Weekly roundup: Plenty of sources for problems and solutions

There’s no shortage of ways for patient data to be compromised as proved by the latest reports of EHR security problems.

Akron General Medical Center employees were fired recently for violating hospital and federal privacy rules involving the fatal shooting of a patient in the intensive care unit. It seems they were curious about another incident at the hospital—a man who shot and killed his wife, a patient at the hospital—although they weren’t involved in the patient’s care.

Meanwhile, a radiology practice in Springfield, Mo., has notified about 13,000 patients about a mix-up by a janitorial services firm. The firm, managed by the billing company’s landlord, transferred paper medical records to a recycling facility without shredding the sensitive documents.

While problems have myriad sources, so do their solutions. For example, Walgreens is unrolling its WellTransitions program at more than 150 health systems and hospitals across the U.S. to assist with coordinated care efforts. The program gives its pharmacists a strong role within care teams responsible for transitioning patients from acute care to home or other healthcare settings. These pharmacists will be available for medication review, bedside medication delivery, patient counseling and follow ups to help hospitals reduce readmission rates, which will affect Medicare reimbursement under a law that went into effect Oct.1.

New tools that help patients better manage and access information in their EHRs were selected by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT as innovation challenge winners.

The Blue Button Mash Up Challenge, launched on June 5, builds on a prior Blue Button challenge to make personal health information more usable and meaningful for the individual consumer or patient. Solvers were required to mash up Blue Button data—personal health data a patient can download using a health plan’s, doctor’s or hospital’s Blue Button function—with other open health data and information to achieve the goals of the three-part aim of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' Innovation Center.

The winner, iBlueButton, is a dual-app system that provides a patient-centered, secure two-way mobile solution where patients can connect to their Blue Button and other health records.

The EHR Accessibility Module Challenge, launched on Jan. 30, asked solvers to create and test a module or application that makes it easy for people with disabilities to access and interact with the health data stored in their EHRs. Successful submissions would be able to download data from EHR systems, be simple to learn and use, and comply with standards for people with disabilities.

Are you finding problems and solutions from a wide range of sources as well? Please share your experience.

Beth Walsh

CI+T Editor

bwalsh@trimedmedia.com