In This Issue:
 HIMSS10
Message from our Georgia HIMSS President
Weekend Immersion in Nursing Informatics
Town Hall Meeting
Advocacy Corner
GA HIMSS Sponsors
CHIME News
HHS - Meaningful Use Criteria
Accountable Care Organizations
Nurses Report on Wireless Networks
HIMSS10 ... change is everywhere…opportunity is here
Healthcare reform…meets the transition to electronic medical records…meets ARRA’s stimulus dollars…meets strategies and solutions…NOW.
For some, it can’t come too soon, for others, it comes at the perfect time… for many it brings challenges. One thing is certain: it’s knocking at your front door…NOW.
Don’t get left in the past. At HIMSS10, there are partners to meet…products to be discovered…knowledge to be gained and answers to be found.
And everywhere you look…you come face-to-face with opportunity.
Keynote speakers include David Blumenthal, MD, MPP and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Register at HIMSS Conference.
Join the Georgia HIMSS Chapter at some great networking events:
Monday, March 1st from 5-6pm - Communities Open House - Mix and mingle with volunteers and leaders from HIMSS communities. (Attendees Only)
Wednesday, March 3rd from 7:30-10pm – Wednesday Night Special Event - Explore Underwater Wonders at the Georgia Aquarium! (All Welcome - $45 fee)
Change is everywhere…opportunity is here
HIMSS10… Education, Solutions, Connections
March 1-4, 2010
Georgia World Congress Center, Atlanta
To learn more about the benefits of attending HIMSS10, visit HIMSS Conference.
Message from our Georgia HIMSS President
Dear Georgia HIMSS Member,
Happy New Year! I hope your 2010 is off to a great start and there couldn’t be a more exciting time for Georgia to host the national HIMSS Conference next month (Feb 28 – Mar 4 at the Georgia World Congress Center). I hope to see you in Atlanta and invite you to join all your Georgia colleagues at the HIMSS Community Open House on Monday March 1 from 5:00–6:00 PM. We have chosen to use the Community Open House as our chapter reception to showcase Health IT in Georgia. Please join us.
Last summer we surveyed our membership and we heard your cry for better chapter communications. In response we have completely revamped our communication strategies. Liz Hanson, the chair of our communications committee is leading these efforts and doing a great job. This e-newsletter is just one artifact of our increased focus on chapter communications and we hope you find it helpful. In addition you can now follow us on Twitter and linked in and of course you can always learn about upcoming events and other chapter news at our website (www.gahimss.org). We are doing a much better job of keeping the website current since we engaged Telusys to help with the site administration.
A key Chapter initiative is the creation of a 3-5 year Strategic Plan that builds on the “ACE” theme the board articulated in our July 2009 meeting: Advocate, Collaborate, Educate. Our President Elect, Rob Aaron is chairing this effort and is joined by Chapter past presidents: Adrienne Dickerson, Dean Athanassiades, Amanda Mewborn, David Cowan and Sheldon Tyndall. This has also been a key agenda item at both of our Board of Director’s meetings this year. Look for the results of this effort sometime this summer.
If you are interested in becoming more active and taking a leadership role in our chapter stay tuned for our call for nominations to serve on the 2010-2011 Chapter Board of Directors. Expect this call for nomination in the next 90 days. We are working to create a more consistent, and more clearly understood, nominating process to help sustain our chapter in the years to come.
We receive a number of requests through our website from members volunteering to help our chapter and we try to respond to all of them. We are a volunteer led organization and sometimes things can fall through the cracks. We do need volunteers to help with upcoming events including the May Golf outing. If you are willing to help please let us know.
We have some exciting events coming up this spring including a statewide Town Hall meeting, the Weekend Immersion in Nursing Informatics and a Golf event (see the website for details). I hope you can join us. Our 4th annual Healthcare Trade Faire last November was well attended. We continue to learn each year and improve the event so next year’s Trade Faire should be even better.
Enjoy the newsletter and I look forward to seeing you in Atlanta Feb 28 – Mar 4.
Don Kinser
President, GA HIMSS
Plan Today to Participate in WINI
Weekend Immersion in Nursing Informatics
This conference focuses on trends and issues in practice facing the nursing professional and provides a comprehensive examination of nursing informatics theories, impact of human factors, systems analysis, and design approaches. Methods for managing information databases and systems, as well as the evaluation of computer technology systems are included. The content provides an opportunity to prepare for the ANCC Nursing Informatics Certification Exam. The Conference is conducted by experts in Nursing Informatics.
