Optum: Testing Time for an Invisible Empire
By Jeff Goldsmith Years ago, the largest living thing in the world was thought to be the blue whale. Then someone discovered that the largest living thing in the world was actually the 106 acre, 47 thousand tree Pando aspen grove in central Utah, which genetic testing revealed to be a single organism. With its enormous network of underground roots and symbiotic relationship with a vast ecosystem of fungi, that aspen grove is a great metaphor for UnitedHealth Group. United, whose revenues amount to more than 8% of the US health system, is the largest healthcare enterprise in the world. The root system of UHG is...
Source: The Health Care Blog - April 2, 2024 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: matthew holt Tags: Health Policy Health Tech Jeff Goldsmith Optum PBMs United HealthGroup Source Type: blogs

Hospital retaliation and my fight for patient rights
I found myself compelled into the complex world of health care advocacy under extraordinary circumstances last year when I went to my university administration to request a table to do a free speech petition because of a personal and troubling experience. My mother, a respected pediatric intensive care doctor, had been abruptly terminated from her Read more… Hospital retaliation and my fight for patient rights originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - April 1, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Conditions Hospital-Based Medicine Source Type: blogs

Bevey Miner, Consensus Cloud Solutions
Bevey Miner runs health care for Consensus Cloud Solutions. I’ve known Bevey since she was at Allscripts in the 2000s where she was one of the first building online prescribing. She’s been at lots of places and is now at Consensus which is taking unstructured data via cloud fax and assessing it, structuring it and delivering it–especially to places like skilled nursing facilities. Bevey calls that data at the “outer circles” and we were talking at a time when a lot of electronic communication was down because of the Change Healthcare hack when a lot of it wasn’t flowing. Bevey tells us a...
Source: The Health Care Blog - April 1, 2024 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: matthew holt Tags: Health Tech Bevey Miner Cloud faxinfg Consensus Cloud Solutions TEFCA Unstrcutured Health Data Source Type: blogs

The unspoken skill of touch in health care
What drew me to spending my gap year as a medical assistant was the advertised “direct patient care experience.” While patient care is my favorite part of the job, it comes with its own unique challenges for a first-time health care worker. An unexpected challenge that I had to overcome with patient care was learning Read more… The unspoken skill of touch in health care originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - March 31, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Education Medical school Source Type: blogs

There Seems To Be Increasing Confidence AI Will Make A Positive Difference In Healthcare!
  This appeared last week AIs will make health care safer and betterIt may even get cheaper, too, says Natasha Loder Mar 27th 2024 When people set goals which are sky-high to the point of silliness, the sensible scoff. They are normally right to do so. Sometimes, though, it is worth entertaining the possibility that even the most startling aspiration might be achievable. In 2015 Priscilla (Source: Australian Health Information Technology)
Source: Australian Health Information Technology - March 31, 2024 Category: Information Technology Authors: Dr David G More MB PhD Source Type: blogs

The battle of the bulge: The struggle is real
The economic impact of obesity looms large, casting a shadow over both individual well-being and national prosperity. Beyond the personal struggles and societal pressures surrounding weight management, the financial ramifications of obesity ripple through health care systems, labor markets, and various sectors of the economy. In the United States alone, the annual health care costs Read more… The battle of the bulge: The struggle is real originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - March 30, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Conditions Obesity Source Type: blogs

Patient engagement: Can tech help? [PODCAST]
Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! Join Joshua Reischer, a physician executive, as we delve into the complexities of modern health care delivery. Explore the challenges physicians face in obtaining essential patient information, the frustrations experienced by both patients and providers due to outdated processes, and the Read more… Patient engagement: Can tech help? [PODCAST] originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - March 29, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Podcast Health IT Source Type: blogs

Addressing mental health in the medical field
In the heart of a bustling hospital, where the relentless pace of saving lives never wanes, lies an unseen battle that rages quietly within the souls of those who care for us. Health care professionals, heralded as heroes, especially in the wake of a global pandemic, face an array of mental health challenges, often overlooked Read more… Addressing mental health in the medical field originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - March 29, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Conditions Psychiatry Source Type: blogs

