A group of German patients has filed a lawsuit against financially beleaguered Integrated Surgical Systems Inc., alleging that the Davis company' Robodoc surgical robot is "defective and dangerous," according to a company filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The class action was filed in Yolo County Superior Court Dec. 17, six months after Integrated Surgical System's product liability insurance coverage was terminated because the company could not pay the premiums.

'Smart bombs' to deliver fatal blast to tumors
New Scientist, 1.5.2005

Nanoscale polymer capsules could one day be used to deliver chemotherapy direct to tumors, leaving adjacent tissue unscathed. The capsules would be designed to rupture when heated by a low-energy laser pulse, delivering their payload right where it is needed. Anti-cancer drugs would be more effective, and the side effects less severe, if they could home in on a tumor and be delivered in a single burst. This would allow the drug to reach the concentrations needed to kill cancer cells, while minimizing damage to surrounding tissue.

iPods Store Medical Images
eWeek.com, 1.5.2005

Radiologists are turning to iPods to deal with the hassles of managing medical images. They're not listening to music, though; they're looking at pictures. Medical images are increasingly important in diagnosing everything from cancer to heart disease to sports injuries. And they are used extensively for research, including brain function and experimental treatments, but they also require large data sets, making storing and transferring images problematic. Two radiologists recently developed open-source software, called OsiriX, to display and manipulate complex medical images on the popular portable devices called iPods.

Medication errors cut in Philadelphia area
Philadelphia Inquirer, 1.6.2005

A regional effort to prevent hospital patients from being harmed by medication errors has made progress, but more must be done, according to a new report. Launched in February 2001 by the Delaware Valley Healthcare Council and two leading patient-safety organizations, the Regional Medication Safety Program for Hospitals sought to give hospitals the tools needed to reduce mistakes that injure and kill patients. A report on the program being released today concludes that participating hospitals had a 22 percent improvement toward meeting the council's goals.

Innovation or Irrelevance: Six Steps to Move Forward
HealthLeaders News, 1.7.2005

Anytime two or more healthcare executives get together, talk will eventually turn to the "tremendous" or "dramatic" change our industry has undergone in recent years. Yet, management guru/author Ian Morrison begs to differ. In his 2000 book "Healthcare in the New Millennium," he observes that "healthcare moves at glacial speed compared to most other industries." Indeed, the speed of change is relative. While recent years have brought considerable change to the industry (for example, increased physician-hospital competition and advances in information technology), healthcare change pales in comparison to that of industries such as financial services, information technology, pharmaceuticals, and even automobile manufacturing.

Surgical tools cleaned improperly
Raleigh (NC) News & Observer, 1.7.2005

Two Duke University Health System hospitals in Durham and Raleigh have notified about 4,000 patients that they may have been operated on with surgical instruments that weren't properly cleaned. Although letters to patients don't specify what happened, drums labeled "detergent" actually contained a petroleum-based hydraulic fluid that was piped into the instrument-cleaning system at Duke Health Raleigh Hospital and Durham Regional Hospital. As a result, from early November until late December, instruments were washed with a solution of hot water and hydraulic fluid and then sterilized with heat. The problem was discovered after hospital employees noticed that surgical instruments seemed unusually slick and oily.

New implant highlights tension between patients, profit
Sacramento Business Journal, 1.10.2005

A new medical device called a drug-eluting stent has made the future brighter for heart patients, but darker for the hospitals that implant the devices. Stents essentially are small tubes made of metal mesh. They are used to repair and strengthen damaged arteries, and for the last decade the bare-metal version has surpassed balloon angioplasty as the procedure of choice. In the past few years, an improved stent has been available, one coated with medicine. Once inside the patient, the medicine gradually oozes out of the stent and helps the body accept the device. These drug-eluting stents also cut down on the formation of new blockages that would require repair work later. The problem for hospitals involves cost and reimbursement.

Suros puts product first
The Indianapolis (IN) Star, 1.10.2005

Suros' ATEC system -- Automated Tissue Excision and Collection -- is an air-powered tool that allows doctors to reach, cut and collect tissue samples through a needle. The procedure is minimally invasive, requiring a puncture rather than surgery.

Doctors finding bigger is better to reduce costs
Philadelphia Inquirer, 1.11.2005

Doctors are frustrated by low insurance reimbursements, high malpractice costs, and lack of control over patient care. They don't want to join hospitals or managed-care practices, but can't afford the overhead and malpractice rates of a one-to-two-person practice. So many small groups are finding strength in numbers - merging to form large private practices.

Hospitals Step Up Efforts To Avoid Medication Errors
The Wall Street Journal, 1.12.2005

It's a simple enough concept: Hospitals should find out what medications a patient is taking when he or she is admitted. Yet too many hospitals don't have a medication-checking protocol, opening the door to potential disaster, like a diabetic returning to a hospital recovery room without a resumption of insulin after surgery or a heart patient being discharged with a drug that duplicates one he's already taking.

Overuse of Medical Scans Is Under Fire
The Wall Street Journal, 1.12.2005

The government is likely to join a growing number of private health plans that are attempting to rein in the use of diagnostic scans. A Medicare advisory panel is expected to make several recommendations to Congress on the best way to curb the sharply escalating costs of MRIs and other scans.

Five Ways To Fix The FDA
Forbes.com, 1.12.2005

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration may have the world's toughest job. A quarter of every dollar Americans spend annually--some $1 trillion in total--is regulated by the FDA. From the start, the safety of medicines has been the agency's most sacrosanct calling. The FDA was founded after a 1937 incident in which a poisonous medicine killed 107 people, most of them children. Since then, the FDA has become synonymous with drug safety. In a sense, "FDA approved" is the brand that the entire $216 billion U.S. drug market is founded upon. Dilute the confidence of the public in the agency, and many billions of dollars in current and potential sales vanish overnight.

How the Right CFO Fixed Cleveland Clinic
HealthLeaders, 1.14.2005

It's a brisk, calm Fall day in northeast Ohio, but at the Cleveland Clinic Health System's administrative offices, organized chaos reigns. Movers and maintenance personnel scurry about with their hands full, and boxes filled with files, frames and memoirs are strewn about the lobby. All signal a sea change in leadership at the world-famous academic medical center. For the first time in 15 years, a new boss is moving in. By all accounts, it is a friendly transition between outgoing chairman and CEO Floyd D. Loop, M.D., and his successor, Delos M. "Toby" Cosgrove, M.D. But a six-month period between the naming of the new CEO and the departure of his predecessor has done only so much to limit stress on some 30,000 subordinates. Still, none of the upheaval penetrates the closed office door of Michael O'Boyle, The Cleveland Clinic Foundation and Health System's self-deprecating chief financial officer, who quietly has brought about tremendous change.

Micromachine grows its own muscles
New Scientist, 1.17.2005

A micromachine that walks using muscles that it grew for itself has been developed in a US laboratory. The remarkable device could eventually lead to muscle-based nerve stimulators that let paralysed patients breathe without a ventilator, or to nanobots that clear away plaque from inside the walls of a human coronary artery.

Through Efficiency, Hospitals Can Improve Both Quality and Safety
The Wall Street Journal, 1.18.2005

For the average patient, the costs and hassles associated with hospitalization make coming to the hospital a last resort. They fear a big bill that they can't pay off as much or more than the illness. Though cutting hospital costs can seem daunting – they've been rising far faster than inflation – there are small changes hospitals could make that would go a long way toward improving the patient experience, and lowering costs in the process. Prices are up because hospitals face challenges such as increasing patient loads, uncompensated care for the uninsured, shortages of nurses and declining reimbursement in the face of rising insurance and general operating costs. Other industries have similar problems too, but they are miles ahead of health care in instituting lean methods that cut the waste from their daily processes.

Minnesota hospital errors revealed

Minneapolis (MN) Star Tribune, 1.20.2005

Minnesota hospitals performed surgery on the wrong body parts, gave the wrong medications or made other mistakes that endangered patients 99 times in a 15-month period starting in the summer of 2003, according to the first such report in the nation. The report, released Wednesday by the Minnesota Health Department, said that 20 deaths were associated with hospital errors, including eight people who died after falls and four after medication errors.

Electronic Medical Records Could Save $78 Billion a Year

The Wall Street Journal, 1.21.2005

Roughly $78 billion is what a group of leading electronic-medical-record proponents believe could be saved annually if the U.S. were to adopt a system that lets medical professionals seamlessly access patient records and other medical data. The conclusion was in a report given to the Bush administration earlier this week.

Health IT Infrastructure Could Net Big Savings

eWeek.com, 1.22.2005

A national system for electronic health information could save as much as $78 billion dollars a year, or about 5 percent of current health care spending, according to a study by the Center for Information Technology Leadership, a nonprofit research group focused on health care. But about half of that value will be lost if health care providers do not make their systems interoperable, or capable of interfacing with each other. As hospitals and their outpatient affiliates move toward adopting EHR (electronic health record) systems, they do so without nationwide standards of interconnectivity. That often means that a patient's information from one provider is inaccessible to other providers.

