Tech

Why clinician buy-in is key to digital health transformation

Tech
May 18, 2022

It was a summer day seven years ago. We had closed our first U.S. hospital customer for my digital health company, which enables health systems to deliver digital care journeys for patients (e.g., surgery, oncology, chronic care, etc.).

I was ecstatic! Unfortunately, our excitement was short-lived.

We “implemented” our solution, but patient enrollment was going poorly. When we went on-site to investigate, we learned that surgeons were pushing back against patients getting …

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Patient platforms should be intuitive in design and execution

Tech
May 15, 2022

Patients need access to their health care data and health care consumers need access to their health care information. Data and information are not the same. Data is akin to the ingredients for a meal, while information is more like the meal. Imagine ordering a meal in a restaurant. The wait staff brings the ingredients to your table. You still need a chef to prepare the dinner. This is much …

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Your doctors don’t keep track of what they’re doing

Tech
May 12, 2022

A little-known fact about doctors that most patients would find horrifying is that physicians don’t keep track of their results.

If I botch a knee surgery so badly that my patient requires five repairs by a different specialist, I might never find out. As a result, I will continue to use a flawed technique on patient after patient. The fact that I never hear from any of them again will be …

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Robotics, automation, and the future of remote health care

Tech
May 3, 2022

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, health care innovation has been occurring at an unprecedented rate. A growing focus on technology – and the ways that it can help improve patient care and the provider experience – is now at the forefront, and many organizations are reexamining how they can implement new tools and processes in their practices.

In my field of interventional cardiology, one of the …

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A critique of interoperability, big data, and AI in medicine

Tech
March 27, 2022

Today medical records are developed for a single encounter (an outpatient visit or hospital stay). The medical records for an encounter are signed off at the end of the encounter and cannot be changed. An addendum medical record can be added later to correct misinformation in the encounter medical records, but this is seldom done.

This process enables medical documents to be legal recordings of what happened during each encounter. But …

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5 ways that health IT can improve health equity

Tech
March 23, 2022

On March 10, I had the distinct privilege of presenting to the ONC Health IT Advisory Committee at their meeting titled “Health Equity by Design.” The presentation highlighted five areas of focus for health IT in reducing health disparities: health equity data collection, actionable analysis of the data, integration of health care and social service providers, the special role that health information exchanges (HIEs) can play, and access to health …

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The myth of physician resistance

Tech
March 21, 2022

I’m an RN and clinical informaticist. When I was studying health care informatics, I learned about physician resistance. The idea is that physicians are uniquely resistant to EHRs and health care information technology (HIT) apps. If only they went to more training or spent more of their limited time customizing their preferences, they would get the benefits of the EHR. For years, I believed this to be true.

Yet, I had …

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How an AI bot transformed my EHR experience

Tech
March 19, 2022

What is it about the documentation of patient encounters that is so aggravating? I was ecstatic to be part of the generation that entered the computer age in medicine. The first day I opened a chart on a pull-down menu within a pixelated screen I felt like I was ushering in the future. We would be able to mine charts for clinical gold!

As a clinician, I value the …

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3 ways interoperability will improve health care

Tech
March 7, 2022

In health information technology circles, interoperability has become quite the buzzword. A Google search for “Interoperability in Healthcare” yielded 28 million results. Given its pervasiveness, it’s not surprising that the precise meaning of the term is often obscured. The 21st Century Cures Act defined three key components of interoperability: “(A)… the secure exchange of electronic health information with, and use of electronic health information from, other health …

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Human nature will help patients better than any algorithm or AI

Tech
March 4, 2022

Tapping into the mindset of one of the most villainous cinematic computers, the HAL 9000 of 2001 A Space Odyssey, may provide introspection to save us from the same paranoid meltdown that led HAL (spoiler alert) to embark on a murderous rampage. Homicidal activity should not be a lurking risk in any of us, but burnout is.

