HealthContentAdvisors

FDA charges Guidant (a Boston Scientific company) with failure to report safety problems with some of its implantable defibrillators.

Eclipsys Sunrise Enterprise suite of health IT software applications to integrate with Microsoft’s Amalga UIS platform.

Athenahealth to delay its Q4 SEC filing so that it can audit its revenue recognition practices. Has to do with how Athenahealth amortizes implementation fees that are deferred until implementation is completed; they are considering extending the period of amortization beyond the current 1 year.

Important story about how Harvard Vanguard/Atrius physician group is making Beth Israel/Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) a priority hospital because of coordination of care between the two institutions.

Mayo, GE Healthcare & Intel partner on year-long study of effects of monitoring seniors & people w/ chronic illnesses with home monitoring devices.

“”Blending Eclipsys’ leadership in physician adoption and sophisticated clinical and decision-support workflows with Microsoft’s leadership in interoperability, data extraction, authentication and context management will open up new choices and opportunities for healthcare organizations needing to make the most from their existing IT infrastructure.”- Peter Neupert, Corporate VP, HSG, Microsoft.

Interesting. DyanamicBooks allow professors to customize textbooks with their own modifications. Prices will be lower for e-books, but print on demand versions will cost about the same as traditional print version. What about copyright for new version? It probably remains with Macmillan, which means professors don’t get to copyright their contributions?

Obama’s healthcare proposal 2/22/10

Missed this last week. PatientsLikeMe acquires ReliefInSite, based in Hungary. ReliefInSite helps patients track their pain levels; bus model relies on pharma and clinical researchers.

IMS offers decision support service for regulatory compliance for Pharma and med device companies.

National Center for Quality Assurance (NCQA) paper on evolving standards for Patient-Centered Medical Home metrics.

Grassley questions Pharma sponsorship of content on WenMD

Eclipsys beat expectations in Q4 2009, with earnings of $3.8 Million, up 15% YoY. Rev. up 5% YoY.

Good overview of ResearchGATE, a social networking site for scientists that allows users to set degree of privacy and facilitates collaboration. Bus model: jobs board for scientists.

ONC’s Aneesh Chopra, who chairs the Implementation Workgroup, seeks feedback on how to build a starter-kit for EHR implementation. Specific categories of interest: Vocabularies; content exchange standards; communications exchange standards, and privacy.

AHRQ

Consistent with research by Tomas Philipson, U. Chicago. Healthcare innovation and IT saves lives, but it comes with a high cost. We can keep innovating, but we can’t afford to keep paying for the innovations in the current system.

“Must read” article in NEJM on creating national program for CER.

Description of study in Worcester, MA to implement evidence-based theraputic management guidelines for cardiac patients.

Meta-analysis indicates that use of statins to control cholesterol is correlated with higher risk of type 2 diabetes.

Simple “hockey-puck on a stick” test easier to implement in real-world situations: “There are computer algorithms to measure reaction time, using game-like programs. But they’re not so good for use at the sidelines, and they involve licensing fees.”

Excellent presentation of text/audio content–and the info provided is excellent, too. Good points about data alone not being sufficient; data must be put in context and must be shared to be helpful. Read Susannah Fox’s comment to learn more about the people behind the voices in the video.

Fascinating overview of changes to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5)currently in draft form. Along with the info about specific disorders, I find the new approach toward categorizing disorders along a spectrum of severity very interesting. The degree to which someone has a disorder is considered, rather than placing each level of severity in a separate category. Aspergers as part of the autism spectrum is the example that is getting a lot of press.

Excellent lead article on need for automated data input (from devices, exchange from other systems, etc), better clinical decision support systems, and process change to make use of EHRs “meaningful” in improving health care.

McKesson & HP partner to provide EHR s/w and hardware for physician practices.

Interesting. Wolters Kluwer has set up a system whereby doctors will receive CME credit for clinical research done via their mobile phone.

Very thorough review of MSFT-Siemens deal to introduce MS HealthVault to German market and make it the system through which patients are provided medical info. HL7 is more widely used in Europe and Infobutton apps will likely catch on more quickly.

Julie Deardorff of Chicago Tribune writes about my recent blog on the AAFP’s FamilyDoctor.org site’s advertising high salt foods. Quotes me, AAFP VP Publishing, and Dr. John Spangler.

Good interview with David Blumenthal, Director, ONC, on meaningful use of EHRs and plans for national health data exchange.

Whole Foods to offer up to an additional 10% discount for employees who meet wellness measures that include nicotine use, cholesteral, and BMI targets.

Good short piece on why publishers are distributing content via Kindles even though there are business considerations.

Kent Bottles brings together topics from current books by Atul Gawande, Timothy Goetz, and an article by Jerome Groopman to consider the merits of checklists and use of decision trees in medicine. He also covers behavioral economics and choice and mentions the Thaler-Sunstein approach to offering nudges (libertarian paternalism) to guide healthful behavior. Conclusion: medicine and health are complicated. Seems to me that since computers are useful for dealing with complex calculations (even under stress) that it makes sense to use automated checklists and decision support systems to guide complex processes. Provided we can avoid GIGO (garbage in, garbage out) situations.

