by The Boston Globe. The company’s last round of layoffs, in 2019, impacted nearly 4% of its workforce.

HIStalk Practice Musings

My reading so far this year has tended toward the Dark Ages, as I’ve become engrossed in Bernard Cornwell’s “The Last Kingdom” series. I’ve yet to see the Netflix show, which I can only imagine is just as bloody, if not bloodier, than the warfare between Saxons, Britons, and a host of other post-Roman tribes depicted in the novel. I’ve also strayed into Cornwell’s Arthur series, which offers an interesting, brutal take on the more typical depictions of the Arthurian saga. Cornwell is my kind of author, spinning tales into a dozen books.

Readers may remember my mention last year of the book “Russian Winter” by Daphne Kalotay. She was kind enough to let me know that her new book, The Archivists, will be released in April.

Finally, I can’t help but mention that I thoroughly enjoyed comedian Nate Bargatze’s new Amazon Prime comedy special, Hello World. I bring it up here because he did at least 30 seconds on his frustration with filling out the same paper medical forms at every doctor’s appointment he’s ever been to.

Webinars

None scheduled soon. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present your own.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Simple HealthKit raises $8 million in a Series A funding round led by Initialized Capital. The company offers a digital health platform encompassing diagnostics and follow-up care to groups including providers, retail clinics, employers, and universities. Founder Sheena Menezes was a former director at Scanadu, a Tricorder-like medical device manufacturer that aimed to put a smartphone-powered diagnostic tool in everyone’s pocket before rebranding and being acquired by Health.io in 2020.

Announcements and Implementations

Houston-based Legacy Community Health Clinic will use $1 million in federal funding to upgrade its 10 year-old EHR. The clinic will go live on the new, unspecified system across its 55 facilities in October.

Research and Innovation

Physician practices are focused on the following healthcare trends, according to anonymous user data from AdvancedMD customers: patient-centric payment capabilities, integrating behavioral and mental health offerings, automation technologies that can improve workflows, remote patient monitoring, and digital patient self-service tools.

Other

Cardiovascular Associates (AL) notifies patients of a data breach late last year in which an unauthorized third party gained access to certain CVS systems that contained patient information. Some of that data was copied and removed from the network.

Fast Company profiles Fresh Connect, a Boston-based nonprofit that has created a credit card physicians can “prescribe” to their patients to help them pay for fruits and vegetables. The Fresh Connect card is scanned at check out, and the cost of fruits and vegetables is deducted from the bill’s balance. Cards are typically funded with $100, with overall funding coming from programs like Medicaid and other nonprofits. Shopping data can be tied to a patient’s EHR for analysis of patient experience and food access, outcomes, and costs. Massachusetts-based ACO Community Care Cooperative has used the card as part of a larger pilot project focused on patients with complex health needs.

Sponsor Updates

• Nordic releases a new podcast, “Making Rounds: The up and downside of disintermediation.”
• Nordic publishes DocTalk Ep. 202, “The Marvel of In-House Business Intelligence.”

Blog Posts

• Improving Patient Safety Through Unified Clinical Collaboration (TigerConnect)
• Increasing access to behavioral health resources (Nordic)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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News 2/1/23

Top News

White label telehealth company OpenLoop Health expands its headquarters in Des Moines, IA to accommodate growth from 25 to 175 employees in the last year. CEO Jon Lensing, MD says the company hopes to hire an additional 400 staffers and close another funding round by the end of 2023. It acquired Reliant.MD’s practice group last month.

Webinars

None scheduled soon. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present your own.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Aluna raises $15 million in a Series B funding round. The company has developed a smart inhaler and companion app to help asthmatic patients and their providers track lung function, triggers, and response to medication. The company, which hopes to raise a Series C round of funding next year, plans to expand into COPD and cystic fibrosis.

People

Hinge Health names Deborah Conrad chief marketing officer.

Mark Goodwin (American Family Care) joins Greenway Health as SVP of revenue services.

Government and Politics

Prescription savings company GoodRx will pay $1.5 million to settle FTC allegations that it shared the sensitive, personal health information of its users with third-party sites like Google and Facebook, which then used that information to serve up targeted ads to those individuals. The FTC also alleges that GoodRx misrepresented its HIPAA compliance and failed to implement data-protection policies.

Research and Innovation

Physicians in Canada spend 18.5 million hours annually on unnecessary administrative tasks, according to a new report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. The report points out that reducing paperwork by 10% would equate to time that could be spent on 5.5 million patient visits. For context, physicians in the US spend nearly two hours each day on EHR documentation outside of regular working hours, according to research published last year in JAMA Internal Medicine.

Other

Chico Immediate Care Medical Center (CA) notifies 3,780 patients of a data breach last fall caused by an unauthorized employee accessing its EHR. The employee was purportedly gathering information for a nearby competing clinic.

Sponsor Updates

• Compass Medical, a 95-provider organization with six locations in Massachusetts, uses EClinicalWorks to excel at value-based care and combat physician burnout.

Blog Posts

• New Evaluation & Management (E/M) Code Updates for 2023 (AdvancedMD)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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News 1/30/23

Top News

Remote patient monitoring and virtual care company CoachCare acquires Nvolve, an RPM business that caters to pain management and orthopedic practices.

Webinars

None scheduled soon. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present your own.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Patient engagement software vendor Engage Technologies Group acquires aesthetic-focused practice employee optimization company APX Platform.

People

Mark Gaines (Talkdesk) joins Viewgol as VP of sales, central.

Other

Job Alert: In Western Australia, the Shire of Quairading is prepared to offer $1 million in salary and benefits to a physician interested in taking over the town’s fully equipped clinic. Accommodation in a four bedroom, two bath house – just steps away from the clinic – will also be provided.

Retired Ob/Gyn Richard Chamberlain becomes a substitute bus driver, noting that he’s likely transporting kids he delivered to their respective schools.

Sponsor Updates

Blog Posts

• What is a Clinical Communication and Collaboration Platform? (PerfectServe)
• Data Privacy & Healthcare Cybersecurity: Addressing the Growing Challenge for Healthcare Organizations (TigerConnect)
• Stepping onto the health IT platform (Nordic)
• What Does Healthcare Disruption Look Like? (Healthwise)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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Become a sponsor.