Experts often compare how slowly the health care system is "reforming" to how hard it is to turn a battleship. They're so big that they can't turn on a dime (much less on $3 trillion!), and there is as much risk in trying to oversteer as in not turning at all. Things are changing, we're assured, but it will take time to get on the desired new course. Maybe. But maybe it is time to jump off the obsolete battleship onto something more nimble. Some call it Do-It-Yourself Health (there are both .org and .com sites devoted to the topic, among others). PwC declared it to be one of the top ten trends of 2015. Dave Chase believes that "DIY health reform is now leading the way for the highest performing reform" -- not Medicare, health insurers, not even employers...
Medicare
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Diabetics Receive Better Care from Docs with EHRs
Although meeting Meaningful Use hasn't exactly been the easiest of feats for hospital CIOs, perhaps they can take solace in knowing that their patients will receive vastly superior care to those treated by doctors using paper records, according to the results of a new study published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine. Read More »
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DIY Health to the Rescue
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DME Bidding Program Seen as Success; Further Study Urged
The first year of the CMS' durable medical-equipment competitive-bidding program was successful, but more experience with competitive bidding is needed to learn if there are access problems for beneficiaries, a new federal report found. Read More »
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Do We Really Need More Doctors? How About Trying to Have Healthier Folks?
Health care needs a better business model. HHS reports that U.S. health care spending will surpass $10,000 per person this year, will grow almost 6% annually for the foreseeable future, and will consume over 20% of GDP by 2025. About half of our spending goes for labor costs, with health care employment remaining one of the "bright spots" in our economy. Indeed, health care jobs continued to soar even when the economy tanked in our most recent recession. Despite that steady growth, we continue to talk about a physician shortage, especially for primary care. Medical school enrollment is at new highs, yet it is not projected to dent the demand...
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DocGraph Hop Teaming Dataset Released at Datapalooza
Today CareSet Labs released the DocGraph Hop Teaming Dataset at Datapalooza. This dataset is the most comprehensive open map of the healthcare system in the United States. It is also the largest graph dataset available as open data that uses real names. This release represents the transition of the DocGraph dataset from a dataset maintained by Medicare/CMS, to a dataset that CareSet Systems will maintain and publish on their website going forward. “It’s called the HOP dataset because it more carefully follows the patients’ journey from provider to provider,” says Fred Trotter, CTO, CareSet Systems.
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Doctors & Other Professionals Billing Medicare At Higher Rates
Thousands of doctors and other medical professionals have billed Medicare for increasingly complicated and costly treatments over the past decade, adding $11 billion or more to their fees — and signaling a possible rise in medical billing abuse, according to an investigation by the Center for Public Integrity. Read More »
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Doctors Given Meals by Drug Makers Prescribed More of Their Pills
Doctors who were fed meals costing even less than $20 later prescribed certain brand-name pills more often than rival medicines, according to a new analysis published on Monday of a federal database. And in most cases, costlier meals were associated with still higher prescribing rates for Medicare Part D drugs made by the same companies that provided the food. The findings, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, are likely to intensify an ongoing debate over the extent to which ties between drug makers and doctors unduly influence medical practice and the nation’s health care costs...
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Doctors Group Hails Reintroduction Of Medicare-For-All Bill
Single-payer health program would cover all 50 million uninsured, upgrade everyone’s benefits and save $400 billion annually on bureaucracy, physicians say Read More »
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Doctors Perform Thousands Of Unnecessary Surgeries
A USA TODAY study found that tens of thousands of times each year, patients undergo surgery they don't need. Read More »
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Doctors Tell All—And It’s Bad
A crop of books by disillusioned physicians reveals a corrosive doctor-patient relationship at the heart of our health-care crisis...
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Don't Overlook Fraud In EHRs, OIG Cautions CMS
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has eagerly pushed EHRs onto healthcare providers without adequately addressing the risk of fraud, suggests a report from the Office of Inspector General. Read More »
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Double Chest CT Scans Persist, New Data Show
Hospital use of double chest scans in 2009 barely changed from the previous year, despite clinical guidelines that say these CT tests should be used sparingly, according to newly released Medicare data. Read More »
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Duplicate IT Systems Cost HHS Millions
An auditor found more than $300 million in duplicative IT systems at three different government agencies, including the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services--which has six duplicative systems costing $256 million alone--according to a new Government Accountability Office report. Read More »
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EHR Adoption Rate Slows, With Physicians Facing Big Hurdles For Meeting Stage 2, Survey Finds
The pace of adoption of electronic health-record systems has begun to slow, and the physicians who have adopted systems have a long way to go to meet the government's Stage 2 criteria for meaningful use of the technology, according to an authoritative survey of practices by the National Center for Health Statistics at HHS. Read More »
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EHR Incentive Payments Blast Toward $18 Billion
The “inexorable progress” of the federal EHR incentive program continues, with payments to providers moving ever closer to $20 billion. Read More »
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