Policy

Article – 9 ‘Cs’ lead to accountable care …part 2

dondennison Policy ,

Earlier this week I posted an article on Accountable Care. Well, here is part 2. Check it out.

The “business” C’s (from the article)…

  • Collaborative learning
  • Cost-effectiveness
  • Capacity expansion
  • Career satisfaction

Article – 9 ‘Cs’ lead to accountable care

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Here is part one of an article outlining 9 ‘Cs’—five that directly concern the patient and four that are focused more on providers. Check it out.

Cheat list for the patient criteria…

  • Contact
  • Comprehensive care
  • Continuous, longitudinal, person-centered care
  • Coordinated care
  • Credibility and trust

…the provider criteria will be published later.

Thought: Much of the article describes physicians interacting directly with the patient. This is not common for Radiologists tucked away in a reading room.

Article – Value-based payment models expected to reach tipping point by 2018, study finds

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Here’s an article on a study on the adoption rate of value-based payment models.

Note that the original study is provided by a vendor (Availity™) of a revenue cycle management solution—to read the study you need to register on the vendor’s Web site.

Infographic – Healthcare Providers and Health Information Technology

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A picture is worth a 1,000 words …or about US$19 billion, in this case.

Check out this USA Today-style (or theonion.com, if you prefer) infographic from the ONC.

Here is some fun with numbers….

A couple of months ago, I posted on a survey on doctors’ satisfaction with their EHR. An excerpt from the article about the survey…

“In 2012, about one-third were “very dissatisfied” with the ability of their EHR to decrease workloads, up from only one-fifth in 2010, according to the survey. Gripes were seen elsewhere, too. Thirty-two percent were dissatisfied with EHR features and functionality in 2012, compared with 20 percent in 2010, while 37 percent in 2012 were not pleased with their product’s ease of use, up from 23 percent in 2010.”

In the infographic, the ONC claims that “85% of physicians who have adopted an EHR system reported SATISFACTION with their system” (47% “somewhat”, and 38% “very” satisfied).

So, somewhere between 15% (ONC’s numbers) and about 33% (survey’s findings) is about right, I guess.

The survey and the ONC did agree on one area…

  • ONC: “8 in 10 of physicians reported that EHR use enhanced overall patient care”
  • Survey: “One-fifth were also highly displeased with the technology’s ability to improve patient care last year, compared with one-tenth in 2010″

Don’t get me wrong: I believe in the value of an EHR. I just bet that those using them 10 years from now wish that they could send us a message about what ended up really mattering.

Review of Stage 2 Meaningful Use Test Procedure for Image Results …and other MU tests

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I was just checking out the draft test procedure (PDF) for access of image results under Meaningful Use stage 2, §170.314 (a)(12).

This is the test that vendors seeking certification of their EHR products must complete and provide evidence of passing.

Often, EHR vendors get imaging wrong, but I think the authors of the test procedure got it mostly right. At least in terms of the requirements.

Essentially, the EHR must allow an authenticated and authorized user to be able to discover that exam images for a patient are available, and access the images (and associated “narrative”) in the EHR, or integrated systems, without requiring the user to re-authenticate, or search for the patient or exam.

Said another way, the system must have some form of Single Sign On (SSO) with the imaging system (or subsystem, if part of the EHR), and share the existing patient and exam context from the EHR to the imaging system.

A couple of comments…

  • I have seen SSO done well and poorly (read as: insecurely) between EHRs and imaging systems. When done poorly, it if often due to technical limitations in the EHR and/or imaging systems. Or, it is simply because the integration and/or IT staff lack the knowledge or effort to do it right (read as: securely). I have found that HIE and portal vendors and enterprise viewers are generally better equipped to properly handle SSO than EHR and PACS products (probably because they are generally based on newer technology and are often deployed in multi-facility environments that demand interoperability).
  • Integration from the EHR to a patient folder or specific exam has been around since PACS was first launched from an EHR well over a decade ago. What often gets lost is that users often want to compare exams side-by-side (e.g. pre-op and post-op). So, the imaging system may need to expand the context beyond a specific exam to allow this. As long as EHRs keep behaving like filing cabinets, the imaging viewer vendors will have to solve this.
  • The typical method of having an EHR be aware that an exam’s images are available for viewing is to push a modified HL7 ORU message, containing info about the exam, from the image manager to the EHR. The EHR then normally parses the info and uses it, along with a URL (or similar) string template, to create a context-sensitive link that can launch the viewer and present the desired exam. Some EHR can provide multiple exam identifiers, when the imaging viewer supports it, to show more than one exam in a single view. More modern methods for an EHR to discover the availability of an exam’s images is to use a REST-based query method, much like defined in DICOM‘s QIDO-RS (Query based on ID for DICOM Objects by RESTful Services) standard (in development).
  • An additional note on the URL to launch the viewer in context mentioned above: check out IHE’s work on the new integration profile Invoke Image Display (IID).

