Users tend to view new technology as foreign and contrary to established habits and associations, said Robert J. Szczerba, PhD, director of Lockheed Martin’s global healthcare initiatives. So, the underlying cultural environment must change and accept new technologies for those technologies to successfully improve healthcare. Szczerba spoke during a Nov. 20 webinar presented by the Institute for Health Technology Transformation.

Federal agencies have failed to adequately assess whether billions of dollars invested in major IT projects will keep those projects on track to meet agency needs, according to a report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

Patients with online access to their medical records and secure email communication with clinicians had increased use of clinical services, including office visits and telephone encounters, compared to patients who did not have online access, according to a study appearing in the Nov. 21 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

A comparison of care provided during virtual and physical interactions with providers revealed that e-visits could reduce healthcare costs despite their correlation with higher prescribing rates, according to a research letter published online Nov. 19 by the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Members of the U.S. House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee are urging the Department of Health and Human Services to maintain a state-based structure for quality improvement organization (QIO) contracts as the department begins to implement QIO provisions included in a trade bill last year.

The National eHealth Collaborative (NeHC) has unveiled its patient engagement framework, a model to help guide health organizations through the process of developing and refining health IT-enabled patient engagement strategies.

North Mississippi Health Services is a recipient of the 2012 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, a presidential honor annually bestowed upon organizations in four different sectors for outperforming their industry’s status quo.

A survey of international primary care providers (PCPs) revealed wide variations from country to country in patient access, health IT utilization, care coordination, performance feedback and providers’ perception of healthcare delivery. The results were published online Nov. 15 by Health Affairs.