January 2011 - The Health Care Blog

Health 2.0 Developer Challenge Live Code-a-thons for 2011!

Health 2.0 is thrilled to be hosting the first three Developer Challenge Code-a-thons for 2011 in the San Francisco Bay Area, Washington DC and Boston. These events occur over the course of one day, bringing together developers, designers and raw... Read...

Published Thu, Jan 20 2011 10:15 AM by The Health Care Blog

Updates on Proposed Stage 2 and 3 Meaningful Use Criteria

By VINCE KURAITIS, JD The Health IT Policy Committee has published proposed Stage 2 and 3 Meaningful Use Recommendations and they’re open for public comment until February 25. I’ll share a couple of particularly useful and well written analyses and.....

Published Thu, Jan 20 2011 9:18 AM by The Health Care Blog

The Proposed Stage 2 and 3 Meaningful Use Recommendations

By JOHN HALAMKA, MD On January 12, the Health Information Technology Policy Committee published its proposed Stage 2 and 3 Meaningful Use recommendations for public comment. Robin Raiford from Allscripts created a Quick Guide to the recommendations, making...

Published Thu, Jan 20 2011 8:50 AM by The Health Care Blog

The End of the World as We Know It

By PAUL LEVY One aspect of religious dogma that has entered the medical world is that fee-for-service pricing of medical services is bad and should be replaced by a capitated, or global, arrangement that establishes an annual budget for care... Read More...

Published Thu, Jan 20 2011 8:03 AM by The Health Care Blog

Health 2.0 Live Code-a-thons for 2011

Health 2.0 will host the first three Developer Challenge Code-a-thons for 2011 in the San Francisco Bay Area, Washington, DC, and Boston. These events occur over the course of one day in each city, bringing together developers, designers and raw... Read...

Published Wed, Jan 19 2011 11:00 PM by The Health Care Blog

Not Colon Cancer

By DAVIS LIU, MD My mother's oncologist ordered the blood test, carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), to check for the recurrence of colon cancer. The good news was that there was no evidence of recurrence. The bad news was that she didn’t... Read More...

Published Wed, Jan 19 2011 6:33 AM by The Health Care Blog

Centrists Back Health Care Reform

By MERRILL GOOZNER The tone on Capitol Hill during Tuesday’s debate was more civil, the partisan rhetoric less harsh than previous exchanges on the House floor. But there’s little doubt that the Republican-led House will vote later today to repeal......

Published Wed, Jan 19 2011 5:30 AM by The Health Care Blog

A Brief Guide To Being Shot in the Head

By NEUROSKEPTIC You know what this is about. I don't have anything especially useful to say about the recent tragedy, or the question of crazy vs. political: at this stage, it's all speculation. Let's wait for the trial. But anyway,... Read...

Published Wed, Jan 19 2011 4:30 AM by The Health Care Blog

Insurance Exchange Budgets: How Much is Needed?

By ROGER COLLIER It’s coming up to four months since the Department of Health and Human Services awarded more than $50 million in grants to states and US possessions for health insurance exchange planning and development, and the money is... Read More...

Published Wed, Jan 19 2011 4:09 AM by The Health Care Blog

Health Care Georgians Deserve

By GAYATHRI SURESH KUMAR, MD As a physician who works at Grady Memorial Hospital, I am regularly reminded of the implications of poor access to health care. One of my regular patients had been suffering from diabetes and hypertension for... Read More...

Published Wed, Jan 19 2011 12:00 AM by The Health Care Blog

Minimum Essential Benefits

By MICHAEL TURPIN The Affordable Care Act is officially under construction. The framework for the minimum mandatory levels of benefits offered through state exchanges is now being researched and will soon be ready for prime time debate. The Institute...

Published Tue, Jan 18 2011 1:47 PM by The Health Care Blog

HPHC Goes Its Way, Thoughtfully

By PAUL LEVY Lots of people are thinking about the form of payments between insurance companies and providers for health care services, but it is also important to think about how each such approach would be marketed as an insurance... Read More...

Published Tue, Jan 18 2011 6:33 AM by The Health Care Blog

Putting the Patient First, Literally

By ADRIAN GROPPER, MD Interoperability is front and center, again. Stage 1 of HITECH was about health records for doctors. Stage 2 is about interoperability. The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) report is all about interoperability...

Published Tue, Jan 18 2011 5:00 AM by The Health Care Blog

The Compromise

By ROBERT LASZEWSKI This week's House health care repeal vote is little more than a political stunt--everyone knows the effort will die in the Senate. But, when the day is done the only way for the Republicans to do anything... Read More...

Published Tue, Jan 18 2011 2:00 AM by The Health Care Blog

What Most Needs Repealing and Replacing

By JOHN GOODMAN, PhD Tomorrow night the House of Representatives will debate the repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), what many call "ObamaCare." Some critics complain that this is a futile exercise because there is...

Published Mon, Jan 17 2011 8:23 AM by The Health Care Blog