Some other test procedures that could be related to imaging…

  • Here (PDF) is the test procedure on authentication, access control, and authorization. And here is one on automatic log-off. I would have liked to see some requirements for SSO, like Kerberos or OAuth.
  • This test procedure on integrity requires a hash to be calculated and validated. This may (should) also be required for image exchange.
  • For the requirement for emergency access, if the imaging system does not allow the EHR to securely manage this (this can be done, by the way), the imaging system may have to also provide an emergency access override function (which means that the unique identity of the user had better have been passed securely to the imaging system, or it will have no idea to whom it is granting access).

Article – DoD yanked from health records project

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This article is intriguing (and a bit depressing).

First, because it shows once again that the amount of money (say like, US$1 billion) that you throw at a problem does not assure success. Aligning goals and system design principles—and getting firm commitment from all stakeholders—is critical, and it doesn’t seem like that happened here.

Also, there is no mention of the use of commercial HIE technology for record exchange. The article mentions the exploration of commercial EMR technology vs. a custom (“home grown”) EMR, like the VA’s VistA. How is the ONC—a government agency—promoting the use of HIE solutions as part of their patient record evolution, but the VA and DoD not looking at the same approach?

Finally, the vision of an open system is not flawed. And by open, I mean interoperable with modern Web-based APIs. It could even mean open source.

Article – AMA: EHRs create ‘appalling Catch-22’

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I enjoyed this article.

Often, policymakers and executives debate the merits of an initiative. What is often lost in the shuffle are the important lessons and optimizations that make the program a success.

In the article, a number of folks discuss the implications of an EMR after implementation, including the possibility of fraud, or the incorrect perception that it has occurred.

My thoughts…

  • Fraud is easier to detect the more the information is electronic and coded. In fact, any pattern is easier to detect if extensive, well-structured data is available. Algorithms that detect possible fraud patterns will emerge, just as they did for credit card transactions. I recall a investigative news show on Medicare fraud where the agent stated that the move to electronic transactions and ‘smarter and smarter’ alogrithms have made their job easier. False positives will be a problem for a while until they get it right.
  • Coding of records is about to become a huge push. Beyond regulations for coding of data, there are several initiatives to provide codes for orderable procedures, lab/clinical observations, medical terms, diseases, medical/surgical/diagnostic services, and even imaging workflow concepts. Other groups are working to provide practical guidance on how to best use these codes in different contexts. This article talks about the need for better and more coding.

And here is an article on a Web site where EMR users can rate their EMR. There are some interesting comments in the article.

Also, an Accenture survey finds a significant increase in the use of EMR and HIE technology by physicians.

Article – Hospital Billing Varies Wildly, Government Data Shows

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One of the thorns in the side of payers is the wide disparity of money charged for the seemingly same procedure among different hospitals—even among those in the same city.

This New York Times article explores some U.S. government data that was recently released, showing procedures at one facility costing multiple times more than the same procedures at another.

If you go through the multimedia widget (the little map on the left), you can explore what specific hospital’s charge for a given procedure, how many cases were in the sample size, and the variance to the norm. The authors did a good job designing this tool.

Article – MRI Payment Cuts Having Dramatic Effect on Radiology Groups

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Last month, I posted about reimbursement cuts to two popular MRI exams.

In this article, the impact of these changes to Radiology groups are explained fairly clearly. Worth a read if you make your living (directly or indirectly) from Radiology services reimbursement.

Article – CHIME seeks Stage 2 delay, defends MU

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So, the U.S. government—CMS/ONC and some Senators—and CHIME (College of Healthcare Information Management Executives) are “discussing” the merits and best timing of HITECH and Meaningful Use.

This article provides a good summary of the questions and recommendations posed.

Some key points from the article and my thoughts…

  • The Senators are fairly looking for evidence of results from the significant investment of taxpayer dollars. The reality is that this change is large and multifaceted. It will take time to reap the benefits once operations are normalized and productivity is enhanced.
  • CHIME believe that there are merits to the government’s programs, but wants to slow the pace of change. I know from personal conversations with smart, effective folks working for respected providers that they are reeling from the number of implementation projects driven by ACO, MU and other initiatives that they have going right now. The troops may indeed need a short break and to reflect on lessons learned from the initial change.
  • “CHIME also urged Congress to request an update from ONC regarding what technologies, architectures and strategies exist to mitigate patient matching errors” …it is interesting that CHIME is looking for this, as MPI (Master Patient Index)—also known as PIX (Patient Identifier Cross-Referencing) in the IHE Technical Framework—has been around for years and used in many projects to enable sharing of patient records across patient ID domains