The Long and Tortured History of Alpha-Synuclein and Parkinson ’s Disease
This study tracks the decades-long journey to harness alpha-synuclein as a treatment for Parkinson’s disease. Steven Zecola an activist who tracks Parkinson’s research and was on THCB last month discussing it, offers three key changes needed to overcome the underlying challenges. A Quick Start for Alpha-Synuclein R&D In the mid-1990’s, Parkinson’s patient advocacy groups had become impatient by the absence of any major therapeutic advances in the 25 years since L-dopa had been approved for Parkinson’s disease (PD). The Director of National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) se...
Source: The Health Care Blog - March 29, 2024 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: matthew holt Tags: Health Policy Medical Practice Parkinson's Disease Steven Zecola Source Type: blogs

It ’ s Time to Get Patient Addresses Straight
Amazing how a trivial detail such as a postal address can cause so many headaches and so much waste. But in health care, a lack of address standardization is a major barrier to important aspects of care, including the sharing of patient records demanded by our trend to value-based care. Part of the problem is provider laziness, because the US postal service offers a standard addressing process called CASS, and several services draw on it to ensure the correct use of abbreviations, ZIP codes, and other elements of the address. But many providers just enter into the databases and EHRs whatever the patient put down on a form ...
Source: EMR and HIPAA - March 29, 2024 Category: Information Technology Authors: Andy Oram Tags: Ambulatory Health IT Company Healthcare IT Hospital - Health System Interoperability IT Infrastructure and Dev Ops LTPAC Regulations Brent Francom CASS Healthcare APIs Healthcare Standards Mailing Address Standards ONC Project Source Type: blogs

Health care waste exposed [PODCAST]
Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! We are joined by Edward Hoffer, an internal medicine physician, to explore the alarming levels of waste plaguing the U.S. health care system. Together, we shine a light on the various culprits behind this inefficiency, ranging from unnecessary treatments to bloated Read more… Health care waste exposed [PODCAST] originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - March 28, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Podcast Public Health & Policy Source Type: blogs

How Enhanced Recovery After Surgery solves our opioid problems
In retrospect, we were an addicted nation waiting to happen. Not from a self-indulgent culture, not from an unwillingness to suffer hardship, nor any of the generational criticisms of lack of grit. Our opioid crisis derives from an impatient culture that fears loss of health more than health care profit. With pain as most people’s Read more… How Enhanced Recovery After Surgery solves our opioid problems originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - March 28, 2024 Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Meds Medications Pain Management Source Type: blogs

Ami Parekh, Included Health
Ami Parekh is the to Chief Health Officer of Included Health. It provides navigation services & expert medical opinions (the original Grand Rounds) and virtual care (the old Doctors on Demand) and it then bought a smaller company called Included Health. Ami explains why navigation exists (clue: health plans have been terrible at it) and how it works, and what money it saves on trend (about 2%). They’re also reaching out asking about people’s “Healthy days” and are tracking that metric, and giving people more healthy days–Matthew Holt (Source: The Health Care Blog)
Source: The Health Care Blog - March 28, 2024 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: matthew holt Tags: Health Tech Matthew Holt THCB Quickbites Ami Parekh Included Health Navigation virtual care Source Type: blogs

Medical Costs
People have complained that I haven ' t said why Medicine is costing so much in the U S of A. Give me a break -- I can ' t talk about everything at once. I ' ve been intending to get to this all along. This is just the first installment, it ' s a long story.So, thanks to all the mind boggling complexities of employer-provided insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, and a few other programs, something like 90% of Americans have some form of health insurance. Great news! That means we can all afford the medical services we need and nobody has to go broke because they get sick or are injured in a car crash or ...
Source: Stayin' Alive - March 28, 2024 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs

WEBINAR: The How-To of Healthcare Analytics: Implementation to Activation
SPONSORED POST 30% of the world’s data volume is being generated by the healthcare industry. We have more information available to us than any other industry but have yet to realize the potential of this information to create predictive, personalized care. To help us navigate the data complexities currently holding us back, Reuters Events has united informatics experts, from NYC Health + Hospitals, Sutter Health, & UnityPoint Health. Register here for the March 28 (THAT’s THIS COMING FRIDAY!) 11am ET webinar: ‘The How-To of Healthcare Analytics: Implementation to Activation’. (Source: The Health Care Blog)
Source: The Health Care Blog - March 28, 2024 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: matthew holt Tags: Health Tech analytics Reuters Source Type: blogs