Kaiser CEO reshapes a health-care giant for the 21st century

Sacramento Business Times, 1.24.2005

George Halvorson, Kaiser Permanente’s chairman and CEO, is convinced that Kaiser's continued financial success in coming years rests on two key strategies, which he's been pushing since he arrived nearly three years ago: Successfully implementing a $3 billion electronic medical record system by late 2006 and introducing a flurry of new products to attract younger, healthier enrollees. So convinced, in fact, that Halvorson has been politely turning aside requests by both foreign health officials and large employers to bring Kaiser to new regions or even new countries.

Baptist South to go 'paperless'

The Business Journal of Jacksonville (FL), 1.24.2005

In just a few weeks the 248,000-square-foot Baptist Medical Center South will open, featuring state-of-the-art care in 92 suites on a 32-acre campus off Interstate 95 and St. Augustine Road. But something will be missing. Paper. Baptist South will be Northeast Florida's first hospital to open as a paperless facility, meaning medical histories, treatment orders and all other documents will be kept only electronically.

Massachusetts hospital group to detail safety plan

The Boston Globe, 1.26.2005

The Massachusetts Hospital Association is expected to unveil an ambitious program today to improve patient safety in the state's 105 hospitals, including public posting of nurses' workloads at individual hospitals and the number of hours each day they spend directly caring for patients. The association's program is voluntary. But hospitals that sign a pledge to participate in the "Patients First" initiative agree to about 20 goals, such as regularly discussing patient safety at hospital trustee meetings and submitting their nurse staffing plans to state public health officials yearly. The association, which is a trade group run by hospitals, plans to report on a new website which hospitals have enrolled and their progress toward the goals, hoping that the public pressure and scrutiny will help motivate hospitals to participate.

High-Tech Alliance on Base for a Digital Health Network

The New York Times, 1.26.2005

Eight of the nation's largest technology companies, including I.B.M., Microsoft and Oracle, have agreed to embrace open, nonproprietary technology standards as the software building blocks for a national health information network. The Bush administration has said that creating such a network should be a national priority over the next several years. The goal is to improve care and reduce costs by abandoning paper and moving to a digital system for handling patient records, clinical research, claims and payments. Such a network, analysts agree, should save both lives and dollars.

MedPAC Recommends Extending Stark Moratorium on
Specialty Hospitals

HealthLeaders News, 1.26.2005

On January 14, 2005, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) announced the much-anticipated recommendations that it will make concerning physician investments in specialty hospitals. MedPAC voted to recommend that Congress take several actions, most notably extending the Stark specialty hospital moratorium for an additional 18 months, to address the growing concern about the effects of physician investments in specialty hospitals. The extended moratorium would give Congress time to further study the quality and efficiency of services offered at specialty hospitals, and, if warranted, to take additional, more drastic steps to level the playing field between specialty hospitals and community hospitals.

President Promotes Switching To Electronic Medical Records

The Washington Post, 1.28.2005

President Bush called on doctors and hospitals Thursday to move their medical records from paper to electronic files, a change that he said would improve medical care while shaving significant sums from the nation's spiraling health care bill. Speaking at the Cleveland Clinic, Bush quoted health analysts who said that the efficiencies wrought by electronic medical records could reduce medical costs as much as 20 percent. Electronic records can "help change medicine and save money and save lives," he said.

Harvard Medical School CIO Tests Embedded
RFID Chip

eWeek.com, 1.28.2005

As an emergency medicine physician, Dr. John D. Halamka immediately saw the life-saving potential of embedding tiny wireless RFID (radio-frequency identification) devices in people. As the CIO of the Harvard Medical School, he was naturally skeptical of such devices and wanted to test them thoroughly before recommending their adoption. As a physician CIO, he knew that there would be risks inserting any foreign object into a human being and that the body might interfere with the device's functioning and that the device could interfere with the body's functioning. Therefore, Halamka said he did the only reasonable move: He offered himself as a radio-signal guinea pig and got a first-hand experience of having an embedded transmitter.

Siemens' unit creating new 'digital hospitals'
Atlanta Business Chronicle, 1.31.2005

Alpharetta-based Siemens One Inc. has been rapidly growing its health-care technology business. The company, which is a subsidiary of Siemens AG (NYSE: SI), is building "digital hospitals" in more than five states. The hospitals are designed so that medical equipment and information systems are completely integrated, as are building and energy infrastructure, communications, environmental controls and security. The "paperless" hospitals aim to improve operational and financial efficiency, while creating a more convenient experience for patients.

Medicare to Pay Bonuses to Doctors For Cutting Costs

The Wall Street Journal, 2.1.2005

Medicare launched an experiment to pay some physicians bonuses if they deliver better-quality care while reducing costs, a move that is part of a broad effort to reward health providers for improved performance. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services named 10 clinics that will be awarded bonus payments if they curb costs for patients with expensive health problems. Medicare currently pays physicians based on the number and complexity of services, leaving little incentive for health-care providers to make care more efficient.

Some Push to Make Hospitals Disclose Rates of Infection

The Wall Street Journal, 2.1.2005

There is a growing push for such disclosure, including a two-year-old national campaign by Consumers Union. The intent is both to help people make informed choices about what hospitals to use and, by harnessing competition, to spur hospitals to try harder.

Paying for Better Care, Not More: Medicare Joins the P4P Movement

The Wall Street Journal, 2.3.2005

About 46 cents of every dollar spent on health care in the U.S. comes from the government, the bulk of it from the Medicare and Medicaid health-insurance programs for the old, the poor and the disabled. The government pays nearly 60% of the hospital bills and 20% of the doctor bills. So if the government changes the way it pays doctors or hospitals, it makes big waves in the health-care system. Which is why it's worth paying attention to the latest government experiments in paying doctors not for providing more care, but for providing better care. Paying for performance, known as P4P, is a fad in health care.

Pollution fighter turns clot buster

New Scientist, 2.5.2005

A material normally used to clean up car exhaust fumes could one day be used in dressings and surgical equipment to prevent severe skin infections and blood clots. It might even help combat infections by the MRSA superbug, a newly filed patent claims. What these medical problems have in common is that they can be treated with nitric oxide (NO). This gas is able to regulate blood pressure, stop thrombosis - blood clotting in the vessels - and is a powerful antibacterial agent. However, applying NO to the right areas and at the right levels is a major challenge.

Hospitals Build Deluxe Wings For New Moms
The Wall Street Journal, 2.8.2005

Even as hospitals are under increasing pressure to reduce costs, they are spending heavily in an unlikely area: luxurious maternity wards. Amid heightened competition, hospitals are betting that making a good impression on moms-to-be and their families during such a formative experience can build lifelong loyalty. The latest boom in hospital construction is an effort to win over patients with state-of-the-art facilities offering private suites, whirlpool baths and Internet access.

Creeping consolidation in the hospital M&A market
HealthLeaders, 2.14.2005

Following a busy 2004, it seems likely that high-profile acquisitions between for-profit chains won't continue to lead the consolidation trend. Though deals in 2004 like LifePoint Hospitals Inc.'s pending $1.7 billion purchase of neighboring Province Healthcare Co.-both based in Brentwood, Tenn.-make a splash in the industry, other perennial giants seem poised to sit this round out. Nashville, Tenn.-based HCA Inc. certainly has not added to its roster, nor has Tenet Healthcare Corp. in Dallas. Instead, it is selling off a slew underperforming hospitals.

The Business of Cancer
HealthLeaders, 2.14.2005

Oncologists run a business where nobody ever wants to be a customer. Yet the universal experience of cancer has touched virtually everyone in and outside of healthcare with a heart-wrenching experience. But it may not always be so. Much talked-about clinical advances on the horizon will revolutionize the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer. At the same time, those same advances will bring about far-reaching changes in how the hospitals, physician practices and health plans involved in treating cancer will operate in the future.

Drug makers press fight vs. counterfeiters
The Boston Globe, 2.14.2005

Pfizer and other US drug companies are fielding their own private agents to wage war on prescription counterfeiters and Internet distributors around the world. They are stepping in to guide and assist agencies like the Food and Drug Administration, which do not have sufficient resources to investigate the flood of unapproved knockoffs and phony prescriptions pouring into the United States.

Make that fish and microchips
HealthLeaders, 2.15.2005

It has been described as the world's largest healthcare information technology project and is a goal the United States only dreams about. England is implementing a border-to-border electronic health record funded by the United Kingdom's National Health Service. Dubbed the "National Programme for Information Technology," the 10-year project will provide a centralized electronic patient record and applications that connect patients, physicians and hospitals throughout the country. The undertaking offers many lessons to U.S. healthcare providers. National Health Service contractors and other experts discuss what it takes to connect an entire nation.

When is Enough, Enough in Supersized Hospital Equipment?
HealthLeaders, 2.18.2005

The U.S. patient population is growing rounder each year, and the trend shows no sign of slowing. A September 2004 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that the number of obese adults over the age of 20 has increased from 19.4 percent in 1997 to 25.1 percent in early 2004. The nation's growing girth means that accommodating an obese population is no longer a choice but a necessity for hospitals. Scores of patients are now too big and too heavy for standard equipment and fixtures.

