August 2010 - The Health Care Blog

Interview with Mary Hiller, MedExpert International

By Matthew Holt Mary Hiller is Executive Director at MedExpert International -- one of the companies behind Safeway's remarkable results in reducing health care costs. The company manages a system that aligns best practices from intensive literature...

Published Mon, Aug 16 2010 1:27 AM by The Health Care Blog

Facepalming Our Way into the Future

By JOE FLOWER The reform isn’t perfect, but maybe it’ll help us avoid disaster. The rapidly ramifying crisis in health care may (we can pray) end all delusions. It may at least begin to weaken them by exposing them to... Read More...

Published Sun, Aug 01 2010 12:08 PM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Joe Flower, health care reform

Waving goodbye to Wave

By PAUL LEVY Google recently announced that it was abandoning Wave, a multimedia social media collaboration tool. I'm sorry about this, as I thought it had great potential. That being said, I never used it, so perhaps I was typical.... Read More....

Published Mon, Aug 09 2010 2:09 AM by The Health Care Blog

That’s Dr. Geek Squad to you

By JANE SARASOHN-KAHN Read More...

Published Mon, Aug 16 2010 9:32 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Technology, Jane Sarasohn-Kahn, health care reform

Docs and Insurers Posture on Report Cards, But Is Silence the Real Goal?

By MICHAEL L. MILLENSON Report cards are back in the news. The Washington Post (via Kaiser Health News) is warning about the difficulty of rating individual physicians. Meanwhile, spokesmen for the insurance industry and the doctor industry (a/k/a the...

Published Tue, Aug 03 2010 6:52 PM by The Health Care Blog

Running Behind

By ROB LAMBERTS I walk into the exam room and the patient looks up at me with a surprised expression. ”Wow! I didn’t expect to see you so quickly!” I smile and turn around to walk out of the door,... Read More...

Published Mon, Aug 30 2010 6:21 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Rob Lamberts, Private practice

Life Saving Errors

By DENNIS GRACE On March 28, 1979 the Three-Mile Island Unit-2 nuclear power plant experienced a feed system failure which prevented the steam generators from removing heat from the plant. The reactor automatically shutdown but, without the feed system...

Published Wed, Aug 25 2010 4:53 AM by The Health Care Blog

“Healthcare” vs. “health care”: The Definitive Word(s)

By MICHAEL L. MILLENSON A recent contributor to this blog wondered about the correctness of “health care” versus “healthcare.” I’d like to answer that question by channeling my inner William Safire (the late, great New York Times language maven). If....

Published Fri, Aug 27 2010 4:20 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Michael Millenson, Op-Ed

Interview with Trisha Torrey

By Bianca Grogan At the Health 2.0 Goes to Washington Conference, June 7, 2010, Trisha Torrey who writes the Guide to Patient Empowerment for About.com, gave a backstage interview. She mentioned how excited she was to be at the conference... Read More...

Published Mon, Aug 02 2010 5:26 PM by The Health Care Blog

Privacy and security of patient records: The lesson of the weakest link

By DAVID HARLOW The Queen of Soul famously wailed about being a link in a chain of fools. Today's lead story in the Boston Globe tells us about another sort of link in the chain -- the weakest link in... Read More...

Published Mon, Aug 16 2010 12:28 PM by The Health Care Blog

If Insurers Thought the Public Plan Was A Threat

By MERRILL GOOZNER Check out this study from the Healthcare Performance Management Institute, a business-backed think tank that promotes self-insurance among employers. The survey claims that insurance companies are refusing to provide employers with...

Published Mon, Aug 02 2010 6:14 AM by The Health Care Blog

Medicaid EHR Incentives – A Learning Experience

By MARGALIT GUR-ARIE By now almost everybody that has any remote interest in Health Care is aware of the much publicized incentives made available to health care providers for the adoption and meaningful use of certified EHR technology. The most... Read...

Published Mon, Aug 30 2010 3:44 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: EHR, Margalit Gur-Arie, Medicaid

What's In an EHR?

By MARGALIT GUR-AIRE One of the most promising uses of Electronic Health Records (EHR) is Research. As EHRs become more and more widespread and the clinical data previously held in silos of paper charts becomes fluid, exchangeable and duly collected,...

Published Wed, Aug 11 2010 5:12 AM by The Health Care Blog

Imperfect Timing, Interesting Findings

By ROGER COLLIER I’ve been reading a recent paper from the Committee for Economic Development, one of the less doctrinaire business research groups, that should give health care reform advocates (and opponents) food for thought. " Health Care in...

Published Fri, Aug 13 2010 8:30 AM by The Health Care Blog

Should We Fear Genetic Testing?

By THOMAS GOETZ Though the prospect of learning about our DNA might seem wrapped in mystery and intrigue, genetic information is not so different from any other metrics we know about ourselves: Our age, our weight, our blood pressure. With... Read More...

Published Thu, Aug 05 2010 7:01 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Thomas Goetz, Genetic testing