Jerry vs. Carla (not Simon)

  California is a reflection of what ails our great nation. The major party gubernatorial candidates offer us very little to chose from with their ‘platforms’…During the recent debate between former Governor, Mayor Jerry Brown and ex-CEO entrepreneur Carla Fiorina several points were glaringly apparent. Governor Brown, for all his experience seemed like a washed out politician-bureaucrat.  He has been a governor, a mayor, attorney general, and his political career seems pointless in the ‘great scheme of things. Once a possible Presidential candidate, he failed to generate enthusiasm for this post. Brown has had a lengthy political career, spanning terms on the Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustees (1969–1971),...

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Do You Know What your Ratings are?

Internet web based rating sites have grown substantially in the past five  years.  At first I thought this would be a short lived phenomenon, however like most things on the internet they have flourished. I must admit that I now Google for most of my colleagues’ information, because it is so efficient.  Usually the top rated first page results from a Google search brings up ‘Ucompare”, Healthgrades, Wellness, Doctor.com If you don’t know the name and who John R. Morrow is and what he  does you need a quick brief on what he does and how it may matter to all of us. John R. Morrow has founded, created and contributed to a variety of national and international ratings programs including; 100 Top Hospitals : Benchmarks...

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Did you Know???

The IRS would apply the withholding to physicians' tax obligations for the year. The remainder would be refunded after doctors file their tax returns the following spring, but in the meantime, the federal government would hold that money, interest-free. Physician practices face a 3% reduction in payments, as well as potential accounting headaches, under a little-noticed tax provision. A little-known provision tucked into a 2005 tax bill requires the Internal Revenue Service, starting in 2012 at the earliest, to withhold 3% of payments to any contractor doing work for federal, state or local governments. The Medicaid program is excluded because it provides services based primarily on patient need. But Medicare, which is age-based, is not exempt. The GAO issued another report in March 2007...

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The Complete Meal

Thanks to Dr Wes for this,   “Parents the world over know the magic of McDonald's Happy Meals. There's something about the promise of a Happy Meal - the way it's packaged, the free toy - young families and especially kids find them irresistible. But anyone who's purchased one of these knows the reality: that toys within the Happy Meal are typically played with for no more than three minutes and the plastic tchotchkes are discarded faster than the accompanying 2% milk. There's a common sense saying: "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true." A complete meal for $0.99. (It may be small, but it’s what we promised.)   Even if we find that the $19.99 infomercial slicer/dicer doesn't work at home...

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HOW DID JEFFERSON KNOW??????

  It has been said the greatest volume of sheer brainpower in one place occurred when Jefferson dined alone..." John Kennedy When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe. Thomas Jefferson The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not. Thomas Jefferson It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes.   A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world. Thomas Jefferson I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them....

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The Amazing Carelessness Of ObamaCare Grace-Marie Turner Investor's Business Daily, May 11, 2010

I don’t think Grace-Marie would mind if I give her attribution for this article she wrote. All bets ARE off as to what really is going to transpire with health reform.  Passing this legislation was a sham for the democrats and President Obama, just to  pass something, workable or not. ...

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DO’S & DON’T’S

  There are many comments circulating on the social media networks, first the blogs, now Facebook and Twitter. Rumor has it that facebook and twitter are passing google and RSS feeds by, so blogging is now old hat.  (it used to be a challenge to make a blog.) Thanks to all you super-geeks guys like me can pour it on with little effort .  Many well known bloggers now don’t even write their own stuff, leaving it to ‘interns’ in the blogville.and syndicating many blogs into one place, such as Better Health.   I often wonder if these bloggers see any patients.  They always seem to be right there, posting my news just before I click on “publish”. The big thing now is should doctors participate in social media? What are the rules?  Fierce Practice Management...

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Inspector General Reports CMS to who?? or

Failure is an OPTION   A recent report in iHealthbeat from the California Health Care Foundation states that CMS did notcomply with identifying and reporting to the Healthcare Integrity and Protection Data Bank as required by law, according to a new report from HHS' Office of the Inspector General, "ProPublica Blog" reports (Wang, "ProPublica Blog," 9/22). Read more: iHealthbeat Since CMS cannot keep up with present reporting requirements, why should anyone believe CMS will be able to comply with  HHS’ demands for meaningful use reporting, or P4P, or outcome statistics.  The system is set up to FAIL !! CMS REPORTING TO THE HEALTHCARE INTEGRITY AND PROTECTION DATA BANK Background on Data Bank HIPDB aims to help...

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Change

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Resident Work Hours- More Reform

OSHA (The Occupational Safety and Health Administration) has now entered the fray concerning physician resident work hours Public Citizen, AMSA, and the  committee of residents and interns have sent a petition to the Secretary of  OSHA. Who signed the petition? LiveJournal Tags: OSHA,AMSA,Resident Physicians,Work Hours,Health Reform,Healthtrain express,quality of care,ACGME According to Katherine Matos writing on the health care blog, The petition requests that OSHA exercise the authority granted under §3(8) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act to implement the following federal work-hour standard: Previous attempts to do this were via the regulatory powers of numerous graduate medical education programs and their ‘guidelines’...

