Tech

Sharing medical information between EHRs: 4 different approaches

Tech
October 13, 2021

The current COVID pandemic has brought into stark contrast the woeful state of medical data collection and data sharing in the United States. It has been a central goal of Health and Human Services (HHS) to at first encourage and later mandate sharing clinical data across multiple electronic health records. Unfortunately, progress has been slow and actual clinically useful widespread adoption of shared medical data remains an aspiration.  Here, we …

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From electric fish to smart device EHRs: the mind-blowing evolution of health care technology

Tech
August 31, 2021

Fun fact: The first recorded use of electric stimulation to ease pain was in … get ready … CE 46! That’s right, nearly 2,000 years ago, ancient Roman writer Scribonius Largus described the use of torpedo fish, aquatic animals capable of electrical discharge, to heal. This system is still as common in health care settings as a conventional TENS Unit (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation). Similarly, many health care IT innovations …

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The pancreas of the future?

Tech
August 5, 2021

Hidden in the epigastric region of the abdomen concealed by a curtain of peritoneum is a moody, often forgettable little organ. Of course, the term organ is a somewhat generous description for this rather overqualified gland. The pancreas has its own set of rules as it mischievously lurks behind the stomach waiting for its cue for chaos.

In a moment of theatrical exaggeration, it can go from completely forgettable to a …

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How to recover from a bad electronic health records implementation

Tech
August 4, 2021

Is your health care organization reeling from a bad EHR implementation?

There have been rumblings from hospital leadership and congressional committees about the Veterans Administration (VA) Hospitals’ implementation of the Cerner Corporation electronic health record (EHR) replacing the VistA EHR.  The $10 million EHR overhaul has been controversial since the staggered rollout started in Spokane, Washington.  One report noted that months after the go-live, fewer users knew how to operate the …

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Is Open Notes as good in practice as it is in theory?

Tech
July 23, 2021

Earlier this year, a federal rule that requires clinical information such as doctors’ notes and lab and imaging results to be made immediately available to patients took effect. A little more than three months out from implementation, there are mixed reviews as to how well the so-called “Open Notes” rule is actually improving patient care.

Patient advocates and even many physicians have supported the concept of electronic health information …

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The rise of non-traditional nursing

Tech
July 7, 2021

Nurses are an essential component of the American health care system and are continually in high demand nationwide. For years, nurses have elected to leave the field or have sought alternative professions instead of working in a traditional nursing role full-time. The pandemic brought into focus the need for work-life balance across professions. Whether strained from high-stress levels, financial upset, demanding hours or an overwhelming workload, nursing …

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Here’s how doctors can support medtech innovation

Tech
June 9, 2021

Medtech companies realize that it’s not a trivial task to get a surgeon to just start using a new device. Surgeons have a great deal of responsibility, and their job involves learning a lot of techniques. Therefore, when surgeons learn a technique and master it over the course of years and decades, it will take a lot of convincing to get them to switch to a new one.

But technological progress …

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3 ways technology in the ER boosts the patient experience

Tech
April 27, 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to light the vital roles effective communication and reliable technology play in the patient journey, starting from the moment a patient is on the way to the emergency department (ED) through to discharge. There are many moving parts during an ED visit, and the process of keeping the patient, their family, and other departments within the hospital or health system informed is no small feat …

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The adaptive unconscious, the physician, and AI

Tech
January 15, 2021

Being an internist, the day is filled with problem-solving.  The problems are often not straightforward and require thinking, rethinking, reevaluating, and reading up and researching before the problem can be solved.  However, when a sixth sense, an intuition kicks in that warns us that something needs to be addressed urgently even when we cannot specify or articulate why.

Once I had a patient come in for shortness of breath that is …

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Keys to sustainable telehealth post COVID-19

Tech
November 25, 2020

As we’ve listened to providers describe their reactions to this pandemic, telehealth continues to be a pervasive theme at the foundation of their response. They refer to this as a “watershed” event that will permanently change healthcare delivery. In that context, many expressed concern that the current relaxation of regulations, and as importantly, the parity payments for telehealth services will be retracted as the crisis eases. While most agree that …

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How the Google algorithm update helps doctor-written content rank higher

Tech
September 24, 2020

If you’re not intricately involved daily with SEO, let me explain what happened in May 2020 and why it will be a huge boost for content created by physicians.

First, what is SEO? In short, it is the process of optimizing content found online in order to help it be seen by those searching for the information found in that content. It used to be that people would just stuff their …

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An EMR frustration that is still torturing us

Tech
September 18, 2020

I have written, or more accurately ranted, about electronic medical records (EMR) systems throughout this blog. While the systems have clearly improved since their mandatory introduction into the medical universe, they have still not delivered on many of their promises.

Of course, EMR has brought tremendous advantages to the medical profession, and we are all grateful for the technology. But this progress has exacted a cost. Many of them are clumsy …

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How technology is a weapon in the fight against COVID-19

Tech
September 2, 2020

As the COVID-19 cases continue to rise across the globe, companies are working hard to develop innovative solutions to fight the coronavirus pandemic. Chinese companies such as Alibaba have led the way using artificial intelligence, data science, and technology. Startups are teaming up with clinicians, engineers, and government entities to reduce the spread of COVID-19. As we continue our fight in the management and eventual eradication of the virus, here …

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The future of whole-person care: high-tech holistic medicine

Tech
August 8, 2020

When we think about holistic medicine, many assume that it requires human-to-human touch points and, therefore, doesn’t lend itself well to technology and innovations such as artificial intelligence. In fact, holistic medicine and whole-person care advocates often view technology as manufactured or impersonal and therefore dismiss its utility for health care. This is because there is a perception that health care tech values the human experience only for the purpose …

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Doctors, a tech revolution is coming

Tech
January 31, 2020

What if I told you just a few years ago that Amazon — a budding e-commerce startup — would come to disrupt the multi-billion dollar retail industry.

I seriously doubt that anyone could have given it a serious thought. At least not in the magnitude that will force a slew of big-box retailers to shut their doors for good.

I am sure the same response would have been elicited about Uber and …

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The robot will see you now

Tech
December 24, 2019

The year is 2050. You enter the room, ready to speak with your next patient, a 60-year-old white male with recent episodes of chest pain when he climbs the stairs to his office. Before sitting down to speak with him, a monitor in the room pulls up his recent lab work and current medications. Your patient note is being filled in, but nobody is typing; the computer is avidly listening …

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The healing patient-physician analog relationship is in critical condition

Tech
November 7, 2019

In the history of medical care, medical records served one purpose and two masters: to record diagnosis and treatment for physicians to refer to and for patients to use to transfer care when they desired. The medical record was a simple 3 x 5 or ledger card in the 1950s. The patient paid directly for care at the time of service. Usually, the physician had a nurse and a spouse …

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The keyboard is the sworn enemy of physicians

Tech
September 26, 2019

During one long ago very hot Washington, DC summer, at the suggestion of my parents, I enrolled in a typing course that was given at our elementary school.

This was the summer between sixth and seventh grades, and there were lots of things I would’ve preferred to have been doing, but my dad, who started out in advertising, felt that touch-typing …

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