- Medicare expected to pay for end-of-life talks (politico.com)
Advocates for better end-of-life care expect Medicare to soon announce that it will start paying physicians for having advanced-care planning conversations with patients...The new policy could be part of an annual Medicare physician payment rule, which could be released any day.
- Nursing homes get help with HIE (healthcareitnews.com)
nursing homes have traditionally been one of the weakest links when it comes to health information exchange and care coordination,… new project to help improve those facilities' electronic communication…With.. a $14.8 million CMS grant to reduce avoidable re-hospitalizations among nursing home residents with hospitals.
- ICD-10: CMS won’t deny claims for first year (healthcareitnews.com)
In a surprise concession the American Medical Association...revealed that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will take four steps designed to ease the transition to ICD-10.
- Federal tool details financial links between doctors, medical industry (reviewjournal.com)
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Open Payments report,…to detail the financial relationships between health care companies and doctors and hospitals…Nationwide,.. doctors and research hospitals collected nearly $6.5 billion…
■ Dr. Michael Reis…$2.5 million (Carson City)
■ Dr. Fadi Braiteh…$500,000 (Las Vegas)
■ Dr. James Del Rosso…$405,000 (Las Vegas)
■ Drs. Troy Watson…$300,000 (Las Vegas)
- Swiss right-to-die group gets green light for new suicide room (newsdaily.com)
A Swiss organization that helps terminally ill people take their own lives and defends their right to refuse medical treatment ...local authorities had allowed it to open another room for assisted suicides.
- The ‘fatal cost’ of poor IT rollouts (healthcareitnews.com)
health organizations "make rookie mistakes" in their technology implementations,...these rollouts leave hospitals vulnerable to serious patient safety risks… unrealistic timelines… rely too much on vendors..
- Drug companies still supplying Greece after ‘No’ vote (ca.news.yahoo.com)
Pharmaceutical companies…continue to supply medicines to Greece for now, despite increased financial uncertainty after Greeks rejected the terms of a rescue package from creditors in a referendum…Drugmakers are owned more than 1.1 billion euros ($1.2 billion) by Greek hospitals and the state-run health insurer, after not being paid since December, but have promised to keep supplying the country on humanitarian grounds.
- How to save the meaningful use program (healthcareitnews.com)
Imposing (electronic health records) on the medical community and forcing them to adopt and use this technology was destined to fail…. meaningful use considers electronic health records as the only type of IT solution and ignores the fact that there are many other IT services that can help medical providers much more.
- Physicians and telehealth: Is it time to embrace virtual visits? (medicaleconomics.modernmedicine.com)
Telehealth services…are viewed increasingly as competition by physicians and healthcare systems,… offer remote audio and/or video consultations with physicians on mobile devices or desktop computers…healthcare organizations are…partnering with telehealth services… leading the way into this brave new world of virtual visits.
- The 5 Cardinal Health programs that helped it earn DoD’s Freedom Award (drugstorenews.com)
Cardinal Health earned the award (2015 Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award ) for -
- Veterans Leadership and Career Development Program
- Veterans Professional Advancement Course
- Veterans & Military Advocates Employee Resource Group
- Veterans SharePoint site
- Support the Troops Care Package Event
-$1.6 million for the Wounded Warriors Project
- "Welcome Home" events