Interesting article on how Conde Nast is seeking to leverage brand value of Gourmet, Domino, and Cookie (defunct magazines) as well as current titles Wired and Lucky. Compares CN to Meredith, whose Better Homes & Gardens has used its brand to provide quality seals to products. CN-selected content (tested by Gourmet kitchens?) is one idea they should consider, IMO.

IUD manufacturer, Mirena (part of Bayer Pharmaceutical) has been using home parties, a la Tupperware, to spread word about benefits of Mirena IUD. FDC has sent warning letter to Bayer.

Everyday Health, the consumer health portal owned by Waterfront Media, files for $100M IPO. Positive sign for consumer health publishers. Everyday is one of the largest consumer health portals that relies on online advertising for most of its revenue.

Home page of Jan 2010 report from RWJF on PHRs.

ZocDoc, a online directory of doctors that has focused on NY and DC, is expanding to cover SF. Note, a key differentiator of ZocDoc (from the slew of other doctor ratings sites) is its integration with practice management systems for scheduling appointments so that users can find doctors with available appts. ZocDoc says they have integrated with close to 1400 PMS companies. Note, ZocDoc also encourages patient reviews of doctors, but only from ZocDoc users. Reviews of doctors remains a sticky wicket for all of the doc review sites.

Susannah Fox from Pew Internet started the conversation with her post about Google Health OneBox that lists results from Mayo Clinic, WebMD, ADAM, and MedlinePlus in a special position at top of search results. Great discussion in the comments ensued, including a couple from me.

Brief article describing MedeAnalytics revenue cycle management solution being adopted by St. Joseph’s Hospital in Maryland.

Info on work Tim Berners-Lee is doing for UK govenment to make sources of gov’t data more available and meaningful.

“Pfizer increased its spending on online professional promotion by more than 90% last year, according to a study, a sign the drugmaker is emphasizing alternatives to live sales reps for detailing certain products.” Study by SDI.

“Press Ganey Associates, Inc. today announced the addition of Philip Marshall, MD, MPH, as senior vice president, clinical products. Dr. Marshall joins the company at a time of continued growth and will be responsible for expanding the clinical product lines for the company.” Dr. Marshall was most recently VP Product Strategy at WebMD Health.

Superb analysis of impact of Scott Brown’s win to fill Ted Kennedy’s seat in the Senate on health reform. David Harlow (whom I finally got to meet yesterday) and Joseph Kvedar offer insightful quotes. Kvedar suggests that if health reform legislation doesn’t pass, we still have raised awareness of need for change to control costs and that some changes will occur even w/o legislation. Harlow says that costs and quality will continue to decline w/o legislation and could lead to a stronger bill with some form of a public option down the road.

Good article from former HBS professor on how companies can mine their own propriety data about customers and partners to their advantage. Lays out the 5 keys to doing it right: 1) create a network to collect proprietary data; 2) use best technology; 3)analyze with insight & precision; 4) figure out how to act on info to your advantage; 5) be lucky enough to have good timing.

Nuval, a Boston-area company that provides numeric ratings that reflect nutritional value of foods, gets official endorsement from American College of Preventive Medicine.

Very good commentary about shortcomings of continued medical education (CME) from a Canadian physician’s perspective. In Canada, CME (called CPD in Canada) is more structured and reporting is more detailed. Dr. Rob is very critical of US system that relies primarily on attendance at medical conferences.

Highlights IdeaBounty and InnoCentive as examples of companies that facilitate crowdsourced innovations. In these two cases, winning participants are paid for their ideas/solutions. Good article that describes how 1 company replaced their ad agency with IdeaBounty for creative.

Pearson FT is apparently shopping Interactive Data.

DeepDyve makes another move toward making scholarly journal articles more accessible. The partnership with CiteULike expands the utility of DeepDyve to knowledge workers who don’t have high-priced subscriptions through their corporate or academic library. CiteULike is a “delicious”-type bookmarking service popular in the scholarly community. DeepDyve also announced partnership with publisher De Gruyter. I am impressed with the pace of innovation and content deals carried out at DeepDyve. Their $0.99 rental price for journal articles is an important step toward opening up access to scholarly research on a much wider scale.

Good article and comments about expectations of enhanced ebooks. Key themes IMO: 1) publishers have to understand the technology platform/distribution platform that is appropriate for their audience; 2) pricing plays a role in selecting the right platform (CD-ROM allowed fixed pricing at a time when online access charged per second); trying to use new technology as a guise for increasing prices is a risky move.

Poll of 800 physicians on Sermo indicate that large percentage feel current Medicare policies are out of sync with market needs. “[O]ver 40% of the physicians polled feel the US government “never will” understand how declining reimbursement rates from Medicare negatively affect the care patients receive from their physicians. They fear reimbursements will continue to decline in the coming years, reducing patient access to physicians.”

