Electronic Health Records

An electronic health record (EHR) stores all of an individual patient's information in electronic format. The record is maintained by the provider over time and may include the patient's medical history, current medications, demographics, doctor's notes and other important administrative information. Issues concerning EHRs include data exchange, privacy and security, and patient consent. The final rule for Meaningful Use, released on July 13, 2010, allows hospitals to qualify for thousands of dollars in stimulus funding for the adoption of electronic health records.

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With policymakers getting impatient about the vexing issue of interoperability, does the news that five big vendors are joining forces for data exchange signal a significant step forward? Or is it just a marketing ploy that will make for more walls?
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April 15, 2013
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Kentucky, a state with roughly four million people has achieved what many much more populated states have not yet been able to accomplish, according to its regional extension center leaders.
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April 15, 2013
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A packed house at the Meaningful Use Symposium held March 3 at the 2013 HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition couldn't help but inspire awe and possibly conjure a little concern in the hearts of those attending.
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April 15, 2013
News
Citing the crush of an increasing workload and dwindling government funding, the Office of the National Coordinator has proposed a health IT user fee that would be imposed on health IT vendors who certify their products through the ONC Health IT Certification Program.
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April 12, 2013
News
The clinics of NorthShore University HealthSystem are the first to reach Stage 7 on the new HIMSS Analytics Ambulatory EMR Adoption Model, patterned after HIMSS Analytics' model for hospitals, which has been in use since 2005.
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April 11, 2013
News
The Office of Inspector General has proposed three significant changes to safe harbor regulations pertaining to electronic health record services, according to a notice in Wednesday's Federal Register. These amendments include updating the provision under which EHR software is considered interoperable, eliminating the electronic prescribing requirement from safe harbor and extending the sunset provision date.
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April 10, 2013
News
Healthcare insurer UnitedHealth Group has awarded On Lok Lifeways a $897,240 grant to help strengthen its health information technology system and delivery of care to San Francisco Bay area seniors through EMR initiatives. The grant is part of $5.2 million UnitedHealthcare awarded to nine healthcare organizations.
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April 10, 2013
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Greater Houston Healthconnect announced Wednesday that Irving, Texas-based CHRISTUS Health and Houston-based Legacy Community Health Services are the first two providers to begin exchanging patient health histories, in the form of continuity of care documents and HL7 feeds, via the HIE.
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April 9, 2013
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The Senate Finance Committee will hold a hearing April 9, beginning at 10 a.m., to consider President Barack Obama's nomination of Marilyn B. Tavenner for administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
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April 9, 2013
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) reports it has paid out nearly $12.7 billion in meaningful use incentive payments through February 2013, according to the latest figures available.
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April 8, 2013
News
In the new world of healthcare -- one that is focused on collaboration, accountability, providing better care and cutting costs -- Aetna executives view the insurer's newly minted Healthagen division, unveiled last month at HIMSS13, as an indispensible piece of getting things right.
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April 4, 2013
News
Extenway Solutions Inc. has announced that it will install and manage approximately 900 multimedia bedside terminals at Lanaudiere Regional Hospital Centre, Pierre-Le Gardeur Hospital and Saint-Jerome Regional Hospital in Quebec.
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April 4, 2013
News
The U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services announced in February 2012 that nearly 2,000 hospitals received incentive payments under the CMMS’ <a href="/directory/electronic-health-record-ehr" target="_blank" class="directory-item-link">EHR</a> Incentive Programs. In addition, 85 percent of hospitals now report that by 2015 they intend to take advantage of the incentive payments. With the competitive inpatient market moving toward critical mass, many hospitals face the challenge of meeting Stage 1 MU criteria. Forward-thinking hospitals and health systems are approaching patient education beyond checking a box on their way to qualifying for incentive payments. Learn how Ochsner Health System now provides consistent patient education materials based on evidence-based medicine to its clinicians across its seven hospitals and 40 clinics.
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March 22, 2012
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Software AG, a leading provider of Business Process Excellence (BPE) solutions, is helping build the “hospital of the future” for Nemours, an internationally-recognized children’s health system. The full-service Nemours Children’s Hospital (NCH) in Orlando will feature state-of-the-art systems for its clinical, facilities, maintenance and other supporting functions, all working together and unified via Software AG technology to create a “smart building” that ensures a comforting, customized experience for young patients and their families.
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March 19, 2012
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Across the healthcare industry, forward-thinking organizations are developing new competencies in anticipation of the opportunity that comes with industry-wide transformation. They are positioning themselves for success and defining the future of healthcare. Will your organization be ready to collaborate, coordinate and integrate? Watch this session now.
