Healthcare IT News For VARs — November 14, 2014
By Megan Williams, contributing writer
In this weeks’ news, late adopting hospitals could struggle to afford electronic health records (EHR) systems, hospital CFOs are delaying purchase of revenue cycle solutions, and insight into why health data breaches are so much worse than financial data breaches.
Late Adopting Hospitals Struggle To Afford EHR
Healthcare Dive reports on the staggering impact that EHR implementation has had on both early and late adopting hospitals. Early adopters like Kaiser Permanente have spent an alleged $3 billion installing Epic Systems EMR, with an additional $1 billion set aside for 10 years of maintenance. While some could afford the blow, and made up for the impact with Meaningful Use incentives, implementation has left many struggling. Hospitals that are just getting into EHR territory are more likely to suffer financially from the decision.
Hospitals Look To Next Gen Rev Cycle In Search For Solvency
CFOs believe that IT investments draw more resources than they expected, according to an article in Healthcare Finance. According to a recent Black Book survey, 40 percent of hospital CFOs say their organizations are stretched from “misjudged EHR, HIE, and patient portal expenses. Because of this, they are putting off purchasing new revenue cycle management software for at least the next year. This is a particular problem for organizations whose well-being relies on well-running revenue cycle solutions.
Performance Of Global EMRs Varies By Region
A recent KLAS report, presented by Digital Journal, has revealed that region matters when it comes to EMR products and performance — largely because of variations in desires for support. The survey included speaking with vendors working with Allscripts, Cerner, ChipSoft, CSC, Epic, InterSystems, MEDITECH, Philips, and Siemens. The report is available for a fee to both healthcare providers and vendors.
Hospital Malpractice Risk Rises In Age Of EHR
EHRs are a new battleground in the world of medical malpractice. For defendants, the records offer detailed insight into the medical decision-making process. At the same time, plaintiffs are now able to cite changes to the records (something that is easily traced), of which physicians might not even be aware. Physicians are regularly faced with the challenge of self-populating templates, which automatically pull a patient’s recent medical history — in a case discussed in the article, a patient’s EHR indicated she had had hip surgery when she’d actually had work done on her spine. Read more at Medscape.
Health Data Breaches Are Significantly Worse Than Financial Data Breaches
Government Health IT reports on five ways health data breaches are more serious than their financial counterparts. Most of the differences are founded in the highly sensitive and unique nature of information in the patient record. The five areas covered are:
- volume
- restoration of identity
- life-threatening consequences
- lack of controls
- lack of victim compensation
Healthcare IT Talking Points
HIT Consultant speaks with Validic CTO, Drew Schiller about the future of harnessing interoperability and open data in the healthcare industry. Schiller discusses the move away from siloed information, going beyond the “hype” of health wearables, and the importance of providers understanding the role they play in the future of data in the industry.
For more news and insights, visit BSMinfo’s Healthcare IT Resource Center.