Financial, regulatory changes mean rapid growth for infection-control software market
Infection-control surveillance software is expected to experience a rapid growth in popularity due to the rise of statewide infection reporting initiatives, tougher standards from insurance companies, and a decision by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to stop reimbursing for hospital-acquired infections, according to a new report from research firm KLAS. “Infection Control: Improving Patient Care and Reimbursements” notes that infection surveillance systems, which typically have a 10 percent to 15 percent market penetration, are “poised for real growth” due to financial and regulatory changes. Hospitals using such systems have reported significantly increased staff efficiency, better patient outcomes and improved financial reimbursement. They “would never return to previous manual workflows,” according to the study. Products by the industry’s three largest vendors, Cardinal Health, TheraDoc and Premier, all received favorable ratings, and another nine companies are gaining traction in the market, KLAS notes. http://www.klasresearch.com/Klas/...

Partners HealthCare to launch startup Web-based health monitoring service
Boston’s largest hospital group, Partners HealthCare, is launching a startup firm that will market a health self-monitoring system by Partners’ Center for Connected Health, the center reports. According to Center for Connected Health Director Joseph Kvedar, the new firm, temporarily called Connected Health, is the result of a successful pilot project involving its Web-based service, SmartBeat, which allows workers to report and track their blood pressure online by using a wireless blood pressure cuff. Kvedar said he plans to meet with his colleagues and business advisors in the coming weeks to work out launch details, and begin a search for a chief executive officer, venture capital, and investors. The new firm is expected to tap into a booming disease management market, which has grown from $1 billion in 2005 to an anticipated $2 billion this year, according to market research firm Frost & Sullivan. Data storage and management giant EMC and Partners HealthCare have already signed on as paying customers. http://www.xconomy.com/boston/2009/...

Search and rescue dogs go wireless in bid to save persons trapped under rubble
A wireless device designed to help dogs save the lives of people trapped under the rubble of a collapsed building by beaming audio and video to human rescuers has won a Canadian technology award for its Toronto-based inventor. The Canine Augmentation Technology (CAT) system consists of twin infrared cameras, headlights, a microphone, a small computer, a wi-fi node and a server attached to a harness worn by the dog. Ryerson University Computer Science Prof. Alex Ferworn and his team have spent the past four years perfecting the product, which gives search and rescue teams a “dog’s eye view” of the path to a trapped victim. The CAT system recently won the Community IT Hero Award from the Information Technology Association of Canada (ITAC). Rescue dogs, who are “wickedly fast and agile,” are often impossible to follow due to the small spaces they can squeeze into while searching, Ferworn said. The video and sound help rescuers determine whether a victim is alive and how to reach him later, once the area has been stabilized. ITAC also awarded a Corporate IT Hero Award to GE Healthcare IT for a system that lets neurosurgeons and medical imaging technicians view patient brain scans from distant locations, preventing stressful and costly patient transfers when they are not necessary. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009...

Massachusetts named nation’s No. 1 state in e-prescriptions for second straight year
Massachusetts and Rhode Island, respectively, have been named the nation’s top e-prescribing states for the second consecutive year, according to an annual audit by electronic prescribing network Surescripts. Prescribers in Massachusetts now route more than 20 percent of all prescriptions electronically, followed by Rhode Island at 17 percent, according to the audit, which Surescripts conducts in conjunction with its annual Safe-Rx Awards. The program was created to “raise awareness of e-prescribing as a means of enhancing patient safety by providing a more secure, accurate and informed prescribing process,” according to Surescripts President and Chief Executive Officer Harry Totonis. Other top five finishers were Michigan, Nevada and Delaware. Vermont was recognized as the most-improved state for climbing from 31st in 2007 to 14th in 2008, with prescribers submitting almost 5 percent of all prescriptions electronically compared to less than 1 percent in 2007. Tennessee and Kansas finished second and third, respectively. http://www.surescripts.net/Awards_Announcements/...

New Web site aims to promote patient health data rights and access to EHRs
Nearly three dozen patient advocates, physicians, software groups and health bloggers have launched a Web site to encourage use of social media to generate support for increasing patient access to electronic health records (EHRs). HealthDataRights.org is calling for patients to have the right to obtain “a complete copy of their individual health data, without delay, at minimal or no cost,” in computerized form, if available. Federal law already entitles patients to EMR access, but many patients, doctors and hospitals are not aware of the law, said Deven McGraw, director of the Health Privacy Project at the Center for Democracy & Technology in Washington, D.C. In other cases, doctors worry that a patient may be asking for his or her records because they are considering switching doctors or suing, while some patients are too embarrassed to ask for information they legally have a right to see. Endorsing groups include wellness sites such as PatientsLikeMe.com and 23andMe.com, members of corporations and firms such as Microsoft Health Solutions Group, Cisco and CollabRx, and employer consortiums such as Dossia.   http://www.healthdatarights.org/press/...

