With HIPAA Phase 2 audits looming on the horizon, many organizations are gearing up for the audits with internal assessments. We've already talked about how your organization might be unwittingly violating HIPAA, but what penalties are you really facing?
The Quantified Self Movement was started back in 2007 by a group of bloggers at Wired Magazine who began blogging about the concept of “life logging” or, as it’s sometimes called, humanistic intelligence. The implications of this technological innovation have widespread implications for healthcare improvement, and tech megaliths like Apple and Sony have been anxious to get their piece of the pie by racing to develop apps and wearable tech for patients.
With all this talk about making patient records more accessible to care teams via the magic of the electronic record, HIPAA and HITECH— the two laws that govern patient privacy — might seem like a bit of a downer. They serve a very explicit purpose, however, and ensuring that you are always in compliance will not only save you legal woes, but money in the form of fines and penalties for breaches. There are some obvious breaches of confidentiality that we must strive to avoid: you would never, for instance, post to all your Facebook followers the name, diagnosis and prognosis of a particularly difficult patient that you had today. What you might do instead, though, is go home and tell your spouse all about it. That’s a HIPAA violation.
If you think young people are the only ones ready to embrace telemed technology and healthcare social media, think again! It might surprise you to know that the 60 + demographic of patients in the U.S. are quickly becoming the most eager to embrace the technology. With good reason: many of these patients may be housebound as a result of their chronic conditions or, at the very least, are unable to drive to the office. This group of patients is quite eager to embrace remote technology, like Skype and email, as a means of communication to their healthcare providers. It’s not uncommon for these patients to have many doctors, sometimes across several states, and having the ability to communicate effectively without necessarily having to travel is a huge draw.
A recent study showed that for the 10th year in a row, financial challenges are #1 on hospital CEO's list of concerns. More than healthcare reform, government mandates, and patient safety, the constant battle to be financially stable is the what keeps the healthcare C-suite up at night. So what factors are contributing the the financial worries? Let's take a look.
In order for hospitals to be successful in 2015, there are a few very important issues that need to be addressed. Today, we'll address 5 of the most pressing issues that will help hospitals overcome the obstacles to success.
You've probably heard people talking about wearable tech--whether it's a new smart watch, Google Glass, etc. It's becoming increasingly popular, and more and more industries are preparing for this next wave of technological advancement. But where is wearable tech's place in the healthcare environment? Today, we'll look at just a few ways we're seeing a positive impact from wearable tech in healthcare.
When it comes to hospital and health system revenue cycles, there are many strategies you can approach to help put things on a positive trajectory. Whether they are changes small or large, they all impact the organization's financial standing. But today, we've pulled together only the very best tips for increasing profitability.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid issued a report covering the trajectory of healthcare expenditures in the United States and found that in 2013, spending only went up by 3.6 percent. With a heavily conservative Congress, it seems likely that the dismantling of the Affordable Care Act may be on top of the Congressional to do list. While the spending increase has been consistent over the last several years, it has also been relatively slow; the data doesn’t suggest an enormous, irreversible spike initiated by the ACA. However, the slow-creep of rising expenditures is still troubling.
With so much of our personal data floating around the digital world, it is important to be able to protect it from cyber threats. Here are 8 simple steps to keeping your patients data secure.