While merger and acquisition activity may have slowed down in other industries, in the healthcare industry, 2011 merger and acquisition activity is poised to surpass last years results by about 20 percent, according to a report from Irving Levin Associates.

MedData, a provider of medical billing services, has acquired Peoria, Ill.-based Data Management, which provides physician billing services to pathologists and emergency departments.

Three unencrypted computer backup tapes containing patient billing and employee payroll data have been reported missing from a Nemours facility in Wilmington, Del., according to the health system.

Patients demand their medical records to be guaranteed against data theft and snooping, according to a survey from healthcare privacy auditing supplier Fair Warning.

If the no-increase-in-revenues position prevails, both Medicare and Medicaid, as well as other healthcare spending and all other domestic social spending, will inevitably be subject to cuts so large that they will make it quite impossible to meet the commitment the U.S. made to assure the aged, disabled and poor a standard of healthcare similar to that enjoyed by other Americans, according to a perspective published Oct. 12 in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Draeger Medical has released its Innovian Anesthesia 4.0, a clinical anesthesia information management system, developed for perioperative care environments in hospitals and surgical centers.

Thomson Reuters of Ann Arbor, Mich., has launched the Infection Xpert, a clinical intelligence dashboard to help manage and reduce hospital-acquired infections, capture and submit mandated infection reporting metrics, as well as analyze hospital infection data.

Imaging software developer and image viewer provider Accusoft Pegasus has acquired document viewing technology developer Adeptol and all its assets.