Potential of health IT goes beyond digitizing medical records, CTIA says
The trade association representing the wireless industry is charging up a campaign to raise awareness of mobile devices’ potential to improve the nation’s healthcare system by reminding people that health information technology applies to more than just medical records. CTIA – The Wireless Association^® notes that much of the current discussion about health IT has focused on digitizing medical records. But mobile healthcare, the group says, offers more dynamic applications that could automate the process of providing care. These applications, most powered by sensors, run the gamut from cardiac-monitoring devices to smart pills that notify a medical facility when they have been ingested, the group notes. “The sky is the limit as to where these technologies can go,” said Daniel Ballon, senior policy fellow at the Pacific Research Institute in San Francisco. “The good news is that the revolution has already started, and that we’re becoming peripherally aware of it.” http://www.ctia.org/media/press/body.cfm/... http://www.internetnews.com/mobility/article.php/3826801

Telehealth Solutions launches CardioPod health check system in UK
Hertfordshire, United Kingdom-based Telehealth Solutions has released a health-check device designed to give patients easy access to medical treatment and advice by general practitioners through the UK’s National Health Service (NHS). According to Telehealth Solutions Executive Chairperson Jeremy Cummin, the CardioPod will be installed in pharmacies and GP surgeries across England as part of the NHS Health Check program. It will help provide patients with a cardiovascular risk score and what actions they can take to reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, type II diabetes and kidney disease. It is estimated that screening patients with the NHS Health Check will prevent at least 9,500 heart attacks and strokes per year, 2,000 deaths per year and will prevent at least 4,000 people from developing diabetes. The CardioPod’s capacity to store and process information also results in a big reduction in clerical time spent entering information, avoiding clerical errors, and patient records and progress can be accessed and analyzed with ease, Cummin adds. http://www.news-medical.net/news/20090624/...

Medical Alarm Concepts™ unveils two-way voice speakerphone EMR pendant
Plymouth Meeting, PA-based Medical Alarm Concepts™ has released a medical alarm system that allows the wearer to call for help by speaking into and listening directly through the pendant. The system, designed to improve safety and mobility for persons at home, consists of the MiniPendant™ hands-free communication device and the LifeSafety Monitoring™ service. According to Medical Alarm Concepts Chief Executive Officer Howard Teicher, the MiniPendant features the world’s first two-way speakerphone pendant for the personal emergency response system industry and may be used from virtually anywhere within the wearer’s home. It is also programmed to dial a pre-designated proprietary call center that provides multilingual monitoring services for the user 24 hours a day, “creating a new level of communication between an end user and the Life Safety Call Center,” Teicher said. http://www.medicalalarmconcepts.com/technology.html

Australia to create $78.1 million EMR program linking patients and physicians
Australia’s National E-Health Transition Authority (NEHTA) plans to develop a $78.1 million [USD] Unique Healthcare Identifier (UHI) program that will link patients’ medical records with physicians through Medicare numbers. NEHTA plans to complete the system by January 2010. Healthcare providers – doctors, pharmacists, community clinics and hospital administrators, in public and private arenas – will be issued with highly secure smartcards using PKI-based identity verification, while consumers’ individual healthcare numbers will be accessed by linking through the old Medicare number. Eventually, the plan is for each person to have an individual e-health record with their personal details; a summary health profile that can be shared with the person’s permission between treating doctors; event summaries such as hospital discharge reports, care plans and test results, and a self-care management record where people can add their own material, according to NEHTA. http://www.australianit.news.com.au/...

Lawmakers to consider bill to improve cancer care through health IT adoption
A new bill by Reps. Artur Davis (D-AL), Steve Israel (D-NY) and Mary Jo Kilroy (D-OH) would create a nationwide Medicare demonstration project that uses information technology to gather data on cancer care. H.R. 2872, the Medicare Quality Cancer Care Demonstration Act, would authorize $300 million in annual incentive payments for documented cancer treatment planning and end-of-life care during the project, which will last at least two years. The bill will also authorize the Health and Human Services secretary to identify and address gaps in current quality measures related to the areas of active treatment planning and end-of-life care by refining the performance measures; explore the potential to report quality data through registries or other electronic means for treatment planning and end-of-life care data; and test and validate identified treatment planning and end-of-life quality measures through a pay-for-reporting program with oncologists. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will implement the project in phases. http://www.healthimaging.com/index... 

Florida governor signs legislation to create state prescription drug database
Florida Gov. Charlie Crist has signed legislation to slow, if not stop, a growing black market of illegal prescriptions by requiring doctors and pharmacists to record patient prescriptions for most drugs in a state-controlled database. The new law, passed nearly unanimously by the state legislature in late spring, allows healthcare professionals, and police and regulators, to detect patients who “doctor shop” for pills by going to multiple physicians. Florida had been one of only 12 states without a prescription-monitoring program, making it a target for criminals looking to buy prescription drugs easily, said Rep. Kelly Skidmore (D-Boca Raton), one of the bill’s sponsors. Much of the illegal prescription drug flow stemmed from South Florida clinics to across the eastern United States. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/...

Electronic medical records adoption rate far slower than hoped in Canada
Canada’s eight-year effort to move to electronic medical records has been slow, with the country only one-third of the way to its goal of having half of all records available electronically by the start of 2011, according to a report by Canada Health Infoway. The country has spent $1.6 billion [USD] between 2001 and last March to modernize health records, but only 17 percent of Canadians have such records at this point, Infoway reports. The nonprofit organization, responsible for accelerating access to EHRs, said the 50 percent goal is “a very blunt target for a complex undertaking.” Infoway’s communications director, Dan Strasbourg, said it’s still too soon to assume the overall national target will not be met, as many provinces and territories have been developing systems for several years and could go online with them over the next 18 months. Success thus far varies by province: For example, 25 percent of Ontario’s family practice doctors have electronic medical records, compared to 50 percent in Alberta. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...    http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/article/654002