Nice article that describes some reliable sources of health info for consumers from a Minnesota pub. Note, they still have PDR listed as owned by Thomson Healthcare, even though it’s a winter 2010 article.

Good overview of the two companies and the impact of the acquisition. John Moore of Chilmark views the acquisition as a long-term investment since he doesn’t see much life in the PHR segment at this time.

Adams replaces Carl Byers, athena’s initial CFO, who last June said he wanted to live abroad.

Credit rating firm TransUnion has acquired MedData LLC, a Charlotte, N.C.-based health care transactions processing firm, for an undisclosed sum.

Healthcare IT News reviews Allscripts/Misys Q2 results. Rev. up 30% yoy. Allscripts CEO, Glen Tullman, calls 2010 “year of the EHR” due to stimulus funds.

Origin, a CT-based provider of RCM and clinical and BI analytics, gets growth equity funding from TCV. Previous investors include Beecken, Petty & O’Keefe & Company (“BPOC”), an investor since 2006, and management as investors in Origin.

Not enough info is provided in blog entry to make much sense of the results. Asking people what general categories of content they would pay for isn’t very telling; better research methods are needed. Plus, there’s such a range of content in each type that results aren’t very valuable.

Good article on outlook for Informa. Author indicates that asset sales are likely in 2010 and points to Performance Improvement as a top candidate, since it doesn’t fit with other Informa assets. However, Informa’s CEO, Peter Rigby, is against divestments and would prefer to grow through more acquisitions, according to article. Also, academic/scholary publishing division is called out as their best performer (due to high margins). Given pressures on this segment and lack of innovation from Informa, I would be worried if I were a shareholder.

Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Inc. has won a $72 Million grant from the FDA to build a system to monitor the safety of drugs and medical devices after they have gone on the market.

Good commonsense views on what will and will not change in 2010.

Short but insightful article that reports some interaction between Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt and Atul Gawande, MD, author of new book The Checklist Manifesto. Key point, workflow or “clinical encounter” is not understood by the computer scientists who create EMR systems. Also, systems analysis and performance improvement (my terms) are not respected uses of time for MDs.

Dr. Fabius, among other things, served as president and chief medical officer for i-TRAX, which was acquired by Walgreens in 2008. “I-TRAX was the parent company of CHD Meridian Healthcare, a leading provider of worksite healthcare centers for large employers.”

Inside Out provides interactive training on the human body for K-12 market.

Brian Ahier summarizes Sec’y HHS Sebelius’ Health Security program.

Kaiser and VA (Veteran’s Affairs) will use NHIN to exchange patient data (with permission) in pilot program in San Diego area.

Some good insight here. E.g., 6)PMS vendors will acquire RCM companies (didn’t I just write that yesterday?),8) Payers, PBMs and Pharmacies will use EHRs to deliver information (add publishers to that list).

Kevin Noland resigns to make way for former CFO Mark Adams to take helm. Could this be result of change in strategy to focus more on benefits management services than content?

TabSafe, an Indiannapolis company, showcases its medication management system at CES.

“23andMe has completed a $27.8 million second round of funding. In addition to funding from Google and Google founder Sergey Brin (husband of 23andMe founder Anne Wojcicki), 23andMe has been funded by Genentech and New Enterprise Associates.”

As my colleague Russell Perkins said, “betcha thought there already was one”.

Dr. Carolyn Clancy, director of AHRQ, describes new report for consumers on anti-depressants. Includes link to full report.

“Atenda is one of the largest home health benefit management companies, providing care and exclusively managing more than 1.3 million lives. Atenda is used by major health plans as a single point of contact for managing all home care services, resulting in improved care and cost savings to plans and their members.” Univita was established by Genstar Capital last year with its acquisition of Long Term Care Group, and subsequently acquired ENURGI.

HIMSS writes up new CDSC created by Blackford Middleton at Partners Healthcare.

“The National Association for Children’s Hospitals and Related Institutions (NACHRI), a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the operations and quality of care in its almost 200 member hospitals, is using a web-based research database and reporting system developed by IT Consulting Services of Quantros to report on quality improvement initiatives. Quantros is a leading software and services provider for the healthcare industry.”

Nice article on Google’s view of future of advertising. I agree with Arora from Google that online ads shouldn’t be an afterthought, but a critical part of overall advertising strategy.

Nice summary of major milestones in medical research in the last 10 years. Emphasizes the impact of the mapping of human genome a decade ago. Also points to advances in preventing disease. Note, although preventive medicine is a much better long-term goal than treating illness, based on my experience, funds tend to be focused on the crisis of the moment and savings of prevention often get forgotten over time (e.g., vaccinations). However, for the present time, there is likely to be renewed focus on prevention in medicine.