A New Medical Worry: Identity Thieves Find Ways To Target Hospital Patients
The Wall Street Journal, 2.22.2005

Certainly, identity theft isn't among the risks of medical treatment -- such as infection -- listed on the standard release form that patients sign. But there's evidence that identity thieves are starting to target medical patients. Hospital patients are vulnerable in part because they are unlikely to detect anything amiss. Some may never leave the hospital. The biggest vulnerability of hospital patients is that their Social Security numbers often double as a medical identifier.

Pulling the covers off hospital infection rates

St. Petersburg Times, 2.21.2005

Germs lurk in every hospital, creeping into surgical wounds, seeping into IV lines, hitching rides on dirty linens and unwashed hands. Most hospitals would rather not talk about them, even though infections kill more than 80,000 Americans each year. That makes it hard to tell which hospitals do a better job of stopping their spread. Hospitals have traditionally closely guarded their infection rates. Even hospitals that report infection data to a federal database are promised confidentiality. In Florida, that veil of secrecy is supposed to lift - but just how soon remains a question.

Medical-Device Industry Faces More Scrutiny By
U.S. Officials

The Wall Street Journal, 2.25.2005

Federal officials, after years of aggressively pursuing drug companies for questionable promotional tactics, are expanding their focus to the medical-device industry.

Sales of medical devices are a fraction of those for prescription drugs, but the use of such devices to treat pain, Parkinson's disease and epilepsy has been expanding. Since many devices are covered by Medicare, regulators want to rein in marketing efforts that provide improper incentives to physicians to use particular devices.

Drug Makers Are Still Giving Gifts to Doctors,
F.D.A. Official Says

The New York Times, 3.2.2005

Three years after the drug industry said it would stop showering doctors with expensive gifts, a top federal drug official told a Senate panel on Thursday that such marketing efforts continued. The official, Dr. Janet Woodcock, acting deputy commissioner for operations of the Food and Drug Administration, said during a break in the hearing that drug companies still invited doctors on cruises and to resorts in exotic places, all free. The F.D.A. has no jurisdiction to police such efforts, she said.

Portable EMRs are still to come

eWeek, 3.5.2005

Fewer than one in five hospital IT executives report that their organizations have fully operational electronic medical records, according to a recent survey by the HIMSS (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society). And, in fact, the exact percentage of health care organizations reporting a functional EMR system actually declined slightly from last year's results, from 19 to 18 percent. Still, most of the hospital IT executives surveyed (62 percent) reported that EMRs are the top IT application priority for their organization over the next two years. That's a huge increase from last year's response, when only 10 percent of the executives reported that EMRs were a top near-term priority. Another 17 percent responded this year that their organizations have no immediate plans to implement EMRs.

Medical data made whole: Health exchanges hope to offer all patient records in one place
San Francisco Chronicle, 3.8.2005

One of the main stumbling blocks in the American health care system, many experts say, is the inefficient use of computer technology to manage medical records. Now, in Santa Barbara County, a network of hospitals, laboratories, pharmacies and doctors is pioneering new technology that will allow medical professionals with different computer systems to share clinical information. The initiative may well be a first step toward the creation of a national patient-care data bank.

EMRs deliver benefits, but physician buyers are wary

Nashville Business Journal, 3.7.2005

Dr. Jerry Franklin understands the benefits of electronic medical records. His Mid-State Cardiology Associates encompasses 15 physicians in two locations, who often see the same patients and who also practice in outlying clinics, making the easy transfer of medical information an attractive prospect. But he still hasn't pulled the trigger on selecting one. When his practice looked for an EMR two years ago, they counted more than 70 companies offering the product. His group is one of thousands concerned about the cost of the product, the amount of time needed to scan in old information such as X-Rays and the lack of a standard for the technology.

High Tech Tag
The Tampa Tribune, 3.7.2005

Every day, thousands of medical gowns travel through a clothing toll booth of sorts at Tampa-based SRI Surgical Express, a hospital supplier. Stitched inside each gown is a tiny radio transmitter that sends an electronic signal, which allows SRI to identify the location, size, color and age of every gown in shipment. Such technology, known as radio frequency identification also allows the company to track returning items.

Drug-error risk at hospitals tied to computers

The Boston Globe, 3.9.2005

Hospital computer systems that are widely touted as the best way to eliminate dangerous medication mix-ups can actually introduce many errors, according to the most comprehensive study of hazards of the new technology. The researchers, who shadowed doctors and nurses in a Philadelphia hospital for four months, found that some patients were put at risk of getting double doses of their medicine while others get none at all. Doctors at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania identified 22 types of mistakes they have made because of difficulty using computerized drug-ordering, such as failing to stop old medications when adding new ones or forgetting that the computer automatically suspended medications after surgery. Some doctors interviewed for the study said they made computer-related mistakes several times a week.

Brigham to adopt barcodes to cut errors

The Boston Globe, 3.16.2005

Brigham and Women's Hospital this month is rolling out supermarket-style barcodes on medications and patients' wristbands, one of the first US hospitals to adopt this common food industry technology to reduce overdoses and other dangerous medical errors. The Harvard Medical School teaching hospital plans to use barcodes on all its medical and surgical floors by mid-July, and to complete implementation in the operating rooms, emergency department and obstetrics units by the end of 2006. The system will cost the hospital about $10 million on equipment and training for several thousand nurses to scan barcodes.

Do MDs or MBAs Make Better Leaders?
HealthLeaders, 3.18.2005

The concept of the physician executive has migrated from the fringe of healthcare to its core. Today's physician leaders are seen as key players in the ongoing effort to reinvent the struggling healthcare system. This transformation of the physician executive from outcast to savior reflects a widespread belief that doctors bring vital skills to the executive suite. For one, physician leaders are more connected to the daily grind of healthcare. From a clinical perspective, they know what needs to happen. And perhaps most importantly, they have an automatic "in" with the prime moneymakers: their fellow physicians. That being said, are physicians better suited for the corner office? Or is the MBA, whose sole career has been focused on the business side of healthcare, better positioned to run a healthcare organization in today's complex financial environment?

HCA leads campaign to curb doctor-owned hospitals

The Tennessean, 3.21.2005

HCA, which runs 190 hospitals in the United States and overseas, has become one of the leaders in the campaign to curb expansion of physician-owned specialty hospitals across the country. What makes it important to companies such as HCA is that doctors are allowed to refer patients to facilities the doctors also own. Critics such as the American Hospital Association say this ''self-referral'' gives doctors an unfair advantage because they refer patients to their own hospitals and take the best-insured patients.

Amazing technology in the making
HealthLeaders, 3.22.2005

Wearing special viewing glasses, the physicians attending last fall's Radiological Society of North America conference were reminiscent of the crowds that packed movie theaters in the 1950s to watch 3-D movies. But this was no retro event. These radiologists were witnessing the future. In one demonstration, Michael Mastrangelo Jr., M.D., an expert in minimally invasive surgery, took viewers on a guided journey through a patient's spinal column. Manipulating a set of "SpaceGrips," Mastrangelo deftly maneuvered through the image, while conversing with another researcher viewing the same image at the University of Kentucky. Sporting the far-out name of "immersive real-time tele-collaboration of complex volumetric medical imaging for surgical planning," Mastrangelo's demonstration drew applause from the rapt radiologists.

Robo-docs check in at Detroit Medical Center
Detroit Free Press, 3.23.2005

Thirty-nine years after "Star Trek" contrived the transporter ("Beam me up, Scotty") and 43 years after the "Jetsons" cartoons featured Rosie the mechanical maid, the Detroit Medical Center today becomes the world's first hospital system to deploy an entire fleet of real robots that can see, hear, talk, scoot around and allow doctors to be in two places at once.

Safety concerns grow over pharmacy-mixed drugs
USA Today, 3.24.2005

Tens of thousands of those patients — and their doctors — may not know that they are using respiratory drugs that are mixed together in pharmacies from bulk-purchased ingredients: Those drugs are not approved by the Food and Drug Administration, and they are made with far less oversight than drugs produced by pharmaceutical companies. At their best, such pharmacies produce a variety of medications for individual patients who can't get what they need from products made by brand-name or generic drug companies, such as flavored syrups for those who can't take pills and dye-free products for patients allergic to colorings. But at worst, critics and regulators say, some pharmacies are skirting federal law by mass-producing drugs without FDA oversight, sometimes making contaminated, ineffective or too-potent products.

GetWell Network asks users to diagnose technology

Washington Business Journal, 3.28.2005

The GetWell Network is about to get its first dose of feedback. The Alexandria company developed and sells a communications system for hospitals that allows patients to use their in-room TVs to surf the Web and access specific information on certain health issues.

Hospital Bills: Comparison Shopping in Gibberish
HealthLeaders, 3.31.2005

The whole idea of consumer-driven healthcare rests on consumers being able to make informed choices on their care based on price and quality. Much emphasis has already been placed on developing consumer-driven health plan products. Somewhere along the line, a key ingredient has mostly been overlooked: What good is consumer-driven healthcare when consumers can't understand a hospital bill?

