“The primary objective of clinical documentation is to assist doctors in the complex journey of portraying in standardized text formats complete clinical pictures,” says Michelle Dragut, MD, CCS, CDIP, a physician adviser for the Florida Hospital Association Management Corporation in Orlando. “All healthcare organizations depend on correct documentation.”

Healthcare CIOs earned an average base salary of $208,417 in 2012, according to a recent survey conducted by the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME). However, the survey found that compensation for IT leaders varied widely based on several factors, including size and type of organization, title held by the respondent, and reporting relationships.

The Healthcare Information Management and Information Systems Society (HIMSS) seems to have packed more into the 2013 Annual Conference and Exhibition than ever before. That comes as little surprise when there are so many different initiatives and efforts for attendees to consider.

Within the competitive healthcare areas of Colorado, California, Kansas and Montana, SCL Health System has integrated evidence-based decision-making directly in its EMR to support, enhance and speed patient care decisions. One-click, fully integrated access to a clinical point-of-care resource was a must as was a clear implementation strategy and plan to spur physician adoption.

It is time for the HIMSS13 Annual Conference & Exhibition. I have attended for more than 20 years and seen it through the eyes of a physician, an informaticist, a consultant and a vendor. I am often asked about the best way to handle this massive conference of more than 30,000 attendees, so let me share some thoughts on how to find innovation, share innovation or sell innovation. The easiest way to do this is to break the conference into its three main parts: the educational sessions, the exhibit hall and networking.

When measured against conventional care, second generation home-based telehealth had no significant impact on health-related quality of life, depression or anxiety for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes or heart failure over 12 months, according to a Feb. 26 BMJ Group study.

Version 4.0 of CONNECT, the community-driven software platform for enabling secure health information exchange, offers several new functions, according to a webinar presented Feb. 22 by the National eHealth Collaborative.

Many view the patient-centered medical home (PCMH) model as the new wave in healthcare delivery, but getting there requires overcoming significant implementation challenges, according to an American Journal of Managed Care study published in February.