When asked to identify what regulations are the most burdensome, physician practices pointed at the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) being implemented as part of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA).

The American Telemedicine Association will see a new CEO soon with Jon Linkous stepping down. After 24 years as the CEO, Linkous will be replaced by Sabrina Smith, MD, acting as interim CEO until a permanent replacement is found.

The Illinois Blockchain Initiative announced today its partnership with blockchain healthcare innovation company Hashed Health, to leverage blockchain and distributed ledger technologies. The pilot program will initially explore opportunities to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the medical credentialing process in Illinois. The concept will leverage a blockchain-based registry to streamline the sharing of medical credential data and smart contracts to automate workflow related to multistate and interstate licensure.

Spok, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Spok Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: SPOK) and the global leader in healthcare communications, announced that all 20 hospitals named to U.S. News & World Report’s 2017-18 Best Hospitals Honor Roll and all 10 hospitals named to the 2017-18 Best Children’s Hospitals Honor Roll rely on Spok® solutions for enterprise healthcare communications. This is the fifth consecutive year that all of the Honor Roll hospitals are Spok customers.

Insurance giant Anthem continued its departure from Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges, announcing it will no longer offer plans in Nevada and 74 counties in Georgia.

Playing video game can reduce the amount of gray matter in the hippocampus region of the brain by using spatial learning, navigation and memory. In a study published in Molecular Psychiatry, researchers evaluated which types of games affect the brain.

Milestone Scientific Inc. (NYSE: MLSS) a medical R&D company that designs, patents, incubates and commercializes a growing portfolio of innovative injection technologies, today announced that the first patient in the U.S was treated with the CompuFlo® Epidural Instrument at the University of Miami Hospital, following Milestone Scientific’s receipt of 510(k) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on June 9, 2017. The CompuFlo® Epidural Instrument provides anesthesiologists and medical practitioners, for the first time, with the unique ability to objectively identify and confirm the epidural space.

Medical researchers are utilizing electronic health records (EHRs) to conduct research on a variety of conditions. A recent study in Circulation evaluated the accuracy of EHR data provided for cardiovascular care traditionally obtained data.