Orthopedic Firms' Ties With Doctors Scrutinized
The Wall Street Journal, 4.1.2005

The Justice Department's probe into orthopedic-device companies has produced only a handful of subpoenas so far, but the investigation has raised concerns about the relationship between doctors and those companies for whom they consult. Orthopedic-device companies frequently pay physicians for feedback on products to help them design new ones. But doctors and industry experts speculate that the Justice Department seems concerned that companies, in an effort to rustle up more business, sometimes pay doctors who don't provide services worthy of compensation.

Pulling plug on medical devices?
Minneapolis Star Tribune, 4.4.2005

There are few universal truths in business, but there's one on which most would agree: Health care costs are out of control. Feeling the pinch, some hospitals are now pushing to cut costs in an unusual way that, if widely implemented, could squeeze profits of Twin Cities-based medical device companies. It's called gain-sharing, a practice that permits hospitals to financially reward doctors who collaborate in efforts to lower costs. As part of these efforts, some hospitals are trying to limit the number of medical devices they use for certain procedures, and share the savings with doctors. Proponents say it would more closely align the often-disparate interests of doctors and hospitals. Critics, however, claim the arrangement is nothing more than a kickback paid to doctors, and some worry it's the interests of the patient that will suffer.

SRI to Develop Robotics for Battlefield Medical Care
Washington Post, 4.4.2005

SRI International Inc. won a two-year, $12 million contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop a robotic surgical system that would let doctors operate on a wounded soldier on the battlefield from a remote location.

Privacy concerns hinder electronic medical records
The Business Journal of the Greater Triad Area, 4.4.2005

As medical professionals tout the benefits of electronic medical records, they also acknowledge that many of those same benefits are driving patient concerns.

The benefits are substantial, professionals say: easy access to patient records no matter where they are, instantly updated files and the ability to more easily share information with other physicians. But because electronic medical record systems are often Web-based, many patients fear that also exposes their medical history to anyone with an Internet connection. To help with ease and portability, many doctors offices use wireless Internet to transmit records around the office, opening up additional security problems since unprotected wireless transmissions can be potentially be accessed by anyone with a wireless modem within range.

How hospitals pay doctors a thorny issue
The Tennessean, 4.8.2005

If hospitals change how they pay doctors, they could control costs and improve care, but finding just the right approach is tricky, a panel of health-care executives said. Some incentives work better than others, some are illegal, and telling which is which isn't always easy, the executives said.

Hospital Business in New York Braces for a Crisis
The New York Times, 4.11.2005

The hospital business in New York, one of the largest and most prized sectors of the region's economy, is deep in financial trouble, which is forcing it into a sharp, swift contraction. Across the city and state, public and industry officials agree, hospital doors are likely to begin swinging shut over the next year, and thousands of jobs could be lost.

Making medical history portable

The Boston Globe, 4.11.2005

If the thought of carrying around your medical information appeals to you but the idea of embedding a computer chip under your skin to do it creeps you out, Dr. Carl Franzblau has an alternative for you. Franzblau, an associate dean of graduate medical sciences and chairman of the biochemistry department at Boston University, has introduced a simple USB device for storing personal medical information that also doubles as a fob for your keys.

Chips to speed new drugs
The News & Observer, 4.9.2005

The hottest drug discovery tool fits into the palm of a hand. Known as a laboratory on a chip, it helps automate the screening of chemical libraries and promises to generate safer drugs that can be brought to market faster and cheaper. In the hands of biologists, chemists, software developers and a physicist at Amphora Discovery in Durham, lab chips also are used to go one step further: detecting possible side effects before experimental drugs are tested in animals or humans.

Virginia Mason says surgery led to troubling event
Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 4.14.2005

Responding to numerous allegations of safety deficiencies in an anonymous memo on hospital letterhead, Virginia Mason Medical Center acknowledged yesterday that a surgery there last year had resulted in an event so troubling that the hospital notified state regulators.

Doctors still e-mail resistant

Chicago Tribune, 4.14.2005

Despite medical technology advances, many physicians say patient communication via the Web takes too much time and has risks. Medical practices have proven remarkably resistant to embracing e-mail as a tool to correspond with patients. Physicians regularly order medical tests and image scans that use high-tech electronics, but when it comes to patient communications they still prefer the phone. E-mail raises concerns about patient privacy, legal liability over miscommunications and the failure of most insurance providers to pay doctors for time spent answering e-mails.

A More Affordable Cardiac Device

The Wall Street Journal, 4.14.2005

New European research raises the possibility that a $12,000 heart device could be as effective in saving lives of many heart-failure patients as one that sells for more than twice as much. The large study from 82 hospitals across Europe, published in this week's New England Journal of Medicine, is almost certain to touch off a debate among cardiologists as to who truly needs the more-expensive machine. It poses a similar question for insurers, such as the federal Medicare system, which only recently agreed to pay for the costlier device.

State will look into patient set on fire at Virginia Mason

Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 4.15.2005

State regulators will launch an investigation today into an incident involving a patient who was set on fire during a surgical procedure at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, officials said yesterday. Virginia Mason confirmed yesterday that a patient ignited while on the operating table in late 2003, but said that was not the cause of his death, as had been claimed in an anonymous memo distributed to the media this week.

A Bonus for Health, Payable to the Doctor

The New York Times, 4.15.2005

A quiet revolution is taking place in Medicare, one that could set a new standard for the way medicine is practiced in this country. For the first time in its history, Medicare is starting to embrace an approach that has changed industries as diverse as carmakers and fast-food restaurants - giving employees financial incentives to meet goals for quality. By the end of this year, more than 600,000 Medicare recipients will be in test programs that pay doctors and hospitals bonuses for achieving better results, like increasing the number of diabetic patients whose blood sugar is under control.

No patient rush to 'concierge' practices

The Boston Globe, 4.15.2005

When two Harvard Medical School-affiliated internists quit their jobs at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center three years ago to open the state's first concierge practice, a dozen Massachusetts doctors frustrated with what one called ''turnstile medicine" followed and many more considered doing so. But patients have not lined up to pay the $1,500 to $4,000 a year such practices cost. In return for the fee, doctors typically offer 24-hour cell phone access to their patients, hour-long same-day appointments, detailed research into patients' medical conditions, and other extras.

One More Time...Are Service Lines the Answer?HealthLeaders News, 4.18.2005

As American hospitals face unrelenting financial pressures, a timely question that begs a thoughtful response is, once again, "Are service lines the answer?" When the model was first offered in the late '80's, the answer was an unqualified, "apparently not." After about five years of attempting the model, most hospitals abandoned the idea as ineffective or irrelevant. But the consumer has matured, the market has changed, and the service-line model may now provide the best means of navigating these turbulent waters.

A Variety of Factors May Contribute to Lower Drug Cost Trends in 2005

Managed Care Week, 4.18.2005

Market withdrawals, safety issues, a smaller pipeline and larger copays could help drive down pharmacy costs in 2005, according to some recent forecasts. UnitedHealth Group last week said it lowered its projections for full-year 2005 pharmacy cost trends, citing a number of external market forces along with internal pharmacy strategies. The Segal Co. also said recent drug sales data indicate lower-than-expected drug costs.

D.I.Y. docs
HealthLeaders News, 4.20.2005

With Congress' specialty hospital moratorium still going strong, many hospital administrators see a recent proliferation of "full-service" hospitals with physician ownership as specialty hospitals by another name, or as one expert puts it, "wolves in sheep's clothing." The hospitals, formed by physicians who are either partnering with or competing against the local legacy providers, run the gamut in terms of service offerings. Whether these facilities are good or bad for costs, patient care and the fiscal health of legacy providers is debatable, but many entrepreneurial physicians see ownership in full-service hospitals as their best chance to gain a share of the say-so-and the profits.

Fewer U.S. Deaths Linked to Obesity
Washington Post, 4.20.2005

A new government study has concluded that obesity causes about 112,000 deaths each year in the United States, far fewer than a previous, highly publicized estimate by another part of the same agency. The new calculation was immediately seized upon by skeptics who argue that public health authorities have created undue alarm about obesity. Other experts and the researchers who conducted the new study, however, said obesity still is a major public health threat.

The Top 4 Power Struggles In Healthcare
HealthLeaders, 4.20.2005

In the pressure cooker known as our national healthcare system, all the major players seem ready for battle. On the right, advancing slowly behind a phalanx of riot shields, are the cost-cutting forces of managed care. On the left, hurling brickbats at almost everyone, are the physicians. In the rear, licking their wounds after their latest brawl with the physicians, and plotting their next ambush on the health plans, are the hospitals. Looking on from the sidelines are the healthcare policy-makers, employers and random pundits-their theories often two steps behind the facts on the ground.

Government Prods Hospitals To Survey Patients on Quality
The Wall Street Journal, 4.20.2005

After three years of often-fractious debate with the hospital industry over how to measure patient satisfaction, the federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services is preparing to launch the first national survey of patients' perception of hospital care. As soon as this June, hospitals could start asking discharged patients to complete the 27-question survey.

Does consolidation equal strength?
HealthLeaders News, 4.21.2005

For both managed care companies and providers, acquisitions have been seen as a fast ticket to greater pricing power in the market. Yet for all the deals that have been successful, the healthcare landscape has been littered over the past decade with the wreckage of mergers that never delivered the market dominance they had seemed to promise. So what is the accepted wisdom today regarding consolidation? Do acquisitions really result in the accumulation of greater marketplace muscle and clout? Or are they too often problematic in the fast-changing, high-volume, low-margin business of healthcare?

