Medical Billing Blog: Section - Medical Data
Archive of all Articles in the Medical Data Section
This is the archive containing links to all articles written in the Medical Data section of our blog.
Click any of the article links below to read the entire article or browse another section to the right to read articles on another subject.
EHR Data Helps Scientists Detect Heart Failure Earlier
Joint research between IBM Research and Sutter Health led to the development of methods for predicting heart failure using clues imbedded in patient records in Epic EHR technology. Researchers observed the performance of machine learning models designed to detect prediagnostic heart failure in primary care patients using longitudinal data in EpicCare EHRs. “Information that can be gained on populations of patients from longitudinal EHR data can be used to individualize care for a given patient,” Ng et al. stated. “Access to these data in combination with the rapid evolution of modern machine learning and data mining techniques offers a potentially promising means to accelerate discoveries that can be readily translated …
EHR is Still a Top Buying Priority for Physicians
A recent survey of healthcare executives shows that inpatient and outpatient EHR technology are top of mind for provider buying priorities for health IT purchases, trailing only telemedicine. A third of 248 respondents to a Research Data survey listed telemedicine (33%), inpatient EHR (32%), and outpatient EHR (32%) solutions as their current top health IT buying priorities. The three technologies were well ahead of MACRA implementation and patient engagement, both reported by 20 percent of healthcare executives, as health IT purchasing priorities. The greatest number of respondents — ranging from healthcare CEOs, CIOs, and CFOs to IT, medical, and nursing directors — working in standalone hospitals (47%) and integrated delivery …
Who’s Accessing Your Health Data?
Despite the fact that ransomware and hacking attacks draw the biggest headlines, it is actually improper insider access that causes the highest number of data breaches. Such are the results from the most recent Protenus “Breach Barometer,” which analyzes reported and sometimes not so publicly reported breaches in healthcare each month. For those who follow privacy and security in healthcare, the Protenus findings are not that surprising. Reports of inappropriate access by insiders are frequent and show a disturbing trend. Many of the reports allege that information was not used in any detrimental manner. Only that snooping occurred. However, there are two problems with that view. First, even small insider …
Many EHR Vendors and Providers Block Information Exchange
Half of electronic health record (EHR) vendors and a quarter of hospitals and health systems routinely engage in information blocking that restricts data flow between providers with different EHRs, according to officials of public health information exchanges (HIEs) surveyed by researchers at the University of Michigan. The top motivation for EHR developers was revenue maximization, whereas the hospital systems were mainly motivated by a desire to maintain or enhance their competitive position, the authors state. The study was published online March 7 in the Milbank Quarterly. In a report issued 2 years ago, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) said there was anecdotal evidence showing that …
