Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
Implementing electronic medical records (EMR) have been elevated to a top priority by healthcare policymakers. Using EMR, medical providers may be able to improve quality and better detect adverse events. One way to improve quality with EMR is chart abstraction. After a physician-patient encounter, the doctor can review the medical chart to see if he…
A New Yorker article (“The Checklist“) recounts Peter Pronovost’s efforts to improve the delivery of medical care. One of his simplest ideas was to invent a 5 step checklist to reduce line infections: Doctors are supposed to (1) wash their hands with soap, (2) clean the patientâs skin with chlorhexidine antiseptic, (3) put sterile drapes…
I recently received an email from the Patient Privacy Rights organization. They are conducting a campaign to protect the privacy of individual’s prescription drug information. According to their website, a Newsday article reports the following: Randee Lonergan filled her prescriptions at the same pharmacy for years. But a month ago she was shocked to find…
GigaOM reports on some new Health 2.0 developments in Germany in its article “Health 2.0 Gaining Traction in Germany.” Websites such as Helpster and Imedo are among a number of website which are now rating German physicians. In order to take into account established medical institutions, Imedo is including the physician certification status as part…
Many people believe that better information technology (IT) can help improve the quality of medical care in the U.S. and around the world. For instance, if a doctor prescribes a drug which interacts harmfully with a drug the patient is already taking, a computer program could notify the doctor of this problem. If a patient…
Yesterday, Microsoft announced the introduction of the online medical records system titled Health Vault. Online medical records would greatly increase productivity in the health care industry since: Patients would be able to have all their health care information in one spot. Moving from one state or country to another would not entail losing your medical…
TechDirt has an interesting article (“The Doctr Is In“) about Dr. Jay Parkinson. Dr. Parkinson started a boutique clinic in which patients pay for services out of pocket. Unlike most boutique practices, patients can email or instant message the doctor about any medical questions from 8am to 5pm, or in the case of medical emergencies…
A new website is available to help patients and physicians find information regarding various diseases. The site is called CureHunter. The site not only has a ton of information on different diseases, therapies, drugs, and bio-agents, but shows the relationship between each of these in a very appealing visual interface. Since I am not a…
You walk into your doctors office hoping for a diagnosis to your most recent ailment. The doctor runs some tests and leaves the room telling you he will return. Ten minutes later, the doctor tells you that you have diabetes. What was the doctor doing during the ten minutes? Most likely, he was reviewing the…
The Nursing Home Compare website provides consumers with quality ratings of thousands of nursing homes (NHs) around the country. Are these ratings accurate? Could they be improved? This is the question which researchers Arling, Lewis, Kane, Mueller and Flood analyze in their 2007 HSR paper. The authors find 2 major flaws with the rankings: 1)…