Good thought-provoking piece by Joe Esposito. He uses example of early enthusiasm from entrepreneurs and Wall St. to build broadband pipes to households, which puzzled the established RBOCs who couldn’t imagine why HHs would need such high bandwidth. Contrasts that situation with today’s need to radical change in scholarly publishing model to provide more direct interactive between researchers and scientists. Implication is that the needed change won’t come from traditional players. I agree.

Scott Kirsner, Boston Globe, on trio of young companies that provide outsourced R&D, using crowdsourcing. Innovcentive, Hypios and Yet2.com are highlighted. Innocentive & Yet2.com are Boston area companies; Hypios is in Paris.

Editor of Journal of Spinal Disorders & Techniques for past seven years receives royalty payments from certain Medtronic devices. “Studies involving Medtronic spinal products or that were funded by Medtronic appeared in the journal at least once per issue, on average.” And, are uniformly reviewed in a positive light. More trouble for scholarly publishing sector–fueled in part by Richard Smith, former editor of BMJ.

Nice post that focuses on improving access to healthcare data–by all stakeholders.

Interesting news about licensing deal between AllTheContent, a Geneva, Switz based content syndicator, and Pharma Channel, which provides info to pharmacies in Europe.

Headline says it all. Gary dissects an actual memo used with TV journalists that promotes tying recent medical research to exaggerated claims of short-term benefits–and the specifically recommends against mentioning research labs or clinical work.

Article on the new building extension of MIT’s media lab designed by Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki. Contrasts Maki’s style of open space with lots of glass to original IM Pei buildling with limited windows. Interesting metaphor for move of technology from “black box” to enabling and thriving on “transparency”.

An indictment of doctors and drug companies that promote drug interventions for preventive care. Uses example of hormone drug replacement for women.

References CBO study (with link) that describes the allocation of marketing $$ to detailing, CME support, DTC and a measly $400 M in professional journals. Journals publishers need to reinvent themselves as a vehicle for reaching doctors/clinicians.

Conversation between Milken and Pfizer CEO Kindler

John Moore writes a brief post about MSFT’s announcement of long-term care provider Golden Living’s adoption of Amalga & HealthVault.

McClellan, former CMS adminstrator, MD, and PhD economist, will keynote Advanstar’s Center for Business Intelligence (CBI)’s Annual Strategic Medicare Policy Summit.

Nancy McKinstry interview: journals renewals are strong even with price increases; hospitals are spending more capital in 2009 than 2008 in anticipation of ARRA funds to come in 2010.

Humana will establish MinuteClinic for its own employees and will encourage all members to use MinuteClinic for basic screening tests for cholesterol, blood pressure, bmi–and will couple basic screenings with its own LifeSynch health coaching.

WebMD, HealthVault (MSFT) and GoogleHealth comprise the panel moderated by Jane Sarasohn-Kahn. About 50 minutes long. Worth a look.

Very good analysis of trends in IT research. Essentially says that high priced IT research reports are becoming commoditized and used for lead gen that is paid for by vendors. Analysts can still make money consulting, firms can put on events, and carry out customized research. Totally in line with my writings and demonstrated in the content value pyramid in my Publishing for e-Patients preso (on Slideshare/janicemc). Like comment about individual analysts becoming branded more so than firms. Agree there, too.

Kent Bottles provides excellent summary of recent lecture by David Eddy, MD (the “founder” of EBM) who has consistently challenged the robustness of existing methods of clinical decision guidelines. Dr. Eddy believes the future requires more complex models that consider a larger number of factors and interactions that in effect provide more personalized medical treatment. Eddy’s own company, Archimedes, builds “virtual patients” that can be used for complex modeling of probable outcomes. I don’t know enough about Archimedes to judge its efficacy, but I think Eddy has the right approach. We know that more data are available about patients and outcomes and will accelerating adoption of EHRs, the amount of data will expand rapidly. Along with the improved data sources, there is clearly a need for more complex models to analyze the data and test the benefits of medical treatments.

Comprehensive article on HSAs and high-deductible health plans.

Schein will merge its animal health business with Butler; Schein to own 50.1%.

Good article that mentiones pricedoc.com, healthcarebluebook.com, and outofpocket.com, sites that provide info on prices for various procedures or office visits by doctor.

Another story that critiques overly simple health care rating schemes. IMO, ratings needs to be based on analysis of outcomes, using real data, not observations from a third-party, which are subject to error.

Excellent post and comments. I just added my own comment (7th in list).

Good commentary on public reaction to public health announcements and EBM. More “infodemiology”, that is, providing trustworthy information and monitoring public response to epidemics, is needed.

IDC Health Insights report on EHR vendors ($4,500)

Sponsored by Google, survey lists most popular resources used to find medical info. Surprise! Search engine/Google is at the top, followed by peer-reviewed journals. No category for online clinical information resources, such as UpToDate, MDConsult, DynaMed, as far as I can see. If no breakout were given on survey, Search Engine category may incorporate these resources too.