Briefly, in case you are unfamiliar with Stanly Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke’s sci-fi …

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The artistic side of a broken pot: a story about Oracle and Cerner

Tech
March 4, 2022

I recently had an opportunity to assist a hospital organization with its electronic health records implementation in Las Vegas. I’m usually working non-stop during implementations, but I was ecstatic when I could get a break from work to sightseeing. I arranged with a tour bus to explore the Grand Canyon (I’m not much into gambling).

I reported to the tour bus at 6 a.m. and was ushered inside the remarkably comfortable …

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Break the rules of health care with technology

Tech
February 23, 2022

In the 21st century, all but one U.S. industry has used information technology (IT) to cut costs, increase access to products and services, and improve quality.

Health care is the lone exception. For decades, medical costs have risen faster than inflation — with spending now above $4 trillion annually. For patients, accessing medical care is both time-consuming and burdensome. Meanwhile, U.S. health …

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Here’s a crazy thought: Make technology work for doctors

Tech
February 15, 2022

We are surrounded by technology.

This hasn’t always been the case in the health care industry—we can be a bit more “deliberate,” if you will—but the pandemic notably accelerated the pace at which organizations invested in new technology. Rock Health’s 2021 year-end report found that digital health funding among U.S.-based startups reached a record $29.1 billion in 2021, which almost doubled the number ($14.9 billion) from 2020. The …

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Debunking the myths around asynchronous care

Tech
January 25, 2022

It is no secret that telehealth adoption has skyrocketed as a result of the pandemic, and because of that, many health systems are in the process of shifting to a virtual-first hybrid care model. Unfortunately, video visits, which most will equate with telehealth, have done little to help with the age-old issues of patient access and convenience, provider efficiency, and rising health care costs.

Patients often encounter the same frustrations during …

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Virtual organizations in health care

Tech
January 1, 2022

In almost all organizations, an employee has a supervisor responsible for guiding the employee in doing their job. This requires good communication between the two.

Currently, in medicine, especially during stays in the hospital, there is a similar relationship between physicians: The attending physician recruits the necessary specialist physicians to provide care for the patient and supervises their care. The difference is that this relationship is just for the patient, and …

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Disrupt health care with blockchain

Tech
December 22, 2021

Health care requires forward progression in the chase for quality, safety, and sustainability. When considering how far we have come collectively, success is often celebrated. Be it a new vaccine to curb a pandemic, an advanced diagnostic tool to expedite diagnoses or process alteration to achieve sustained quality, advancement is paramount in both length and quality of life and care delivery. Retrospectively, one can look with ease on the way …

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Health care technology innovation from COVID

Tech
December 7, 2021

The provision of quality medical services is the main target that every health care provider aims at achieving. Medical practitioners should have effective technical skills to ease their service delivery to their clients regardless of the health care sector’s various challenges.

During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, many government-imposed restriction measures had adverse effects in many sectors, including health care. Patients with comorbidities have a weak immune system, and …

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The race to find uses for Big Data

Tech
December 6, 2021

Smartwatch wearers: Have you checked your smartwatch lately? Did it tell you how many steps you have or how fast your heart is beating? How accurate is the information? What does that number mean for your overall health, and where do all of those numbers go after they are reported back to your computer?

The health care industry is under constant pressure to securely store patient information and still have it …

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The exciting future of our physical exam with point-of-care ultrasound

Tech
November 15, 2021

In a 1968 episode of Star Trek, Captain Kirk is kidnapped by humanoid aliens, tortured unrelentingly, and shackled to the ceiling by his wrists. Science officer Spock and Dr. McCoy find him disheveled and minimally responsive. They release him from the chains and set him on a nearby table for examination. Dr. McCoy urgently takes out his medical tricorder, a device that can check organ function and …

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What does it mean to be a nurse innovator?

Tech
November 4, 2021

A nurse innovator is a nurse who specializes in bringing forth positive change in health care quality and equity by addressing the unmet needs of a target population through new products, processes, and services. Innovators have existed throughout the history of nursing which dates to the 19th century. Yet, the formalization of a ‘nurse innovator’ role has only begun to emerge within health care organizations across the U.S. over the …

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CME Spotlights