Emory Healthcare in Atlanta has determined that 10 backup discs containing information on surgical patients treated between September 1990 and April 2007 are missing from a storage location at Emory University Hospital.

Sotera Wireless has received 510(k) clearance to sell a new, wrist-worn system for continuous monitoring of vital signs, called ViSi, which has been designed for use in ambulatory, non-ICU clinical settings and measures heart/pulse rate, 3- or 5-lead electrocardiography, oxygen saturation, blood pressure, respiration rate and skin temperature.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has alerted the FDA that, if the agency is to bring its IT environment up to snuff, it needs to take three essential steps: develop a comprehensive inventory of its IT systems, implement an integrated master schedule for a particular modernization effort already underway and identify opportunities to get better at sharing data with internal and external partners.

Data loss is the top cybersecurity threat (32 percent) among respondents to a survey from technology services provider CDW.

Weve all been there, whether as physician champions or CMIOs, we are involved in the selection, design and implementation of a new system. Everyone (except possibly some of the end users) is excited about the system and new features.

It seems that waiting until the last minute is a universal problem. Take for example ICD-10. Despite the fact that the healthcare community has known about the Oct. 1, 2013, compliance deadline for years, survey results released by the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange recently revealed that most facilities are not ready.

In June 2010, Kansas Gov. Mark Parkinson signed an executive order creating the Kansas Health Information Exchange (KHIE), a quasi-public agency to oversee the activities of health information organizations (HIOs) that provide health information exchange (HIE) services in the state.

Were moving well beyond rules and alerts smacking us in the face during order entry. Clinical decision support is evolving and changing in significant ways. Several issues are driving those changes.