FDA would need legislative action to approve new db, but given the ability to track more data from electronic records and online user-input, federal db makes sense.

Study of search behavior indicates that online search is often used to confirm or refute one’s internal knowledge. Hm, sounds rather Bayesian to me.

Good review of press related to new mammogram guidelines. Interesting that so many who say they want EBM, object when they don’t like the data. “Don’t like” often means they stand to lose business or stature.

Article describes how students are sharing for-fee medical articles in a Napster-type environment.

With pressure from patient groups and regulators, hospitals have make significant progress in reducing hospital-acquired patient infections. Checklists and focus on solving the problem (using best practices from other institutions as one means) are noted as key to changing the procedures and culture at hospitals.

MD who wrote this post suggests that Kolata’s article is biased toward the big pharma position, since her only sources were from pharma.

InformationWeek profiles Transparent health Network, which is compiling prices for direct purchases of healthcare services by patients.

Flybridge invests in woman-owned pilates equipment seller, which has sold over $500M in equip on QVC over the past 12 years.

Workflow study that follows patient through hospital identifies areas for improvement.

Brian Ahier writes about recent developments in electronic healthcare records with a focus on Practice Fusion and GoogleHealth’s attempts to offer patient info that is consistent with physician info.

John Moore of Chilmark Research, who moderated closing panel, recaps the day’s highlights. I’ll add that John did a very good job on the last panel, which included Esther Dyson, Steve Munini COO Dossia, Fred Smith of CDC, and George Willock, CEO of HealthString. Audience appreciated the focus on the patient (Adam Bosworth did focus on patient, too). I believe it was Esther who said: “the patient is the most important input into health decisions”. She mentioned the “quantified self” movement and Society for Participatory Medicine also got a plug. This was the most forward-looking session that addressed social media and the exploding amount of new data that will be available for analysis.

DataONE (Data Observation Network for Earth) is one of two $20 million awards made this year as part of the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) DataNet program. The collaboration of universities and government agencies coalesced to address the mounting need for organizing and serving up vast amounts of highly diverse and inter-related but often incompatible scientific data. Resulting studies will range from research that illuminates fundamental environmental processes to identifying environmental problems and potential solutions.

Center for Ix Therapy, which was represented at our first Health Content07 conference, to shut down Nov 30, 2009. The Center was small organization with limited resources, and suffered from trying to define a space that already existed and was far more widespread and diverse than their definition of Ix Therapy.

Wonder what Lexis and Westlaw will say about this?

Makes sense. FDA and other govt sources are not best at marketing and distribution. Everyday Health (Waterfront Media) can take on that role to extend reach of FDA info.

Grove, former CEO of Intel, promotes concept of new degree to help accelerate the cycle from medical research discoveries to mass production of new treatments. Essentially, Grove wants to combine skills of researchers and engineers to disrupt current cycle that can take many years from bench research to broad availability.

Physician posits that dependence on checklists may not be to the benefit of good patient care if insufficient attention to individual patients is paid.

Gary slams the morning TV shows for their promotion of junk information about weight-loss and other health issues. I agree that for the most part, TV news health info is superficial and very seldom put in context. Wouldn’t it be great if the money were spent on disseminating helpful information and pointing people to more trustsworthy sources?

How much information is optimal to share between patients & doctors? Great comments here.

Article makes the point that it’s great that gov’t agencies are providing more open data, but that data needs to be put in context and displayed in an engaging manner to really have full impact. And that, dear publishers, is what you should be doing…

Excellent round-up of Day 1 of FDA hearings on social media use by Pharma.

CVS sees value in studying interaction between genes and medication for its PBM business and for its end-customers.

Dr. Pauline Chen’s column about the decline in # docs who want to go into primary care. In large part, it’s due to large number of routine cases they deal with and the amount of paperwork and coordination required. Of course, pay is an issue too. This ties with articles I’ve published about the commodization of routine health care enabled by health IT. Programming routine tasks and allowing nurses and other clinicians to take over these tasks should relieve primary care physicians of the “burden” of routine tasks.

Nice rundown of vetted sources of online health information from medical librarians.

David Blumenthal’s latest statement on goals of the ONC for interoperability of electronic health records.

linking patient data and related information

Live webcast of FDA’s hearing on use of Internet and Social Media Tools by FDA-regulated Medical Products, Nov. 12-13. Much anticipated meeting on topic of use of online media by Pharma and other FDA-regulated companies.

More outlets for distributing health and fitness gear as focus on wellness and prevention increases.

No matter the outcome on ONC pronouncements about meaningful use, CCHIT, the certifying board for EMR/EHR systems, is continuing to play its previous role. CCHIT describes itself as a “community” and believes they offer meaningful services to small hospitals and group practices.

Comments on Erik Engstrom’s new position as CEO of parent company Reed Elsevier. Engstrom has been CEO of Elsevier, the STM group of RE, for some time. Smart and analytical, I think he’s a good choice.

