April 2010 - The Health Care Blog

VAT on the horizon

By PAUL LEVY Several months ago, a friend met with a high government official and expressed concern that the new health care bill would be more expensive than people were saying. "Oh yes," said the official, "In several years, the... Read...

Published Wed, Apr 14 2010 7:18 AM by The Health Care Blog

Survey on PHRs: interesting data, wrong emphasis

By Matthew Holt There's a new study on PHR use out today (although it looks like Brian Ahier ignored the embargo in his good summary! Update--he didn't, he just posted late PST so it looked like he did. Sorry Brian!)... Read More...

Published Tue, Apr 13 2010 8:11 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Health 2.0, Matthew Holt, Consumers

Get Privacy Right, So We Can Move On Already

By Lygeia Ricciardi A national survey released today by the California HealthCare Foundation shows that 66% of Americans believe we should address privacy worries, but not let them stop us from learning how technology can improve our health care. Amen...

Published Tue, Apr 13 2010 3:09 AM by The Health Care Blog

Meaningful Use in the Real World -- Is the Additional Administrative Burden Worth the Bonus for Small Practices?

By DAVID C. KIBBE An article in the April 10, 2010 New York Times entitled "Doctors and Patients, Lost in Paperwork," brought attention to what may be, in the near term, the Achilles heel of the plan to incentivize doctors... Read More...

Published Sun, Apr 11 2010 6:59 PM by The Health Care Blog

APSO needs to replace SOAP in EMRs

By Dr. Pullen Electronic medical records (EMRs) have a bad reputation among many physicians for generating progress notes that are so verbose and filled with standard phrases that they are nearly useless to other physicians, and even to the physician...

Published Sun, Apr 11 2010 6:24 PM by The Health Care Blog

A song for (Health 2.0) Europe

By Matthew Holt On Tuesday and Wednesday this week we completed a remarkable first—Health 2.0 Europe brought the spirit, technology and passion we’ve hosted at Health 2.0 conferences in the US,and married it to all those qualitites and many more... Read...

Published Sat, Apr 10 2010 4:47 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Health 2.0, Matthew Holt

The Laboratory of Democracy

By PAUL LEVY People from other states would be wise to watch the sequence of events happening here in Massachusetts with regard to health insurance rates. As I described below: Things are playing out just as one might predict in... Read More...

Published Fri, Apr 09 2010 6:25 AM by The Health Care Blog

Health 2.0 Europe Opening Video

Health 2.0 Europe Intro from Health 2.0 on Vimeo. Read More...

Published Fri, Apr 09 2010 3:40 AM by The Health Care Blog

The iPad in Healthcare: A Game Changer?

There have been a lot of discussions on the Net regarding the potential impact of the iPad in the healthcare sector. At this point, there is very little agreement with some pointing to the ubiquitous nature of the iPhone in... Read More...

Published Thu, Apr 08 2010 11:46 AM by The Health Care Blog

Watch health insurance premiums soar

By DONALD JOHNSON Enactment of ObamaCare will open the floodgates for new federal mandates that insurers cover expensive wellness and alternative care services and send health insurance premiums soaring. While the New England Journal of Medicine says...

Published Thu, Apr 08 2010 11:30 AM by The Health Care Blog

The Power of Negotiated Prices

By MERRILL GOOZNER A lot of health care is wasted because it's not very effective. David Leonhardt of the New York Times returned to that theme in a useful article in today's paper. But when will economics writers with broad... Read More...

Published Thu, Apr 08 2010 10:41 AM by The Health Care Blog

EHR Etiquette

By LISA GUALTIERI, PhD I had an interesting juxtaposition of events. While waiting in Peets, a coffee shop in Lexington Center, I watched the friendly discussions between the baristas and customers. I then went to a doctor’s appointment, where a... Read...

Published Thu, Apr 08 2010 8:45 AM by The Health Care Blog

It's Easier to Beat Up the Insurers

By PAUL LEVY Things are playing out just as one might predict in the Massachusetts small business and individual insurance market. The Insurance Commissioner turned down proposed rate increases, the state's insurers appealed to the courts, and now...

Published Wed, Apr 07 2010 7:14 AM by The Health Care Blog

Health 2.0 Europe, a fabulous end to Day 1

By Matthew Holt (posted early Weds 7th April, Paris time!) We had quite the fabulous time at Health 2.0 Europe Day 1. Other than my personal fouling up of the final presentation about Health 2.0 in Haiti, things went very... Read More...

Published Tue, Apr 06 2010 8:05 PM by The Health Care Blog