Practice Technology

The Department of Health and Human Services has launched a new Web site aimed at helping consumers access healthcare coverage. HealthCare.gov is the first central database of public and private health coverage options, according to the government.

Two papers in the July issue of Health Affairs examine how email, cell phones, and other technology can affect the patient-provider relationship and health outcomes.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services has launched the Web site for its electronic health record incentive programs.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology has established a temporary certification program through which it will authorize organizations to test and certify electronic health record technology.

Wellpoint Inc. reported it will offer web visits to healh plan members through the American Well Online Care platform.

Potential theft is the top worry of those with concerns about electronic health records, according to a recent online survey conducted for Xerox Corp. by Harris Interactive.

One obstacle to better use of clinical data within healthcare organizations is that capturing discrete patient data and entering that data in a computable format appear to be daunting, resource-intensive tasks, according to healthcare providers participating in a study, the findings of which are summarized in a white paper titled, Can Organizations Maximize Clinical Data?

A national initiative by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Institute of Medicine aims to improve access to health data so that developers of Web and mobile phone applications, social media, and other information technologies can create tools designed to improve health.

The U.S Department of Health and Human Services has awarded $83.9 million in grants to help networks of health centers adopt electronic health records and other health information technology systems.

A new study in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Washington will examine the effect of physicians sharing with patients, through online medical record portals, the comments and observations they make after each patient encounter.

Americans rely on Google searches as a source of healthcare information, second only to physicians, according to a survey.

The use of at-home blood pressure monitors and Web-based reporting tools that connect clinicians and patients via the Internet appears to significantly improve patients? ability to manage their hypertension to healthy levels, according to a recent study from Kaiser Permanente.

Practices using paper notes should consider switching to electronic health records to improve the efficiency with which they recall and treat sexually transmitted infections such as chlamydia, according to research conducted at the Patrick Clements Clinic, Central Middlesex Hospital, London.

A proposal by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology to establish a temporary program to certify electronic health record systems, followed by a permanent program, has elicited formal comments from the Electronic Healthcare Network Accreditation Commission.

A new provision under the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act places an administrative burden on physician practices that could discourage them from adopting electronic health record systems, according to the Medical Group Management Association.

For busy clinicans, new technologies promise savings in time as well as costs-in theory. But in practice, is this actually true? The jury is still out, as Medical Economics found out.

Growing acceptance of telemedicine is paving the way for technology to burst into the mainstream.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is providing $9.2 million in federal matching funds to Medicaid programs in four states to enable the programs to implement electronic health records.

The use of home use medical devices will ramp up as telehealth takes off, according to a report from British medical research company InMedica.

Healthcare reform can "catalyze healthcare innovation that improves quality and reduces cost, if only investors, policy-makers, and companies rise to the challenge before us," according to a new report by healthcare venture capital firm Psilos Group.

The non-profit National Quality Forum has formed the Health Information Technology Advisory Committee (HITAC) to guide its ongoing work in health information technology.

One in five consumers rated their interest in accessing personal health records through a secure Internet connection as high, said they would switch physicians to obtain access, and indicated that they would be very likely to use a mobile communication device to access them, according to the third annual Deloitte Center for Health Solutions Survey of Health Care Consumers.

Electronic health record systems can help medical practices improve their design and payment structures, according to one doctor?s examination of his five-physician internal medicine practice, published in the April 29 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Citizen satisfaction with government Web sites, which climbed to an all-time high last year, remained high through the first quarter of 2010, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index?s E-Government Satisfaction Index.

Physician practices are considering an ever-increasing number of software vendors when it comes to choosing an electronic health record, according to a new report from KLAS, a research firm specializing in monitoring and reporting the performance of healthcare vendors.

The health information exchange infrastructure will change dramatically over the next two years, according to the new report from IDC Health Insights.

To achieve meaningful use of health information technology, physician practices must increase the use of quality measurement as part of their electronic health records systems, according to a paper recently released by the American College of Physicians.

Community Care Physicians, a multi-specialty group in Albany, N.Y., recognizes the value of integrating primary care with technology.

Physician practices large and small are being herded into the panacea of the electronic health record. However, why do we tolerate a physician "texting" when he or she is examining a patient?

Do you tweet? Do your patients? Social networking via Twitter and other means could be a way to disseminate correct information and improve behavior related to the use of antibiotics, but it also might lead to confusion or the sharing of inaccurate information, contend the authors of research recently published in the American Journal of Infection Control.