CareMedic, a Florida revenue cycle management (RCM) company, to be acquired by UnitedHealth’s Ingenix group. Ingenix now has near end-to-end platform for managing every step of the revenue cycle, from patient registration to reimbursement.

WaPo on how some people may overreact to info they find on online health sites. Writer overreacts a bit herself in implying that online resources shouldn’t be used to help diagnose one’s condition. Agree that health literacy is needed; that is, consumers need better training to vet health resources. But, we’ll have hypochondriacs in the real and virtual worlds. Not everyone will gain the same benefits from online health resources.

SDI Health, a PA company that provides healthcare data analytics services, receives funding from Tailwind Capital.

Article on lack of transparency in reporting health research and health statistics.

Narrated slide slow illustrating new features of reports on Patients Like Me. Impressive.

PhRMA proposes methods for verifying FDA-approved data in health info provided to consumers. FDA logo on sites?

Excellent slide deck that describes influence of social media in healthcare: pharma, med school, epatients, doctors, nurses.

Focus on shortage of primary care doc and how nurses will take on more resposibility. Agree, but shortage isn’t the source of problem. Rather, commoditization of basic medical care & procedures due to digitization of health care info is source of change. See piece on “heatlh content is rapidly becoming a commoditiy” in my blog at Health Content Advisors.

Sermo creates community on practice management topics for docs to share info about healthIT and the business issues of running a practice. There are even CME activities with 8 module curriculum titled: The New Business of Medicine.

Microsoft will launch a video web series on health IT beginning Nov 11, 2009.

Long interview with David Brailer, now a PE exec, fmly Director ONC.

Anne Woods promoted to CNO (Chief Nursing Officer) at WK Health. She’s responsible for nursing strategy across Medical Research & journals publishing businesses.

Does technology interrupt the communication between doctors & patients? That’s the question posed by this book. Sounds interesting.

New site that compiles info about neuroscience research.

Great example of the how new sources of data will transform medical research.

Jay Parkinson on specialized providers v. general hospitals.

Review of Adam Bosworth’s company, Keas, which uses custom “care plans” that collect personal data - directly or indirectly.

Consumer Watchdog wants change to HHS ruling that gives providers the authority to decide if/when a patient’s healthcare information security has been breached.

Karen Overstreet, named executive director of Lippincott CME unit. Interesting that she’ll report to the Medical Research division, not education. Has there been a re-org?

FDA will use data from Wolters Kluwer’s Pharma Solutions Source Lx Patient Studies Suite that captures patient-level Rx data and Pharmaceutical Audit Suite (PHAST) that captures Rx transactions to follow trends in flu medication prescribing activity by region and other patient demographics.

American Academy of Professional Coders offers free app to help convert ICD-9 to ICD-10 codes. See aapc.com.

New edition will include feeds from Factiva and use Factiva Smart Search. Need to check on pricing.

HealthPort Inc., an Alpharetta, Ga.-based provider of healthcare IT solutions to hospitals and health systems, has set its IPO terms to six million common shares being offered at between $14 and $16 per share. It would have an initial market cap of approximately $360 million, were it to price at the high end of its range. HealthPort is owned by ABRY Partners. www.healthport.com

New study in The Journal of the American Medical Association, estimates that there are 67,000 fewer active physicians than calculations have suggested. The physician work force is also younger than previously estimated, with a greater proportion of doctors in their 20s and 30s and fewer who are 65 and older. By 2020, there will be 957,000 physicians, according to the new estimates, rather than the 1.05 million previously projected. Only 9 percent will be 65 or older, or half as many as had been predicted.

Team that developed InnovationRx at the Innovation Company bought the rights to the company and relaunched it as Aprexis Health Solutions. Aprexis focuses on patient adherence, with adherence to prescription drugs the focus.

WK Health announces new customer who will use Provation, now branded as Provation Order Sets, powered by UpToDate Decision Support.

UnitedHealth exceed analyst estimates despite declines in #insured, due to increases at drug unit.

Argentina the latest country to launch medical tourism program to encourage visitors to plan vacations centered around medical procedures (cosmetic and fertility are top treatments for medical tourists in Arg).

MVP Health, a regional health insurer in upstate NY, VT, and NH, will reimburse physicians for using RelayHealth’s WebVisit (TM) for patient consultations. MVP is partnering with Mohawk Valley Medical Associate (MVMA) to offer physician’s immediate reimbursement for implementing Relay’s webVisit.

presentation materials from Sept 24, 2009 webcasts on CAHPS Clinician and Group Survey

Concerns about patient privacy loom over electronic health records segment. George Hill of Leerink Swann estimates that by 2020, data mining could represent a $5 Billion industry.

Preview of next week’s Connected Health 09 conference in Boston. Focus: new devices and communications tools will help patients take more control of their health and leave hospital visits for severe events.

