HIMSS Conference News

Precyse Releases New HIM Innovation Community White Paper

Precyse, a provider of HIM technologies and services, released a new white paper from the HIM Innovation Community at HIMSS13. “Health Information Management in 2016: Guiding Principles and a Governance Framework for a Digital Age” was authored by Linda L. Kloss, RHIA, of Kloss Strategic Advisors, Ltd and former CEO of AHIMA in collaboration with Precyse thought leaders and HIM professionals from 30 healthcare institutions in North America.

The new white paper is a sequel to the one released by the innovation community in 2012, “Health Information Management in 2016: The HIM Industry’s Transformative Journey to Enterprise Information Management — What Does the HIM Department of the Future Look Like?” The first paper examined future scenarios for HIM and laid out a draft framework for enterprise information management. The second white paper continues the discussion, setting forth guiding principles for information management and a plan of action for putting them to use to drive transformational change in healthcare.

— Source: Precyse

 

PatientSafe Solutions Launches Point-of-Care Mobile Solution

PatientSafe Solutions, a provider of point-of-care patient safety clinical workflow applications, introduced the first smart point-of-care mobile solution, PatientTouch 3.3, at HIMSS13.

The PatientTouch platform unites mobile communications and collaboration capabilities with clinical intelligence and context at the point of care, all on a single, easy-to-use mobile handheld powered by the Apple iPhone 5. It helps frontline clinical staff deliver care without the burden of cumbersome technology while delivering measurable performance through enhanced patient safety, reduced waste, and improved productivity for hospitals and health organizations.

PatientTouch 3.3 leverages an existing EMR system and provides a set of intuitive, dynamic software applications. Frontline nursing staff can run a full set of positive patient identification (PPID) workflows, facilitate interdisciplinary care plan execution, and drive clinical communications and collaboration on a single, intuitive, and always available mobile device that fits in the clinician’s pocket. PatientTouch allows clinicians to stay connected and well orchestrated with the entire care team to deliver safe and effective care. The platform’s software modules include the following:

• PPID, which includes comprehensive point-of-care bar-code medication administration workflows, robust wireless bedside bar-code–enabled specimen collection workflows, positive mother-infant identity and breast milk matching workflows, and blood transfusion verification workflows.
• Care plan execution (care interventions), which includes patient safety and quality bundles, role-based point of care, and respiratory therapy workflows for coordination, collaboration, and safe care delivery.
• Clinical communication and collaboration, which includes HIPAA-compliant, secure text messages for the inpatient care team, voice-over Internet protocol communication with clinical presence, multimedia capture (photos, video, voice recording), consolidated safety and quality alerting and reminders across clinical status and alarms, and unified inbox, caregiver to-dos, and assignment.

— Source: PatientSafe Solutions

 

Career Step Launches ICD-10-CM/PCS Code Set Training

Career Step, an online education company, launched its ICD-10-CM/PCS code set training at HIMSS13. The courses are available through Career Step’s ICD-10 education offering, The ICD-10 Solution, developed in partnership with YES HIM Consulting, Inc, a firm specializing in ICD-10 preparation.

Career Step’s code set courses teach the new concepts introduced by ICD-10 in a phased approach that begins at a basic level and then works through intermediate exercises and advanced scenarios where coders can apply the new concepts and codes. To further encourage retention, practice exercises and a variety of visual and audio learning opportunities specifically designed for adult learners are included. Students also have the opportunity to interact with AHIMA-certified instructors through instructional webinars.

The programs include assessments prior to training as well as biomedical sciences education. The assessments evaluate coders’ baseline knowledge levels prior to training and identify more advanced retraining needs. Biomedical sciences education in medical terminology, anatomy, pathophysiology, and pharmacology is conducted to ensure coders’ preparedness prior to code set training.

— Source: Career Step

 

CCHIT Unveils New HIE Interoperability Testing

The Certification Commission for Health Information Technology (CCHIT) announced the opening of the pilot phase of a new health information exchange (HIE) compliance-testing program at HIMSS13. It also revealed the program seals designed to help healthcare providers identify HIE-certified technology and demonstrated its automated testing tool for vendors.

At completion, the HIE compliance-testing and certification program components will include the following:

• HIE Certified Community for EHRs and other HIT systems that will enable statewide patient data inquiry, allowing clinicians to query an HIE for information on specific patients;
• HIE Certified Direct that provides a simple way for providers to send secure health information directly to trusted recipients, including patients, over the Internet; and
• HIE Certified Network for HIE-to-HIE connectivity and connection to the eHealth Exchange.

Certification will be specific to each technology and its version and will include testing of commercially available products, healthcare provider participants, and HIEs.

— Source: Certification Commission for Health Information Technology

 

Six HIT Companies Announce Alliance to Enable Integrated Healthcare

Cerner, McKesson, Allscripts, athenahealth, Greenway Medical Technologies, and RelayHealth recently announced the launch of the CommonWell Health Alliance, planned to be an independent not-for-profit organization that will support universal, trusted access to healthcare data through seamless interoperability. This effort is aimed at improving the quality of care delivery while working to lower costs for care providers, patients, and the industry as a whole.

The alliance intends to be a collaborative effort of suppliers who are focused on achieving data liquidity among systems in compliance with patient authorizations. The alliance will define, promote, and certify a national infrastructure with common platforms and policies. It also will ensure that HIT products displaying the alliance’s seal are certified to work on the national infrastructure.

Elements of the national infrastructure will be tested in a local pilot within the next year. Early components will include the following core services:

• Cross-entity patient linking and matching services to help developers and providers link and match patients as they transition through care facilities, regardless of the underlying software system;
• Patient consent and data access management to foster HIPAA-compliant and simple patient-centered management of data-sharing consents and authorizations; and
• Patient record locator and directed query services to help providers deliver a history of recent patient care encounters and, with appropriate authorization, patient data across multiple providers and episodes of care.

— Source: CommonWell Health Alliance