Fake Hospital Inspectors Probed
Washington Post, 4.22.2005

The FBI and other law enforcement agencies are looking into incidents in which people masquerading as unannounced inspectors were found poking around three hospitals in Boston, Detroit and Los Angeles. In each case the impostors were stopped by security guards or hospital staff, and then either left or were expelled. No one has been arrested, and neither the identity of the intruders nor their motives are known.

Insiders' Insights: Unions gaining ground against providers
HealthLeaders News, 4.22.2005

Depending on which side you ask, the relationship between hospitals and unions has become either more or less combative over the past year. Both sides agree, however, that union organizing tools have become extremely sophisticated and are a definite force to be reckoned with. For example, the use of a "corporate campaign" that targets a hospital's reputation-often by claiming that the organization provides poor quality healthcare or doesn't serve the poor-is fast becoming a tactic of concern to all hospital administrators.

Surgeon left in midst of operation
The Boston Globe, 4.22.2005

A prominent plastic surgeon has been reprimanded and indefinitely suspended by Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center after he left a patient in the middle of an operation to perform surgery down the street at another hospital. Dr. Joseph Upton, who specializes in complex hand surgeries, has voluntarily agreed to stop practicing medicine until at least May 4 while state regulators investigate whether he has double-booked operations on other occasions.

Hospital suits fall flat, but debate rages
USA Today, 4.24.2005

Most of the lawsuits filed in federal court by high-profile lawyer Richard Scruggs and other attorneys alleging non-profit hospitals overcharge the uninsured have been dismissed, but the debate over the industry's charity care continues.

Curbing costs of medical scans
San Francisco Chronicle, 4.24.2005

Imaging procedures such as CT scans and MRIs have been hailed as one of the miracles of modern medicine, letting doctors see inside the body to spot tumors and other abnormalities. But these great advances in medicine do not come cheap. Medical imaging is one of the fast-growing pieces of the health care bill, with spending approaching $100 billion a year. There is a growing movement among insurers and health care planners to try to rein in expenses associated with high-tech scans such as CTs, short for computerized tomography, and MRIs, or magnetic resonance imaging.

In search of the 800-pound gorilla
HealthLeaders News, 4.25.2005

There is no shortage of well-meaning stakeholders in regional health information organizations or RHIOs. From local hospitals and medical groups, to the state and federal government, there is growing consensus on the value of RHIOs. But due to the very collaborative structure comes a key roadblock: Who takes the lead?

Mind-reading machine knows what you see
New Scientist, 4.25.2005

It is possible to read someone’s mind by remotely measuring their brain activity, researchers have shown. The technique can even extract information from subjects that they are not aware of themselves. So far, it has only been used to identify visual patterns a subject can see or has chosen to focus on. But the researchers speculate the approach might be extended to probe a person’s awareness, focus of attention, memory and movement intention. In the meantime, it could help doctors work out if patients apparently in a coma are actually conscious.

Curing health’s IT
San Francisco Business Times, 4.25.2005

In Silicon Valley and statewide, health-care, business and technology leaders are scrambling to create data-exchange networks to link hospitals, physicians and patients electronically. And they're pushing for far greater use of health-care IT.

Scanning out medication errors
Pittsburgh Business Times, 4.25.2005

A $2 million investment has given Ohio Valley General Hospital in McKees Rocks the distinction of being the first medical facility in the country to automate its intravenous medication system using bar code scanning and innovative infusion technology.

Tiny scope gives surgeons inside look at damaged joints
The Birmingham News, 4.25.2005

Medical technology is drawing ever closer to those scenes produced for the 1966 sci-fi classic, "Fantastic Voyage," a movie about a miniaturized surgical team traveling through a patient's body. Most recently, the Orthopaedic Sports Medicine Clinic of Alabama - a medical group with offices in Vestavia Hills - started using the InnerVue Diagnostic Scope System to get amazing, inside views of damaged knees, shoulders, ankles and wrists. The scope is a tiny bundle of optical fibers that is inserted into a joint like a large needle. It provides surprisingly clear pictures of tissue or bone damage with a minimum of pain and trauma.

The Prosperity of Managed Care Plans May Be Tapering Off
The New York Times, 4.27.2005

Even as the nation's health care costs keep climbing, the insurance companies that try to manage those costs have been prospering and increasing their profit. But some analysts see trouble ahead. The share prices of three of the largest insurers - WellPoint, UnitedHealth Group and Cigna - reached 52-week highs early this month, at the peak of a two-year surge in the stocks of managed care companies. But since April 7, the big insurers have led the way down as a Standard & Poor's index of managed care stocks fell 8.4 percent while the broader S.& P. 500-stock index slipped only 3.3 percent.

Are radiologists running the show?
HealthLeaders News, 4.27.2005

About 60 miles down Interstate 57 from busy Chicago, with its millions of residents and its multitude of healthcare providers, lies tiny Kankakee, Ill., with about 27,000 residents and its two hospitals. Administrative leaders at 210-staffed-bed Riverside Medical Center could conceivably rest easy on capital spending, knowing patients and physicians have only two choices for healthcare. Instead, they're busily adding to a 60-acre outpatient campus five miles north in the city of Bourbonnais. The priority: radiology. Riverside is building a $10 million outpatient imaging center there to complement a radiation center and wellness center already on the campus. When it opens in May, it will feature one of the hottest "toys" available to any size hospital: a 64-slice CT scanner that can treat 100 patients each day at capacity. The $1-million-plus piece of equipment will complement a 16-slice scanner the hospital purchased two years ago that can handle 75 patients a day. Why this heady pace of investment in imaging? Radiology pays well, and because it increasingly applies to so many specialties, physicians are subverting their funding requests for pet capital projects in favor of system-wide investment in radiology.

IBM Moves Aggressively Into Health Care
Associated Press via Chicago Tribune, 4.27.2005

As it moves aggressively into the health care business, International Business Machines Corp. announced an 8-year, $402 million partnership with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center that the company said will be a model for how the health care industry can use new technology. Earlier this week, the company announced a test system for sharing medical data across hospitals, agencies and patients, which will connect IBM sites in San Jose, Calif., Rochester, Minn., and Haifa, Israel. The company also said earlier this week that it plans to buy Healthlink, a Houston-based consulting firm that helps hospitals convert to electronic medical records. It did not disclose a price.

Five Healthcare Joint Venture Scenarios Facing New Antitrust Reporting Rules
HealthLeaders News, 4.27.2005

As of April 7, 2005, there are new reporting requirements applicable to joint ventures structured as unincorporated entities, such as limited partnerships and limited liability companies, under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act. According to the new rules, which were announced by the Premerger Notification Office of the Federal Trade Commission, a change of control of a joint venture or the acquisition of control of a newly formed joint venture structured as an unincorporated entity is subject to reporting requirements. The transactions and the parties involved must meet certain size requirements to trigger the reporting requirements.

VR headset spots concussion in minutes
New Scientist, 4.27.2005

You’ve had a blow to the head, but how do you know whether you are concussed or not? The answer could be a matter of life or death, yet it takes hours of testing by professionals to know for sure. Now a virtual-reality headset is being developed that can diagnose the extent of a head injury within minutes. Non-medical personnel will use it to quickly gauge the extent of brain damage, and the system works in noisy emergency rooms, on the battlefield or at the side of a sports field. It can also pick up early signs for dementia.

Ilinois lawmakers target bad doctors
Chicago Tribune, 5.1.2005

One Illinois doctor left a woman waiting for an emergency Caesarean section while he spent time with his girlfriend. Another botched a gynecological surgery, then urged his bleeding patient not to go to the hospital. A third ignored the fetal monitor during a difficult delivery that resulted in a brain-damaged infant. Although all three were referred to state regulators for investigation, none was ever disciplined--even though all resulted in out-of-court settlements in malpractice lawsuits. Advocates for injured patients say state law sets the bar so high that some of the worst cases go unpunished. Now, in an attempt to contain the rising cost of medical malpractice insurance in Illinois, lawmakers are considering how to toughen up the regulatory system to weed out doctors who might be most prone to the kind of medical negligence that ends up in court.

HMO Profits, Enrollment Declining
HealthLeaders News, 5.2.2005

With few exceptions, HMO licenses held by health plans across the United States produced profits in 2004, although many of them generated less net income than the year before, an analysis by HealthLeaders-InterStudy finds. The trend reflects continued migration from HMOs to PPOs and self-insured accounts and significant technology investments.

Surgery tracking system at Christ mirrors airport
Cincinnati Business Courier, 5.2.2005

A new computer system allows Christ Hospital to track surgical patients from the moment they enter the lobby. Using keypads and large display monitors, the NaviCare Patient Flow System from Batesville-based Hill-Rom operates like the departures and arrivals screen at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.

