Zargis Medical, a majority-owned subsidiary of Speedus, has signed an agreement with the Ontario Telemedicine Network (OTN) to provide the delivery and testing of Zargis' telemedicine stethoscope system.

The issue of sustainability with the Beacon Community Program was raised at the end of CMIO Jeff Byers interview with ONC's Aaron McKethan, who said that ONC does not expect Congress to extend the life of the three-year program, which is funding health IT initiatives to measurably improve patient care in 17 locations. That said, we would be delighted for more communities across the country to take similar steps. We are prepared for other communities to receive benefits from the program even if we dont expand from the formal program, he added.

The FDA is requiring that gadolinium-based contrast agents (GBCAs) carry new warnings on their labels about the risk of the rare and potentially fatal skin disease, nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF), if the drug is administered to certain patients with kidney disease. Since the agency issued its decision Sept. 9, the companies that manufacture and sell these agents have begun to respond to the labeling changes.

Corepoint Health and Interface People (IPeople) have collaborated to offer a bidirectional interfacing tool for Meditech hospitals.

Emdeon, a Nashville, Tenn.-based developer of healthcare revenue and payment cycle management technologies, will acquire Chamberlin Edmonds & Associates for $260 million in cash.

Agfa HealthCare has signed an agreement with Ziekenhuis Oost-Limburg (Eastern Limburg Hospital Group) of Limburg, Belgium for the installation of its nursing management system, Orbis Care.

St. Jude Medical will make a $60 million equity investment in CardioMEMS, a medical device company focused on wireless monitoring technology.

EMR-based data, used across institutions in a structured way, offer great potential for diverse research studies, including those related to understanding the genetic bases of common diseases, according to new research published in this month's Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association.