Wireless technology challenges in healthcare are the focus of the May/June issue of Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation’s journal, Biomedical Instrumentation & Technology.

The Center for Connected Health (CCH) and the Center for Technology and Aging have jointly developed an online tool that enables providers to evaluate the return on investment (ROI) for patient monitoring programs for patients with heart failure, according to a June 10 announcement.

June 11, 2013 — Chalfont St. Giles, U.K. — GE Healthcare announced today its plans to invest $2 billion over the next five years to accelerate the development of innovative software for healthcare systems and applications. GE Healthcare has a long history in software with its Healthcare IT business; and this investment is designed to advance current and future offerings in order to address new and pressing operational and productivity challenges faced by healthcare organizations around the world. GE Healthcare will work closely with the GE Software Center of Excellence in San Ramon, California - as well as at various research and development hubs around the world - to develop new software solutions.

More than 70 healthcare, research and disease advocacy organizations representing over 40 countries have formed a global alliance to facilitate the secure sharing of clinical and genomic data, according to a June 4 Broad Institute announcement.

To assist providers transitioning into accountable care organizations (ACOs), the Certification Commission for Health Information Technology (CCHIT) released a 42-page framework to help them navigate health IT challenges.

With the October 2014 compliance date of ICD-10 looming, athenahealth put out a guarantee to its clients on June 5 of its readiness for the requirement and promised to waive its fees in case this guarantee is not met. “Athenahealth will also backstop the revenue cycle for independent practices by providing a cash advance against submitted claims, if those claims are delayed by payers in the ICD-10 transition period,” according to the announcement.

Telemedicine patient monitoring market revenue jumped from $4.2 billion in 2007 to $10 billion in 2012, representing a 237 percent increase, according to a Kalorama Information report, “Advanced Patient Monitoring Systems.”

Health Tech Hatch (HTH), an online, mobile resource that aims to launch early-stage healthcare innovations for patient use, will operate the user testing platform for the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT’s (ONC’s) Blue Button Co-Design Challenge, according to an HTH announcement.