Doctors see more pay for careful care

Houston Business Journal, 5.2.2005

These days, family practitioner Dr. Robert Vanzant is just doing his job when he works with diabetic patients to control blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels. But under proposed pay-for-performance initiatives, Vanzant might be eligible for a monetary bonus if he provides evidence of taking extra measures to help his diabetic patients keep their vitals in check. For example, diabetics are at risk for kidney failure, so monthly physician visits are often recommended. In the current system, a diabetic patient may or may not consistently receive an outreach call from a doctor's office to schedule a monthly appointment. And even if such a call were made, the doctor would not receive extra compensation for those efforts. But under pay-for-performance initiatives -- which vary widely from program to program -- that extra step might make the physician eligible for a financial reward.

Increase in actions filed against doctors leads to more lost licenses

Tampa Bay Business Journal, 5.2.2005

Nearly 1,000 Florida doctors -- just under 2 percent of all the doctors in the state -- faced actions from the Board of Medicine in 2004. That's more than twice the number of actions handed down by the board in 2003. The bulk of the 2004 actions were citations against doctors who fell behind in meeting requirements to stay up-to-date in their profession. Citations for failure to complete and document participation in continuing medical education -- or CME violations -- are the equivalent of a traffic ticket, said Lindsay Hodges, a spokeswoman for the medical board. Those citations accounted for about 400 of the 976 actions the board took against doctors last year.

Radiologists junking film for digital systems

South Florida Business Journal, 5.2.2005

Local emergency room patients receiving nighttime imaging tests may soon get their results from radiologists enjoying a sunny morning in Shanghai, China. A Fort Lauderdale company is creating this type of system, using an information network of digital images that's been replicated at many local hospitals. These digital systems are quickly making film images obsolete and allowing doctors to share images anywhere, from offices to laptops. A 20-doctor group called Florida United Radiology set up Information Management Systems and Support (IMSS) to build its digital network. Those radiologists, along with other participating doctors, share the image-reading responsibilities between them to get specialist input and handle the workload when facilities are understaffed.

Kaiser cuts cord between drugs, docs

San Francisco Business Times, 5.2.2005

Kaiser Permanente’s Northern California medical group has quietly adopted a revised conflict-of-interest policy intended to dramatically limit links between its physicians and vendors. The policy shift by the Permanente Medical Group affects doctors for 3.2 million Kaiser enrollees in the region. It results from concerns over real and perceived conflicts created when doctors accept gifts or compensation from pharmaceutical or biotech companies, medical-device makers and other vendors or consultants with a vested interest in Kaiser's business.

RFID Technology Developments:
Wal-Mart tagging fuels RFID market
CNET News.com, 12.22.2004

Wal-Mart Stores' top merchandise suppliers are lifting sales of radio frequency identification devices as they race to comply with a January deadline from the world's largest retailer.

Major consumer goods companies--including Gillette, Kraft Foods and Procter & Gamble--have collectively spent about $250 million on RFID tags and related equipment this year, according to a new report from AMR Research. Those companies are among the nearly 140 Wal-Mart suppliers working toward fulfilling the retailer's RFID directive. Issued last year, the directive calls for Wal-Mart's largest suppliers to attach RFID tracking "tags" on shipments sent to several Dallas-area Wal-Mart warehouses and stores.

Microsoft plans RFID software in 2006
CNET News.com, 3.8.2005

After investing significantly in technology for radio frequency identification devices, Microsoft is readying its first major product, a software package designed to help companies manage the product tagging technology. Microsoft plans early next year to release the RFID Services Platform, a "middleware" product that connects the hardware that monitors RFID signals with the business software that can make sense of the information. The product is designed for businesses that want to incorporate RFID into their own systems, as well as for other software companies that want to build a product based on Microsoft's technology. The RFID product will be built on top of Microsoft's .Net development platform.

Gartner: Get ready now for next-gen RFID tags
CNET News.com, 4.11.2005

Companies should start preparing now for next-generation RFID technology that will soon hit the shelves, according to research company Gartner. Earlier this month Intermec, Metro Group and Royal Philips Electronics said they had developed an RFID chip that complies with EPCglobal's Ultra High Frequency Electronic Product Code Class 1 Generation 2 G2 standard, sometimes referred to as UHF and G2. Impinj has also unveiled an RFID reader and tag system that conforms to the next-generation standard, and Gartner said these hardware announcements will soon be followed by many more.

Survey: Tagging tech gets to work
CNET News.com, 4.29.2005

Manufacturers in Europe and North America are finally getting turned on to radio frequency identification technology--and they're jumping rather than being pushed. According to new research from Datamonitor, manufacturing executives are keen on the tracking technology because of its merits, not because they're being forced to use it as a result of mandates from the likes of Wal-Mart Stores. The research is based on a survey of IT decision makers at 150 of the top 300 manufacturers in Europe and North America.

MRI and CT Centers Offer Doctors Way to Profit on Scans

The Wall Street Journal, 5.2.2005

Medical imaging such as MRI and CT scanning is one of health care's fastest-growing sectors. Last October, an owner of imaging centers told doctors how they could get in on the boom.

At a meeting of cardiologists, neurologists and cancer specialists in Torrance, Calif., Imaging Solutions Inc. proposed that the doctors sign a contract to send patients to one of its centers. According to documents handed out there and physicians who attended, the deal worked this way: The center would charge doctors a flat rate per scan. Then the doctors could bill insurers at the going reimbursement rate in their area. Arrangements like this are increasingly common, say some doctors, industry officials and health-care lawyers. But few doctors acknowledge taking part in them, and the scanning centers that offer them typically are reluctant to identify referring doctors. Some lawyers say the referral deals risk running afoul of federal and state laws. Others say the arrangements risk raising usage of expensive procedures at a time when U.S. medical costs already are surging.

David Brailer's Year of Living Attentively

HealthLeaders, 5.10.2005

For the past year, David Brailer, M.D., Ph. D., the national coordinator for healthcare information technology, has been speaking and gathering feedback at congressional hearings, industry conferences, hospitals and wherever else the gospel of electronic health records needed to be spread. He has spent the year "pinging," he says, or sending out ideas to see how the industry's stakeholders would react. But that year-and the phase that it represents-is about to come to a close.

New X-ray scanners can speed, sharpen diagnoses

Chicago Tribune, 5.16.2005

New X-ray machines give physicians a window inside the human body that's so clear, it promises to change the way doctors treat patients. Within a year or two, a patient whose chest pain sends him to an emergency room may get an X-ray exam that could determine, within 10 minutes, if he is in danger of a heart attack due to clogged coronary arteries.

Sen. Bill Frist:
What's next for the country's most powerful M.D.?

HealthLeaders News, 5.18.2005

Sen. William H. Frist, M.D., (R-Tenn.) says he has every intention of fulfilling his pledge to leave his powerful position behind next year. Consider that just more than a decade ago, Frist was a successful transplant surgeon, with a family name and wealth to let him try something else. His father, the late Thomas F. Frist Sr., M.D., was a co-founder of Nashville, Tenn.-based Hospital Corporation of America, along with his brother, Thomas F. Frist Jr., M.D. Another older brother, Robert, is also a physician. In 1994, Frist tried the U.S. Senate-defeating incumbent Sen. Jim Sasser (D-Tenn.)-with a promise to leave after two terms. Few would have guessed that he would be leaving as Senate majority leader and on the short list for the GOP ticket in 2008. In his Senate terms, however, he has never been far away from his black doctor's bag-which he has used on several lifesaving occasions-or from healthcare policy. HealthLeaders recently posed a few key questions to the nation's most powerful M.D.

Seven Steps: Using Marketing in Healthcare Technology Planning
HealthLeaders, 5.23.2005

In the face of ever-expanding information technology solutions, many healthcare executives continue to wrestle with how best to invest their resources and effectively manage digital applications throughout the healthcare organization. Often, decisions regarding what technologies to buy are being driven by short-term internal and external pressures rather than sound business planning and long-term vision. Given the thin margins most health systems operate within today and the high cost of IT products and solutions – both in terms of the immediate capital expenditures and the manpower resources to fully implement these solutions – it’s little wonder that many healthcare executives are cautiously evaluating going digital.

Four Reasons Not to Outsource Your Margin
HealthLeaders, 5.25.2005

Outsourcing is a growth industry in healthcare. It's estimated that at least 75 percent of all hospitals outsource at least one hospital function. The 20 largest outsourcing companies reported a combined total of 9,422 healthcare clients in 2003, up 12 percent from 2002. Studies show that housekeeping, food service and laundry top the list of hospital department management contracts, with the combined total of these contracts jumping 17 percent from 2002 to 2003. Survey results also indicate that healthcare organizations are expanding outsourcing beyond their historic areas of focus. For example, the number of hospitals with management contracts for outsourcing billing and collections and information systems increased 10.6 percent and 31 percent respectively from 2002 to 2003. Such increased interest in outsourcing has led many healthcare organizations to raise questions about outsourcing their entire revenue cycle function in the hopes of improving efficiency and performance.