Date: Friday - Sunday,April 16-18, 2010
Location: University of West Georgia
Download the brochure
For more information and to register, visit our website at GAHIMSS.org.
Save the Date!
Town Hall Meeting - April 29th
Coming in April 2010, GA HIMSS is sponsoring a first-ever, statewide Healthcare Town Hall focused on Healthcare Quality in Georgia. The agenda will offer keynote session(s) on Georgia's quality indicators and a healthcare executive roundtable to discuss how ARRA/HITECH, health information exchange and other key initiatives will impact care quality and population health throughout the state. We invite you to participate in this forum of key healthcare leaders. The panel will represent diverse perspectives on healthcare quality - academic, public, community and military care facilities; public/population health; and healthcare financing.
The GA HIMSS Town Hall will be simultaneously broadcast from both Atlanta and Savannah. The audience for this event is healthcare providers, payers, policy makers, employers, vendors, and the community - any stakeholder interested in Georgia's healthcare quality. We will post more details about the event as they become available. We would like to thank our GAHIMSS sponsors CentriNet Corporation, Lawson Software and Relay Health for their continued support. We would also like to thank Microsoft for sponsoring the technology which will make our simulcast possible. If you interested in sponsoring this event, please contact Dan Stewart at stewart@gahimms.org.
Advocacy Corner
Denise W. Hines, DHA, PMP
Georgia HIMSS Board Member
Vice-President, Government Services and Education, HealthNovation
ARRA Update
The Notice of Proposed Rule Making on the Medicare and Medicaid EHR Incentive Programs (Meaningful Use) and Interim Final Rule on the Initial Set of Standards, Implementation Specifications, and Certification Criteria were officially released at the end of December. On January 13th, The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) opened a 60 day comment period for the public to provide comments on the regulations. The comment period will remain open until March 15, 2010.
The ONC recently announced new grant opportunities:
Health IT Workforce Development Grants are available to support the training and development of the skilled workforce required to support broad adoption and use of health information technology.
The Beacon Community Program will include $220 million in grants to build and strengthen health IT infrastructure and health information exchange capabilities, including strong privacy and security measures for data exchange, within 15 communities. An additional $15 million will be provided for technical assistance to the communities and to evaluate the success of the program.
Strategic Health IT Advanced Research Projects (SHARP) program funding ($60 million) is available to support four research projects designed to find solutions for health IT adoption challenges. Each project within the SHARP Program will implement a research program addressing one of the four research focus areas: (1)Security of Health Information Technology, (2)Patient-Centered Cognitive Support, (3)Healthcare Application and Network Platform Architectures and (4)Secondary Use of EHR Data.
The grant application periods for these grants are rapidly approaching. For more information on these grants and others visit: HealthIT.hhs.gov (click on HITECH Funding Opportunities).
State of Georgia ARRA Activities
The Georgia Department of Community Health (DCH), Office of Health Information Technology is anxiously awaiting news on their application to establish Regional Extension Centers (REC) and news on the funding to develop the plan for the state-wide Health Information Exchange (HIE). DCH submitted an application with the National Center for Primary Care at Morehouse School of Medicine to create Georgia’s RECs. DCH was awarded $3.2 million in December to create the strategic plan for Medicaid information technology. DCH is currently working with stakeholder committees to start creating guidelines for the state-wide HIE. The State of Georgia has also been awarded over $6.9million to expand services and improve infrastructure for Community Health Centers and $2.2 million for broadband mapping activities.
Healthcare Reform Negotiations Continue
Democratic leaders continued negotiations this week on healthcare reform legislation. It is reported that marathon negotiation sessions took place at the White House, working to develop a compromise by early next week. While leaders work to hash out many of the differences between the House and Senate bills, one the largest factors of success for passage will be retaining the 60 votes needed for passage in the Senate.
Share Your News!
Your Georgia HIMSS chapter would like to share your news across the state. Send us your upcoming events, news and activities for publication in our eNewsletter. Please include your contact information so we can verify your news and provide you with a proof of your article before publishing.
