EMRAnswers #HITSM

In my last post, I talked about the concept of slacktivism in the era of social media. Slacktivism is sort of a pseudo-activism , where participants takes part

Hands-only CPR (CPR without mouth-to-mouth resuscitation), may not be the best method for rural or remote areas or for anyone who has to wait more than a few minutes for an ambulance, a new study suggests.

.@athenahealth @ONC_HealthIT I hope you can join our walk http://t.co/BxBkxIHj3M #theWalkingGallery #HealthdataPalooza

It was time for the FDA to step up and represent the very loud voice of e-patients as well. The FDA Patient Network was just launched to educate patients and advocates about FDA; recruit patients a...

The Internet offers more than WebMD searches to find out what that headache really means. But how should we - and doctors - navigate this tricky space?

You wake up feeling a slight tickle in your throat. You try and shake it off and drink lots of water. After a few hours, it’s still there. Instead of calling your mom or making a doctor appointment, you head to the Internet. 

Today, anyone with a computer and a connection can get online and find a variety of results, ranging from simple sore throat to the more serious, like bronchitis and asthma.

But just because we can doesn’t mean we should. In a world where almost everyone is online and can easily find and provide medical solace, is it really, truly a good idea to consider social media and the Web a reliable source of healthcare?

Doctors and hospitals are on the social media bandwagon

Today, more and more members of the medical profession are embracing social media for sharing helpful medical information and providing patient care.

A Pricewaterhouse Cooper conducted survey asked over a thousand patients and over a hundred healthcare executives what they thought of the way many healthcare companies are utilizing social media and the Web, and results show the most trusted resources online are those posted by doctors (60 percent), followed by nurses (56 percent), and hospitals (55 percent).

There are plenty of conventions, conferences, symposiums, forums, and expos coming up this spring in the Health IT space. Here are some speaker highlights.

In 2012, more than 3 million people had stents inserted in their coronary arteries. These tiny mesh tubes prop open blood vessels healing from procedures like a balloon angioplasty, which widens arteries blocked by clots or plaque deposits.

1. The integration must take into account each user’s day-to-day life and workflow, including patients, providers, IT staff, and additional caregivers. Some users will need access to a greater depth of information, while for others design and usability will be paramount.

2. The design should be interoperable and support the integration of multiple MITs into a single EHR. In particular, developers should make sure to eliminate redundancies between the systems, where app users and EHR users might enter the same data into different fields.

3. Multiple environments have to be secure, but their security can’t keep them from interacting with each other. Stakeholders WellDoc interviewed reported problems with competing firewalls in implementing the integration.

4. Both halves of the integration, but especially the patient-facing app, should work natively on as many mobile devices as possible. Patients are most likely to use a system that allows them to continue using their device.

5. The mobile health offering is subject to a limitation already standard for EHR apps: it must be able to run even when network connectivity is sparse or intermittent, as is sometimes the case in large hospital complexes.

6. It’s crucial to have a support team in place familiar with the technology  to help acquaint users with it.

7. Make sure the two systems adhere to common standards. Not only data interchange standards like HL7, but also making sure that measurements in both systems use the same units. If lab-collected blood glucose data in the EHR and patient-collected blood glucose data have the same unit, but one is potentially more accurate, the integrated system should easily identify and distinguish the two.

8. The team working on an integration should be ready for a more complex process than anticipated. A clear vision, good communication, and a steering committee are important for anyone attempting to integrate a mobile heath offering and an EHR.

CNN's Leading Women wins social media award
CNN International
(CNN) -- Leading Women has won the silver award in the Social Media category at the inaugural WAN-IFRA European Digital Media Awards last Monday night.

ElationEMR Founders Kyna And Conan Fong In the heart of San Francisco’s design district, siblings Kyna and Conan Fong are polishing the contours of a digital patient record.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The HIV Outpatient Study (HOPS), supported by Cerner's Infectious Disease Insights group, HIV clinic researchers, and the dedicated project team from the Centers for Disease Control ...

ONC has released a white paper giving details on Meaningful Use Core Measure 3: Maintain Problem List and a brief on health IT in long-term/post-acute care, (ONC Issues New Whitepaper on Meaningful Use Core Measure 3