Along hospitals' road to high-tech bliss, there are numerous potholes

Baltimore Business Journal, 5.30.2005

Technology advances offer hospitals a chance to make giant strides in enhancing quality and safety for patients. But as any business executive knows, the transition to new information technology is complex and fraught with peril. Some have criticized hospitals for their slowness in joining the information technology revolution, but keep in mind that a hospital's IT makeover is mind-boggling given the multiple variables in treating and caring for patients 24/7. It takes time, careful planning and a lot of money. The good news is that hospitals in Maryland are working to integrate computer technology into their ordering and distribution systems for medication and are adopting various components to create electronic medical records.

Gutcheck: Robot combined with swallowable camera could give docs a better look inside the small intestine

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 5.30.2005

The words "intestinal bug" could gain a whole new meaning if a Carnegie Mellon University engineer is successful in his efforts to develop a medical robot for examining the intestinal tract.

Metin Sitti, director of the NanoRobotics Lab, is developing a set of legs that could be incorporated into the swallowable camera-in-a-pill that has become available in the past four years for diagnosing gastrointestinal disorders in the small intestine. The capsule camera snaps thousands of pictures as it makes its way slowly through the narrow tract, carried by the wave-like peristaltic motion that moves all contents through the intestines.

Toyota Assembly Line Inspires Improvements at Hospital
Washington Post, 6.3.2005

Manufacturing giants such as General Motors Corp. and Dell Computer Corp. began stealing Toyota's model decades ago, but hospitals took much longer. Today, about a dozen are experimenting with elements of the approach, but "nobody has been bolder in what they are trying to do than Virginia Mason," said Premera Blue Cross president and chief executive H.R. Brereton "Gubby" Barlow, who is watching the effort as both an insurance executive and a patient. In an era of aging patients, costly new therapies and stingy reimbursement rates, the medical profession is searching for ways to gain a financial and performance edge. Many are turning to information technology; others are shifting more costs to patients. Here in downtown Seattle, a community accustomed to innovation, one hospital is experimenting with a total overhaul of its business philosophy, embracing a set of concepts designed in the 1950s by Taiichi Ohno. Whether making a car or a healthier patient, the approach fundamentally is about eliminating waste -- from paperwork and inventory to waiting-room delays and extraneous surgical tools.

Stents supplant surgery

Pittsburgh Business Journal, 6.6.2005

Although an increasing number of people prefer stenting over surgery, the revolution in the catheterization suite is squeezing hospitals' bottom line. The number of bypass operations in Pennsylvania was relatively constant at approximately 20,000 between 1995 and 2000, according to the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council, a state agency that tracks medical data. By 2003, the number of bypass surgeries had fallen to 15,117, partly because of the increasing popularity of heart stents. Based on sales for the first quarter of 2005, the domestic market for cardiac stents has been estimated at $3.2 billion.

Emergency rooms may strike out on their own

Washington Business Journal, 6.6.2005

Hospitals are so five minutes ago. To get patients the care they need -- and fast -- health care officials across the region are looking beyond traditional hospital campuses and considering a new hybrid: the free-standing emergency room. While many Washington-area hospitals have massive on-site expansions under way, there also has been a push by some to build free-standing facilities: Northern Virginia already is home to free-standing medical facilities run by Inova Health System. The HealthPlex in Springfield, for example, includes a full-service emergency department, surgery center, medical office building and other services. It is becoming a model for other hospitals.

Hospital's bottom line tied to surgical mistakes
Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 6.8.2005

Did the hospital where you're having that operation next week turn a profit last year? If not, the odds are higher that the medical staff will make a significant mistake during or after your surgery, according to a study published yesterday. Researchers from the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality reviewed medical errors in the files of about 1 million patients who underwent major surgery in 176 Florida hospitals between 1996 and 2000. They found that over time, a decrease in a hospital's financial profit margin leads to a higher risk for mistakes in the treatment of adult surgical patients.

Surgery's next step: face transplants
Chicago Tribune, 6.12.2005

Ethicists may find the idea unacceptable, but at least two medical centers in the U.S. are in the final phases of planning for a controversial new procedure: a face transplant. Surgeons say they are ready to remove the face of a cadaver and stitch it onto an adult who has been severely disfigured by trauma, burns or tumors. The goal is helping people who often say they are shunned by society and lead extremely unhappy lives.

State will post surgery prices

Chicago Tribune, 6.15.2005

Patients will be able to shop around more easily among health care providers before choosing where to have outpatient surgery in Illinois, under a measure Gov. Rod Blagojevich signed into law. The new law will require hospitals and surgery centers to report to the state the cost of outpatient procedures, as well as their success rates in performing them. The state will post the information on the Internet beginning in January 2007.

Moratorium on specialty hospitals expires

Dallas Business Journal, 6.20.2005

It could be described as a quiet death, which is ironic given the venom that's been spilled as the divided health care community argues over the fate of specialty hospitals. On June 8, an 18-month federal moratorium barring the opening or development of specialty hospitals expired. Large, local hospital system officials cheered the moratorium expiration, but are keeping an eye on Washington, D.C., policymakers. The expiration of the moratorium did not go unmarked. The U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued an outline of its planned actions on the topic, including what amounts to a six-month ban on any new specialty hospital openings. CMS declared that it, and its regional offices around the country, will not issue payment agreements to any new specialty hospitals, which means even if a facility were to open, it would be unable to collect payments for treating Medicare and Medicaid patients.

One group of doctors changes its ways
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette/The Wall Street Journal, 6.21.2005

The rising cost of medical-malpractice insurance has hit many doctors, especially surgeons and obstetricians. But one specialty has largely shielded itself: Anesthesiologists pay less for malpractice insurance today, in constant dollars, than they did 20 years ago. That's mainly because some anesthesiologists chose a path many doctors in other specialties did not. Rather than pushing for laws that would protect them against patient lawsuits, these anesthesiologists focused on improving patient safety. Their theory: Less harm to patients would mean fewer lawsuits. Over the past two decades, anesthesiologists have advocated the use of devices that alert doctors to potentially fatal problems in the operating room. They have helped develop computerized mannequins that simulate real-life surgical crises. And they have pressed for procedures that protect unconscious patients from potential carbon-monoxide poisoning.

`Bionic' arm brings back sense of touch
Chicago Tribune, 6.23.2005

Jesse Sullivan lost both of his arms at the shoulders, but with the help of a prosthetic hand and a set of rewired nerves, he can now feel -- and sense hot and cold -- almost as if he had real fingers. Two years ago, experts thought this advance in technology was at least a decade away. Now they see it as a leap forward in treating victims of stroke, lost limbs and paralysis.

Healthcare's strange bedfellows
HealthLeaders, 6.24.2005

The universe is held together by opposites, like mass and energy working together to keep the fabric of space from ripping apart. Healthcare holds together the same way, with competing interests keeping the system in balance, at least theoretically. So when healthcare's feuding clans start to shake hands, is that a good thing? The shifting sands of today's healthcare landscape leave various interests wondering where they stand. In at least a few cases, longtime opponents are finding that they stand together in unexpected, if uneasy, partnerships-hospital administrators and trial lawyers, drug companies and a hard-bargaining state payor, a huge health plan and its region's major hospital system. Who knows where peaceable cooperation may flare up next?

The new face of the digital hospital
HealthLeaders, 6.27.2005

Just weeks before the grand opening of Baptist Health's new "digital" hospital in Jacksonville, Fla., its chief information officer suffered a nervous breakdown. But the $90 million facility, Baptist Medical Center South, opened without a hitch in mid-February. The new hospital, which is stocked with the latest information technology, has been flooded with patients and, at last report, Senior Vice President and CIO Roland Garcia was doing fine.

Alabama hospital group saves millions with infection-tracking technology
HealthLeaders, 6.28.2005

It may be that the best way to kill hospital germs isn't with disinfectant, but with numbers.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta estimates that some 88,000 people die each year from infections they get in the hospital. Finding the sources of each one of those infections requires a sophisticated system that can track, cross-reference and analyze signals of an infection source. Until recently, the technology for such a system was unavailable in healthcare, but the Alabama Hospital Quality Initiative, now joined by 37 hospitals, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama and an Alabama-based healthcare technology company is using number crunching technology, also known as data mining, to root out deadly germs. So far, the program has saved the four hospitals that have participated for the full two years an estimated $4.96 million total, and an incalculable amount of needless patient suffering. Thirty-three Alabama hospitals have joined at various times since then, and officials expect similar savings from their participation. Meanwhile, BCBSA has saved an estimated $3 million over the same time period-savings that are expected to grow sharply as the additional hospitals are integrated into the program.

Behind the Wires:
Rural hospital in Wisconsin has IT success
HealthLeaders, 6.28.2005

At first glance, it looks as though Mike Bartman, IT Director of 36-staffed-bed Sauk Prairie Memorial Hospital & Clinics, has assembled the power elite at the rural hospital in Prairie du Sac, Wis. Flanking Bartman in the community hospital's modest library are the chief operations officer, chief financial officer, chief nursing officer, the director of acute care and the director of pharmacy. The topic of the day is which of three proposals for an automated medicine dispensing cabinet to accept.