New device from Fitbit that tracks exercise & sleep & can be used to monitor calorie intake, too. Fitbit is joining a fast-growing segment of devices that help monitor healthy behavior & can be used by payer segment to evaluate lifestyle of insured populations.

Dr. Rob on medical costs and medical codes–and plug for his interview with Ira Glass for This American Life’s series on medical costs to be aired weekend of 10/17-18, 2009.

Quest Diagnostics’ MedPlus group, launches its Care360 ambulatory EHR on Oct.24. MedPlus will market the EHR to teh 150,000 physicians that already use its other Care360 apps and will offer hosted solutions for smaller practices. Quest’s MedPlus has the advantage of having existing relationships with these practices who use their other Care360 apps.

Developed in collaboration with the Allen Institute for Brain Science, Elsevier’s Brain Navigator tool, a “GPS system” that provides 3-D software to navigate the brain, adds new features for visualizing injection pathways and printing and exporting images. Interesting to note that this collaboration is with Elsevier’s Science and Technology Books division. Great example of how STM publishers can leverage their content through IT/R&D partnerships.

According to 2006 Kaiser Foundation study, nearly 1/3 of US companies that offer health insurance also offer some sort of wellness program. And, the focus on wellness has increased since then. This article describes some of the programs and $$ incentives for reaching wellness goals.

Very interesting. Healthy Advice Networks, which markets health info to physician practices with content sponsored by pharma and health and wellness brands, partners with HealthScape Consumer, a joint WK Health and Nielsen longitudinal panel to provide data on the effectiveness of sponsoring/promoting in Healthy Advice Network.

RightHealth is dba name of Kosmix, a Mt. View California search technology company that initially focused on the health space.

Digitas Health lists 140 possible uses of Twitter in healthcare. Nice.

Florida-based video sharing site that posts videos for docs to use for patient education.

CEO of OptumHealth’s Care Solutions group describes their programs to encourage healthy behavior before and after health care is needed.

Webmedx, which transcribes doctors’ voice recordings, implements new system powered by MarkLogic to create indexed data that can be fed into other apps.

Phase Forward signs Hungarian pharma company, Gedeon Richter, to multi-year deal for PF’s clinical trial management s/w.

Incentives for employees to participate in wellness programs are growing. Safeway is an example of a company that offers financial rewards to employees who achieve certain wellness goals. To encourage similar programs, health reform legislation will increase existing limits for rewards. This amendment is becoming known as the “Safeway Amendment”.

John Sharp’s presentation at Cleveland Clinic seminar on how IT is transforming medical practice and research. Good preso with good examples.

Article on MD who won HHS contest to prepare a PSA on H1N1. Dr. Clarke wrote a rap music PSA. Links to Youtube video of him performing the short video included.

Among issues mentioned in article, complexity of medical knowledge and explosion of # of journal articles.

Excellent article that emphasizes that providing information to stakeholders (esp. patients and doctors) is the best approach to assuring optimal decisionmaking.

Market forecast for medical device segment in France.

More examples of how Pharma is using social media.

New book forthcoming from Sage Publications, Encylopedia of Medical Decision Making. Seems like an obvious good online reference work.

Profile of Gawande from Harvard Magazine.

James Murdoch lambasts publishing industry for resisting change.

A little counterpoint to all of the pharma industry bashing that’s been in the news recently. IMO, some incentives should be shifted to encourage development of needed drugs & not just me-too drugs.

Deloitte’s whitepaper on how pharma could make use of data from EHRs to improve their research, clinical trials, and post-market surveillance processes.

Heart monitor that detects, analyzes & stores info about patient’s heart. AngelMed Guardian. Smart devices are a growth segment.

WSJ points to Business Week article on biggest R&D spenders. Merck led the pharma cos, but much of their R&D expenses went to licensing, not internal drug discovery.

Minnesota provides website with price info on primary care services, labs, etc for over 100 providers.

Interesting case where patient’s wife suggested experimental treatment that eventually was accepted. She wants $300M plus % of profits.

United Health promotes compliance with Rx drugs with discount off next Rx. Negotiated lower prices with pharma companies, which will also benefit from long-term compliance.

Experiment to charge minimal fee vs. free shows that far more will accept free than fee. But, isn’t segmenting the audience the right path?

Hope Leman reviews the book Internet Cool Tools for Physicians, which I have been planning to read since it came out. Thanks Hope, I’ll do my best to remember to order it the next time I’m on Amazon.

Free whitepaper from Manhattan Research on Pharma use of digital marketing.

Article includes comments from Susannah Fox of Pew & ePatient Dave (deBronkart) about finding experimental medicine and specialist doctors to combat fatal diagnoses.

U. Washington dept that studies global healthcare, funded by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Dr. Vince Kuraitis describes the foundations of a “network economy” and asks if healthcare industry fits the bill.

Study attempts to measure level of empathy (or lack of empathy) in medical students. Thesis and conclusions are rather scary.