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March 13, 2012
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Data-intensive <a href="/directory/electronic-medical-record-emr" target="_blank" class="directory-item-link">EMR</a> has dramatically increased storage requirements for healthcare providers and is impacting application throughput due to I/O performance challenges. In this exclusive webcast, healthcare industry experts will provide insights on how you can guarantee performance and availability SLAs for the IT infrastructure that supports your <a href="/directory/epic" target="_blank" class="directory-item-link">Epic</a> applications.
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March 8, 2012
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http://www.virtualinstruments.com/files/videos/webinar-epic-022912/webinar-epic.html
In just a few short years, the health information exchange (HIE) market has grown exponentially and continues to expand in terms of number of initiatives, scope of services provided and technology offerings. When the nonprofit, community-based Central Florida Regional Health Information Organization(CFRHIO) was formed in 2003, its leaders focused on improving the quality of healthcare across the seven counties it serves. Read this white paper to learn how CFRHIO built a repository platform that collects data from numerous clinical providers into a central database, which participating providers can access, regardless of where the data came from or where the patient is when the data is retrieved.
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March 7, 2012
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Computer technology has become a vital component of patient care in hospitals and other healthcare facilities, but has it also introduced new threats to those patients? Research indicates that computer keyboards can act as reservoirs for microorganisms and bacteria that can be cross-transmitted via the hands of healthcare providers. This free white paper examines the risks associated with these bacterial conditions in keyboards and how they can be overcome.
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March 1, 2012
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Inside, industry experts examine how health analytics can drastically improve the current state of health care in the US. By integrating and analyzing the vast amounts of data available, the industry will be better equipped to identify at-risk patients, evaluate potential treatment plans, assess individual physicians’ performance and more.
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March 1, 2012
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This paper examines why health care reform is causing a shift to a consumer-driven business model and the role analytics plays in helping organizations make the transformation successfully. Read this white paper to gain insight on how health insurance plans can come out ahead with advanced customer intelligence and engagement strategies.
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March 1, 2012
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Driven largely by the Medicare and Medicaid <a href="/directory/electronic-health-record-ehr" target="_blank" class="directory-item-link">EHR</a> incentive programs, EHR adoption in the U.S. has been growing exponentially and exceeding federal health officials’ expectations. Although the Dept. of Health and Human Services has delayed the qualification date for Stage 2 <a href="/directory/meaningful-use" target="_blank" class="directory-item-link">Meaningful Use</a> until 2014, healthcare providers expect more complex <a href="/directory/health-information-exchange-hie" target="_blank" class="directory-item-link">HIE</a> to be included. In order to easily and efficiently share patient information with multiple entities, including other EHRs and health information systems, providers, payers and HIEs, healthcare providers will need to capture, manage and make electronically accessible a broader set of clinical data elements. Read this white paper, including Healthcare IT News reader survey responses, to learn how to manage and digitize unstructured documents in order to meet Stage 2 requirements.
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February 13, 2012
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I would like to highlight ten of this year's most notable developments in the world of health information technology and ONC.
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January 10, 2012
Blog
You can read about the shift happening. You can see the shift happening. You can sense the shift happening. In all of this, there is still an understanding that we have a long way to go in order to achieve a true connected health care system, yet we know the movement is happening.
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December 29, 2011
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It is almost becoming the norm to say that it has been another tumultuous year in the healthcare IT market. If 2011, was a bit bumpy, believe we will see craters in the road to HIT enlightenment in 2012.
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December 28, 2011
Blog
2011 was a hard year filled with Meaningful Use (including many upgrades to certified systems or self-certification), 5010 (the deadline for upgrading billing systems is January 1, 2012), accelerating compliance demands, new security threats, rapidly evolving technologies, and unprecedented demand for new projects driven by the consumerization of IT.
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December 27, 2011
Blog
Productivity loss and workflow disruptions are commonplace as our industry gets on the Meaningful Use bandwagon and is starting to adopt EHR systems at a slightly more rapid pace than in previous years (things aren’t really as rosy as many think, but the pace is picking up).
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December 22, 2011
Blog
The December HIT Standards Committee included a discussion of the work ahead for the next year based on the priorities we've heard from stakeholders. We'll have 10 in person and 2 telephonic meetings in 2012.
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December 20, 2011
Blog
The amount of office based physicians using electronic health records (EHRs) is up 12% from 2010 according to a new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report.
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December 19, 2011
Blog
While healthcare organizations have been preoccupied with EHR meaningful use, ICD-10 and HIPAA 5010, a lesser-known set of regulations that could have a dramatic effect on research institutions, and which will also require technological solutions, was finalized this year.
