Hopefully, you spent the holiday celebrating America's independence outside -preferably near a grill. Assuming that was the case, you may have missed some of the week's big HIT news. Let's get you all caught up.
A mystery-shopper program of primary-care physicians was announced to hefty criticism. And then swiftly cancelled. Here's what the controversial plan proposed: 4,185 primary-care physicians would receive two calls, one by a patient pretending to have private insurance and another from a patient claiming to be enrolled in a public insurance plan to determine difficultly in accessing care based on presumed insurance type. For some commentary, Dr. Kent Bottles didn't think it was such a bad idea-after all, it works for the consumer industry.
In other government and health information technology developments-many were excited to hear that the federal appeals court in Cincinnati ruled the health reform bill as constitutional. This is the first ruling of three to come from the federal appeals court regarding the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).
Google Health's announcement of their exit from the healthcare space left many surprised (and not so surprised) last week. According to their blog, the project did not get as much steam as they had hoped for. However, people who previously signed up will still be able to download their information through January of 2013.
Even if Google did not make the impact they had hoped in engaging consumers, other eHealth initiatives have experienced plenty of traction in the past year. For example, the World Health Organization recently released the third edition of the Global Observatory eHealth Series, which states that 83% of nations are using mHealth initiatives. Another study by QuantiaMD confirmed the buzz about physicians and smart phones is not for nothing.
Believe or not, physicians are adopting smart phones faster than the average person. The device optimizes their entire workflow-from accessing drug treatment and clinical research data to educating patients about their care plans.
We were also excited to hear about Disney's new plan to share their wisdom within the healthcare industry. Last Friday, the Disney Institute, created to highlight the ease of which Disney practices may be adopted by other organizations, announced that they will work with hospitals on their customer service strategies. We have a feeling that this collaboration has the potential to boost patient satisfaction-what do you think?
So there you have it. That's what happened this holiday weekend. As always we welcome you to join us in discussion about these issues on our blog, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Kimberly Labow
Chief Marketing Officer