Interesting & worthwhile read about the future of scholarly publishing. Author posits that old model of journals publishing will be replaced by open model with actual usage metrics replacing journal impact factors.

Program for AHRQ’s upcoming conference (Sept. 13-16). Registration is closed; it’s a sellout.

US Bank offers HSA with access to WebMD Coverage Advisor, which helps consumers manage out of pocket costs.

Hospitals are finding that reporting medical errors and making the info easily available helps reduce the number of malpractice lawsuits. Transparency helps!

Important issues about how doctors communicate to patients risks & tradeoffs using statistics described in this paper.

Suggested reading from RWJF.

Interesting comparative study of using 3 different medical search platforms: Dialog (ProQuest), OVID (WK) and EBSCOhost. Same search gave different results, with Dialog returning more than twice as many results as others.

Wired UK highlights how doctors & hospitals are using Twitter in UK & US.

Article provides good context for current activity in managing hospital supply chains. Several stories in past week about purchasing cooperatives to reduce cost of supplies.

Survey of medical students by Epocrates shows high usage of health IT, low confidence in info provided by pharma detailers.

AMA uses Impelsys’ iPublishCentral s/w to publish frequently updated versions of its books in ebook format.

Army & Navy doctors collaborate real-time with medical researchers on wound care for injured soldiers–bridging the time gap in tradtional “translational medicine”.

NaviNet, a Cambridge, MA claims clearinghouse vendor (RCM) (formerly known as NaviMedix), is promoting its clearninghouse services as preliminary health info exchange (HIE). Currently, EDI is limited to certain payment-related data types, but NaviNet suggests that scope could be increased. Their argument: Why recreate the EDI wheel if the basic network is already in place?

Informatics Corp. of America (ICA) partners with Mark Logic to offer OEM version of Mark Logic server to allow users to search across structured and unstructured data in EHR systems.

iMedX, a US-based EHR/ medical transcription outsourcing company, acquires Worldtech, Inc., a competing health IT/med transcription company that serves over 800 small physician practices in US and has global medical language specialists. Worldtech will become a division of iMedX.

P&G to sell prescription drug businesses to Warner Chilcott for $3.1 B. Warner Chilcott, an Irish company that specializes in drugs for women’s health, has annual rev. of $938M. Deal will increase size of WC by huge percentage. P&G’s strategy is to sell off slower-growing units to focus on growth.

Healthland, a health IT solutions provider to small rural hospitals, acquires American Healthnet, an Omaha based health IT company to expand its customer base. Last year, Healthland acquired Advanced Professional Software.

Scary to read that many doctors don’t know when they are prescribing for off-label uses. David Williams suggests pharma detailing/marketing is cause.

Good piece about using patient-generated data in medical research. Although not as controlled as clinical trials, certainly better reporting mechanisms can be created to increase the usefulness of real-world health conditions and outcomes data.

Excellent article that describes how iPhone and other wireless apps are being used by nurses in clinical settings.

Obama administration says it can find $313 B in healthcare savings to help pay for reforms.

John Moore summarizes his thoughts on the recent Microsoft Connected Health conf. Key point: MSFT has shifted some focus from consumer apps to enterprise apps, in large part because of the faster uptake & more clear business models.

Allhealthcarejobs.com, which was launched in 2006 and is reported to have sales <$1M, is acquired by jobs site Dice Holdings for $2.8 million.

Sramana Mitra on some well-positioned health IT and health content companies. Mostly focused on IT companies that help to save costs.

AMA & Covisint are working together to build a portfolio of Web-bases services to physicians and on June 11, announced that the portal will be launched nationally in early 2010 and will provide a link to Microsoft’s HealthVault PHR platform.

Thomas H. Lee, MD writes about effect of IT on role of physician. Comparing what IT has done to publishing (and journalists), Dr. Lee posits that some basic functions of doctors can indeed be automated. This is an important theme and I will write more on this topic soon.

LifeShirt,a wearable remote patient monitoring system, completes prototype of next-gen shirt. Current version embeds sensors to collect respiratory, cardiopulmonary, & other data from patient. Can also connect to peripheral devices and transmit data to vendor’s db for analysis. New version will integrate all sensors, extend battery life, & make upgrades easier. Sounds cool, but what about washability?

Ed Felten’s suggestions for data.gov & general role of feds in serving as info provider. Great points: “Private actors….are better suited to deliver govt info to citizens and can constatnly create and reshape the tools individuals use to find and leverage public data.”

The government says sipping red wine improves the benefits. Glad to know I’m doing it right!

Steve Outing provides a list of suggestions for newspaper company executives. Food for thought for publishers in other segments, too!

Class action settlement against First DataBank (Hearst) that publishes benchmark drug prices and McKesson, a drug wholesaler, will result in some payments to consumers who bought these drugs, along with some price rollbacks, but not a significant change.

Healthcare Informatics’ June issue with HCI 100 list of top health IT vendors.

Drug interaction/adverse effects info tool added to MSFT’s HealthVault.