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New venue

I was busy the past several days working on relocating health train express onto a new ‘track’.  I had some difficulties transporting images from my present location, so health train express will remain on this track while I resolve some ‘geek’ issues. President Obama is beginning another round of promoting ‘Obama care”.  Public opinion is overwhelming against the overall scope of reform..  Today’s Wall Street Journal Blog focuses on this, “Health Care on the Agenda: Following mid-term elections, the Obama administration this week will once again focus on pushing the overhaul of the health care system, with the president giving a health-care speech on Wednesday, reports the WSJ. Public support has continued to wane,...

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Pew Internet Project

  The Pew Internet Project's Susannah Fox discusses the research group's latest healthcare findings at Health 2.0. Europe. The Pew Internet project is a non-profit research organization based in Washington DC that studies the social impact of the internet.     She elaborates on several patterns of usage for patients with chronic diseases, diabetes, cancer, lung diseases, hypertension and those with acute illness.  Patients with chronic diseases are more likely to see or ask a health professional.  Only 62% of patients with chronic illness seek advice from the internet, while 82% of healthy individuals seek advice from the internet. 93% of those with chronic illness seek their health from health professionals rather than the internet. Patients seek knowledge...

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Reviewing the Past

Yesterday I was privileged to witness the growth of our Inland Empire Health Information Organization. After one false start five years ago it now will happen.   Bottom line,  you just follow the money and the open pocketbook of the U.S. Congress (your taxpayer dollars) I had been away for almost five years after planting a seed for the development of this important initiative. Five years ago when David Brailer MD was head of ONCHIT few knew what was being planned nor what would come to fruition. For those who want to look at some of those days click here….. I don’t really remember writing some of these blogs , but this one was particularly funny (at least to me) After a long hard search I found my original blog post announcing the formation of the Riverside Regional Health...

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Health Information Exchanges and Electronic Medical Records Part II

  Part I in my previous blog   ………………   I describe HITECH and APPA and the negative reward system to create incentives for physicians and hospitals to acquire and use electronic medical records.   Today I am going to describe several critical and key issues which will greatly impact on providers in their daily work. Here is the scenario. Dr Gofaster is an internal medicine physician who attends patients at two different hospitals, BeHospitalized Medical Center and Don’tbeAdmiited Center for Cardiac Arrest.  He is on call for both E.Ds His iPhone do it all sounds an alarm and he receives an SMS from BHMC E.D. Dr Gofaster sees the patient and records his EMR for patient  I.Dont Wantadiehere.  Following...

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Health Information Exchanges and Electronic Medical Record Negative Reward Incentives

    Health Information Exchanges and Electronic Medical Record Negative Reward Incentives are still controversial. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act includes a wide variety of mandates, including HITECH to stimulate acquisition of EMR and building a national health information exchange network. As a student and consultant of health information exchange development and the federal and state government incentives for ‘rapid’ development’ of medical digital records, I am struck at the lack of organized medicine’s and individual practitioners opinions regarding EMRs. Congress has been sold a ‘bill of goods’ much like buying the Brooklyn Bridge for $1.00. (And the price will go up next year if you don’t buy it now). This...

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Rising Stars in Health Reform

Sermo has arisen in the past three years as a powerful media voice for the grass roots of physicians. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Sermo Named to Fast Company Magazine’s List of World’s Most Innovative Companies Largest Physician Community Recognized as ‘Political Force’ Behind Healthcare Reform Efforts Cambridge, MA, February 24, 2010 — Sermo (http://www.sermo.com), the world’s largest online community for physicians, today announced it has been named to Fast Company Magazine’s list of the world's most innovative companies. Sermo earned its ranking for providing a free web service – referenced by Fast Company as a ‘facebook for doctors’ - where physicians can collaborate and improve patient care. The company was also cited as a ‘political force’ after 11,500 physician members composed, signed...

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Health 2.0 International

Please click to expand to fill screen     Medical Social Networking has gone global, from the U.S. to the U.K. and beyond into specialty societies. A quick google search will bring up many social networking sites, some with authentication required, membership requirements,and also open networks....

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The Elephant in the Boa Constrictor

Richard Reece M.D. who writes Medinnovation Blog aptly analogized HIT  and the Government.  The Elephant in the Room Before resigning in frustration as the first “HIT Czar,” David Brailer observed in a 2005 in a New Times Times interview , “The elephant in the living room is what we’re trying to do is the small physician practice. That’s the hardest part, and it will bring this effort to its knees if we fail.” The Blind Men and The Elephant The second metaphor is the Blind Men and the Elephant. Our health care system is an elephant. Everyone feels the elephant’s parts differently. Doctors hanging on to the tail feel the system is an encircling rope, purchasers touching the leg feel it is an immovable tree, plans...

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Certification Central

The ONC has announced the approval of both CCHIT and the Drummond Group as agents for certifying interoperability and other standards for EMR.  Both groups fulfilled the requirement of the ONC and the NIST.   This ruling should bring much relief to CCHIT and those vendors who have participated willingly and volunteered to develop and test the standards. CCHIT has been in operation since 2006.   Some were critical and concerned that CCHIT represented mainly vendors, while the Drummond Group would be more unbiased. Competition is always a good thing, and should enhance affordability for those vendors seeking certification for EMRs. This is another ‘elephant for the boa constrictor to swallow.   ...

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