Send your news to GA HIMSS News.
CHIME voices concerns about proposed ARRA regulations
CHIME
ANN ARBOR, MI, January 7, 2010 – Reporting, product certification and implementation deadlines represent major concerns that could affect efforts to effectively implement electronic health records under recently proposed federal regulations, according to The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME).
CHIME is beginning an intensive review of provisions of the recently released regulations to implement healthcare information technology provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA). However, at first glance, several provisions within the regulations merit closer scrutiny and will pose significant challenges for providers hoping to implement electronic health records.
To continue reading, please visit: CHIME News
HHS Releases Proposed “Meaningful Use” Criteria
Healthcare IT News Healthcare IT News Meaningful Use
On December 30, 2009, CMS announced a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) to implement provisions of the Recovery Act that provide incentive payments for the meaningful use of certified EHR technology. The proposed rule outlines provisions governing the EHR incentive programs, including defining the central concept of “meaningful use” of EHR technology. CMS’ goal is for the definition of meaningful use to be consistent with applicable provisions of Medicare and Medicaid law while continually advancing the contributions certified EHR technology can make to improving health care quality, efficiency, and patient safety. To accomplish this, CMS’ proposed rule would phase in more robust criteria for demonstrating meaningful use in three stages. CMS provides a 60-day comment period on the proposed rule, beginning on the date of publication. For more on the HITECH and meaningful use, go to www.HealthIT.hhs.gov. Learn more about the NPRM:
• Meaningful Use Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM)
• Provide public comment on the NPRM
In a related announcement, ONC has issued an Interim Final Rule (IFR) that specifies the Secretary’s adoption of an initial set of standards, implementation specifications, and certification criteria for electronic health record (EHR) technology
The resulting standards and certification criteria in the IFR are organized into four categories:
1. Content Exchange Standards (that is, standards used to share clinical information such as clinical summaries, prescriptions, and structured electronic documents);
2. Vocabulary Standards (that is, standard nomenclature used to describe clinical problems and procedures, medications, and allergies);
3. Transport Standards (that is, standards used to establish the communication protocol between systems); and
4. Privacy and Security Standards (for example, authentication, access control, transmission security/encryption) which relate to and span all of the other types of standards.
Accountable Care Organizations
New acronym for your healthcare vocabulary – ACOs
The Hospitalist Hospitalist ACO
In an effort to introduce provider payment reform, the concept of accountable care organizations (ACOs), in which primary care providers and hospital staff assume joint responsibility for both cost and quality, is moving into the federal reform limelight. The ACO would cover a specific group of patients. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is planning pilots. Using quality benchmarks, providers in ACOs can expect to share in savings and incentives. Hospital staff likely will be at the forefront to smooth admissions, discharges, and handoffs of care.
Nurses report that wireless networks are often inadequate
Spyglass Consulting
Spyglass Consulting Wireless
According to research by Spyglass Consulting that involved telephone interviews with more than 100 acute care and home health nurses, 71% consider their organization’s wireless networks to be inadequate in supporting their documentation and communication needs with other clinicians at the point of care. The major problem areas appear to be due to poorly designed networks creating coverage gaps, wireless interference, and overloaded access points.
The nurses reported frequent incidences of dropped data that made it difficult to document patient care data at the point of care (that is, at the patient’s bedside). To alleviate this problem the authors urge hospital information systems groups to collaborate closely with nursing staff in point of care deployments to understand existing workflow inefficiencies and how wireless communications and mobile computing technology can be used to support new and existing processes at the point of care.
You are receiving this e-newsletter because you are a registered member of the GAHIMSS Chapter. Please feel free to forward this e-newsletter to your associates.
For Georgia HIMSS membership options, please visit our membership page here.
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President
Donald E. Kinser, PE, MBA
Chairman and CEO
EDI, Ltd.
President Elect
Robert Aaron, MA
Healthcare Industry Manager
Microsoft Corporation
Past President
R. Sheldon Tyndall
Founder
Hunter Stokes & Associates
Treasurer
Mr. Steve Toland
President
Quality Computer Systems
Program Chair
Claire Shults
Business Development Manager
Intel Digital Health
Advocacy Chair
David G. Lenhart
Director Health Solutions – State and Local Government
Vangent
GAHIMSS
www.gahimss.org
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