Technology

Telehealth has great potential to improve access to healthcare, but the promise of the technology depends on a number of factors, such as modernization of policy frameworks and communications infrastructures.

The future of patient engagement in healthcare will be mobile, which should also help reduce healthcare disparities as more and more less-fortunate groups adopt smartphones, said Joseph C. Kvedar, MD, vice president of Connected Health at Partners HealthCare.

A weight-loss cell phone app alone did not help overweight young adults sustain weight loss any better than a written handout did.

There is an enormous medication adherence problem in the United States, and millions of people could benefit from cognitive therapy, and technology can help.

The estimated cost per quality-adjusted life year for the PCSK9 drugs is $300,000. How should health plans respond?

Using information in a patient's electronic medical record during outpatient visits for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease can lead to better outcomes, according to a study in Respiratory Medicine.

Interoperability is becoming the most sought-after in healthcare, but needs further standardization.

What we're reading, November 5, 2015: defensive medicine actually does reduce malpractice risk; patients would like more options for using digital technology with their healthcare; and Americans are eating healthier.

A majority of pharmacies are committed to implementing an electronic prior authorization (ePA) solution that sends prior authorization requests electronically to the prescriber.

What we're reading, October 29, 2015: Fewer health plans will be available on HealthCare.gov in 2016; PBMs cut ties with pharmacy connected to Valeant; and emergency departments are dissatisfied with electronic health record interoperability.

Patients who had access to their PCP's progress notes had improved adherence to prescribed antihypertension medications.

What we're reading, October 28, 2015: Ben Carson plans to replace the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid, and Medicare; a homeless shelter utilizes telemedicine to alleviate emergency department visits; and researchers uncover gender gap in post-heart attack treatment.

Getting health information technology (IT) to work in one provider system can be difficult enough, but in ACOs, they have multiple systems on different platforms, explained Joseph Gifford, MD, chief executive officer of the Providence-Swedish Health Alliance.

A new health insurance start-up aiming to aid companies with their employer-sponsored insurance raised $81 million in a new round of financing. The new funding will allow the company to expand its services beyond California in 2016.

A presentation at the annual meeting of the American Society for Radiation Oncology underscored the importance of patient-centered care and the benefit of incorporating the patient voice in advanced oncology care.

A panel discussion during the 2nd PMC/BIO Solutions Summit identified barriers and discussed the path forward to improve clinical integration of precision medicine.

Managed care will become rapidly refined and driven toward more patient-reported outcomes in the future, said Christine K. Cassel, MD, president and chief executive officer of National Quality Forum.

A new study published in the journal BMJ Innovations that surveyed doctors and nurses in the United Kingdom has found routine breach of patient privacy through the use of digital devices.

The announcement covered a final rule on interoperability for creators of Health IT, and a proposal to simplify current rules for providers. Both look ahead to implementation of the new Medicare and CHIP reimbursement models.

During the early years of the "meaningful use" program, surveys found decreases in both optimism and concerns about electronic health records.

The use of telemedicine could be an alternative to visits at respiratory outpatient clinics for patients with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, according to a study published in the International Journal of COPD.

Researchers in China and the United States have developed a predictive model capable of forecasting which patients will account for either small or large proportions of healthcare resource utilization in the next 6 months.

Addiction is a national scourge. Cognitive Technologies are needed to deal with this very expensive illness.

Telehealth follow up consultations after a surgical operation have become preferred compared to in-person visits, according to 2 recent studies.

Complex interventions from hospital settings mapped to Omaha System terms commonly used in community care; demonstrating its potential as a tool for interoperability across settings.

Electronic databases promote a safe environment for healthcare professionals by facilitating retrospective analysis of errors; however, providers should make significant changes to how they handle patient information.

The federal government intends to modernize the US health information technology (IT) infrastructure so patients, providers, and communities can achieve health and wellness goals.

AstraZeneca hopes to harness the open source platform of the DREAM challenge, releasing preclinical data to discover synergistic cancer drug combinations.

The next 20 years will bring greater use of big data and health information technology in managed care, but the challenge is using that technology to place patients in charge of their own healthcare, said Rajesh Balkrishnan, PhD, associate director for research and education at the University of Michigan Center for Global Health.

Meaningful use stage 3 is not scheduled to start until 2017, but 41 medical societies are calling to delay the start of stage 3, especially given recent changes to Medicare.