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December 9, 2011
Blog
During the SIIM 2011 Annual Meeting earlier this year, radiology leaders were rallying the industry to engage with the incentive program being driven under the Meaningful Use banner.
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November 30, 2011
Blog
A recent report published by The Commonwealth Fund finds that electronic consultation between primary care physicians and specialists could improve healthcare quality and reduce specialty care costs. However, e-consultation will be limited unless physicians can earn incentives and be reimbursed for use of the technology.
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November 29, 2011
Blog
This past week I had the pleasure of traveling, along with MedTech Media Editorial Director Rich Pizzi, to Amelia Island, Fla. for the inaugural HIMSS Leaders & Innovators conference.
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November 22, 2011
Blog
We’ve all heard the classic song Small Town by John Mellencamp, which romanticizes growing up and living in some place other than the big city. I, too, am what most would consider “small town,” and many aspects of small town life haven’t changed a lot since I left. That small-town simplicity, however, also exists in the local health care facilities.
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November 16, 2011
Blog
NextGen Healthcare Information Systems, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Quality Systems, Inc. and a leading provider of healthcare information systems and connectivity solutions, today announced it has entered into an agreement with MEDSEEK to create the NextGen® Enterprise Patient Portal.
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August 9, 2011
Press Release
Dr. Martin H. Orens, FACEP, a board certified emergency room physician, has developed a new electronic health record (EHR) technology system to solve the issue of patients not being able to access or share medical information with any doctor, laboratory or hospital of their choice. KIS Electronic Health Record (KIS-EHR), is a technologically advanced web-based service that allows patients to manage the accessibility of their health records. Low in cost, KIS-EHR is a secure, comprehensive digitized medical record system that can be accessed at any time, from anywhere.
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August 8, 2011
Press Release
The Christ Hospital, in partnership with Epic Systems Corporation, has successfully implemented the first-ever interface that captures real-time data from hemodialysis treatments in the Epic Electronic Medical Record (EMR). This added functionality will provide more complete documentation of each patient’s treatment and help caregivers to provide a higher level of individualized care.
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August 8, 2011
Press Release
MGMA’s Patient Centered Medical Home Study: 2011 Report based on 2011 Data, conducted in April 2011, captured the views of 341 primary care and multispecialty practices nationwide and found that almost 70 percent of respondents were already in the process of transforming or interested in becoming a PCMH while more than 20 percent were accredited or recognized as a PCMH by a national organization. The report is available for free through the MGMA store. MGMA’s study found the majority of practices interested in becoming a PCMH were family medicine (nearly 36 percent), followed closely by multispecialty practices with primary and specialty care (more than 30 percent) and pediatrics (more than 10 percent).
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July 21, 2011
Press Release
To help healthcare providers of all specialties, their staff and the public to master the intricacies of EHR Alameda Services, a dynamic Health Information Technology (HIT) organization specializes in workforce development and intense Electronic Health Record (EHR) training, today announced the launch and availability of its first e-learning segment that will serve as a powerful Web-based EHR training tool.
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July 21, 2011
Press Release
Canada Health Infoway (Infoway) has established an Emerging Technology Group to identify and guide the use of information and communications technologies (ICTs) in health care innovation, announced Richard Alvarez, President and CEO.
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July 7, 2011
Press Release
UMass Memorial Health Care is aiming to improve and lower the cost of diabetes care using a new approach that allows patients and their care team to better manage their health remotely.
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June 28, 2011
Press Release
In a recent keynote address at a UNCG-hosted conference, an official from the U.S. Health Information Technology Research Center noted there are 30,000 healthcare organizations in the U.S. planning or implementing a move to Electronic Health Record technology over the near term. And having the right information technology talent is fundamental to their success.
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June 28, 2011
Press Release
Seven community health centers and federally qualified health centers in central Indiana are now part of the Indiana Health Information Exchange's (IHIE) quality initiative, called the Quality Health First Program. Open Door Health Services, based in Muncie, is the latest participant the program.
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June 21, 2011
Press Release
CapSite announces the release of the 2011 U.S. Ambulatory Electronic Health Record (EHR) and Practice Management (PM) Study. The study is the most recent in a series of CapSite strategic industry reports focused on the Ambulatory EHR & PM market.
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June 16, 2011
Press Release
Atlanta-based Business Computer Applications, Inc. (BCA) has been awarded an $8 million dollar task order to provide IT and statistical support to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).
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June 16, 2011
Press Release
For more than 40 Indiana physicians and hospitals, compliance with new federal electronic recordkeeping standards could net more than $10 million in incentives as they adopt information technology systems geared to improve their operations and the level of patient care.
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June 16, 2011
Press Release