Radiology work shifts to overnight, overseas

The Boston Globe, 6.29.2005

On many nights, detailed body scans of patients at the North Shore Medical Center in Salem zip through Internet lines to a suburban Minneapolis office. From there, they might be rerouted to Texas or California, or to France, China, or India, where doctors study the images for signs of disease. More than two dozen other medical institutions in Massachusetts send their CAT, MRI, and X-ray scans to doctors in other states or foreign countries who often render crucial medical judgments. To many local hospitals, these so-called ''nighthawk" radiology services are godsends, a global solution to a local problem: a rapidly increasing demand for patient scans, but a shortage of trained radiologists to analyze them. Doctors in other time zones analyze the scans while radiologists here sleep. Often, emergency room doctors on the night shift treat patients based on these far-off diagnoses. Some local radiologists said the volume of work would overwhelm their practices if nighthawk services were not available.

Harvard project to scan millions of medical files
The Boston Globe, 7.3.2005

Harvard scientists are building a powerful computer system that will use artificial intelligence to scan the private medical files of 2.5 million people at local hospitals, as part of a government-funded effort to find the genetic roots of asthma and other diseases. The $20 million project -- which would probe more deeply and more quickly into medical records than human researchers are capable of -- is designed to find links between patients' DNA and illnesses. Although the effort could raise concerns about privacy, researchers say the new program, called ''I2B2" (for ''Informatics for Integrating Biology and the Bedside") would respect the strict guidelines set out in federal and state laws, and could be a powerful tool for many kinds of research.

Video Robots Redefine 'TV Doctor'
The Washington Post, 7.6.2005

Robot-assisted exchanges are being repeated in dozens of hospitals across the country by doctors who use the machines to make their rounds, monitor intensive-care units, respond to emergency calls and consult with other physicians. Proponents say this and other new "telemedicine" technologies are allowing doctors to use their time more efficiently and serve more patients, often at odd hours or in remote places where the sick would otherwise have a hard time seeing a doctor.

Baptist puts $50M in paperless system
Memphis Business Journal, 7.11.2005

Baptist Memorial Health Care Corp. will spend up to $50 million in the next four years to convert six hospitals to a near-paperless environment. The system will integrate all aspects of patient care, as well as inventory, scheduling and billing into a single system which is dubbed as Baptist CD: Clinical Documentation. It will allow, for example, a physician to call up patient information in real time from home, reorder supplies as they are consumed and automatically check each drug before it is administered. If a medication is too early, or incompatible with a recent lab test, the system will automatically warn the nurse.

Supersized health care
Atlanta Business Chronicle, 7.11.2005

Bigger beds, supersized stretchers and double-wide wheelchairs are becoming more common at Atlanta hospitals. As the nation's weight problem balloons, hospitals are stretching to care for heavier patients that require special gear and extra attention -- often at a higher cost and a greater strain on hospital employees. Many hospitals are furnished with standard hospital beds built for patients up to 350 pounds, so they typically have to rent bigger beds or special mattress pads to accommodate larger patients. Although many of the expenses are reimbursed by insurance, hospitals still bear much of the cost of accommodating the obese, said hospital officials.

FDA halts expansion of network to monitor medical device safety
The Boston Globe, 7.14.2005

Despite its plans to closely monitor deadly malfunctions and misuses of medical devices through a new computer reporting system, the Food and Drug Administration has frozen the project in place well short of its goal of connecting 500 hospitals. The system, known as MedSun, allows doctors nationwide to directly report to the FDA problems with pacemakers, stents, and defibrillators. The FDA had aimed to connect 500 of the nation's 5,000 eligible hospitals, but is stuck at 350 and won't fund further expansion for the next several years. That means more doctors are using an older system, through which they report problems to manufacturers, who then notify regulators. Some fear the process allows device makers to downplay bad news to the FDA.

CEO's guide to winning physician relations
HealthLeaders, 7.15.2005

Of all the relationships that a hospital's senior leadership must massage, finding successful partnerships with physicians requires perhaps the most creativity, risk and effort. The American College of Healthcare Executives asks hospital CEOs for their top three concerns in its annual survey, and physician/hospital relations are quickly moving up the priority list. In 2002, 21 percent of CEOs said the issue was one of their top three concerns. By 2004, the share had grown to 32 percent. Because their economic futures are inextricably entwined with those of their medical staffs, hospital CEOs say cooperation is inevitable. Moreover, hospitals are using a number of strategies to build better relationships with their physicians, such as including them in decision-making, helping them become more efficient and productive, and increasing their revenue streams. In the give-and-take relationship, however, both sides have offered precious little give until recently. But the success stories share in common a willingness to release old notions about how doctors and hospitals should work.

Disruptive Physicians Pose Compliance Problems, Risks for Hospitals
Report on Medicare Compliance, 5.9.2005

The occasional obnoxious, egomaniacal physician can cause risk management and compliance problems for hospitals, which should take steps to prevent and address them, one expert says — especially because 60% of adverse medical events are traceable to out-of-control physicians. Disruptive physicians are "a breeding ground for major problems for hospitals from the standpoint of staff relations, patient care, false claims, criminal actions because of misrepresentations in certification" and malpractice liability, says Philadelphia attorney Mike Mustokoff.

Five Ways to Make Sure Your HIPAA Privacy Compliance Remains Effective
Report on Patient Privacy, 6.1.2005

No amount of preparation is likely to insulate your organization from the damage that can be done by disgruntled employees who post protected health information (PHI) on a Web site, or thugs who break into your facility at night to steal personal information. No matter how hard you try, you could someday face one of these types of privacy-related PR nightmares. But if you've taken regular measures to monitor and refocus your compliance, investigators, prosecutors, judges and juries are likely to reward your good-faith efforts.

Drug Reps Are Restricted by HIPAA Privacy Rules
Report on Patient Privacy, 7.1.2005

Before the privacy rule went into effect, well-groomed, attractive men and women with bright smiles would meander into the offices of Cardiology Associates, P.C., of Tennessee, peddling statins, cholesterol medications and clot-stopping drugs. They'd come at any time, on any workday, hoping to chat with one of the group's 26 physicians and 15 non-physician practitioners, perhaps politely cornering them as they moved between patient rooms. Not anymore. Today drug reps are welcome on only specified days of the week, and must first sign in before being escorted to the supply closets at the group's three locations.

Q&A: HealthSouth in the rear view mirror
HealthLeaders, 7.18.2005

Guy Sansone didn't know exactly what to expect when he rolled into Birmingham, Ala., in March 2003 as the interim CFO of HealthSouth Corp. He was ready for the worst, and he got it. More than a dozen former executives, including chairman and CEO Richard Scrushy, have resigned. Five former CFOs have since pleaded guilty to fraud. The company's leadership, it was later revealed, overstated profits by about $2.7 billion between 1996 and 2002. Meanwhile, no one knew the extent of that overstatement: The books said the company was sitting on $600 million in cash but the reality was closer to $117 million. Sansone was tasked with crisis management as well as figuring out whether there was a sound business underneath all the lies. When this veteran turnaround expert at New York-based Alvarez & Marsal LLC turned over the reins to permanent CFO John Workman in September 2004, it was clear that despite the problems, the company was much stronger than anyone, including Sansone, had dared to hope. Though not fully recovered from the taint of fraud, today HealthSouth is moving past the scandal with Workman and new president and CEO Jay Grinney at the helm. Profit for 2004 was more than $643 million, slightly more than expected. Sansone says his crisis management skills helped convince a ravenous band of creditors that the troubled rehab center and hospital owner could be salvaged.

Bad Practices Net Hospitals More Money
Washington Post, 7.24.2005

As far back as 1999, federal and state regulators began to receive complaints that the heart surgery unit at Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center in Florida was a breeding ground for germs. Dust and dirt covered some surgical equipment. Trash cans and soiled linens were stored in hallways. IV pumps were spattered with dried blood. One patient's wife said she saw a medical assistant tear surgical tape with his teeth. State inspectors in 2002 found "massive post operative infections" in the heart unit, requiring patients to undergo more surgery and lengthy hospital stays. In a four-year period, 106 heart patients at Palm Beach Gardens developed infections after surgery, according to lawsuits and government records. More than two dozen were readmitted with fevers, pneumonia and serious blood infections. The lawsuits included 16 patients who died. How did Medicare, the federal health insurance program for the elderly, respond? It paid Palm Beach Gardens more. Under Medicare's rules, each time a patient comes back for another treatment, a hospital qualifies for an additional payment. In effect, Palm Beach Gardens was paid a bonus for its mistakes.

Experts Disagree on Staying Power of Pay-for-Performance Programs
Managed Care Week, 7.25.2005

Several health insurers have launched new pay-for-performance (P4P) programs and are continuing to invest in existing ones. Despite that, some analysts have dismissed the initiatives as a short-lived trend driven primarily by employee consulting firms. Others, however, contend that the programs will continue to proliferate, as public and private payers and enrollees themselves push for more health quality and cost information. P4P programs are intended to improve quality of care and reduce costs by using financial and other incentives to encourage physicians and hospitals to change practice patterns and other behaviors.

Hospitals study when to apologize to patients
The Boston Globe, 7.24.2005

Harvard Medical School's major teaching hospitals are considering adopting a sweeping disclosure policy that would establish detailed procedures for physicians to openly acknowledge medical errors and other bad results to their patients, and provide for training in apologizing.

If Harvard's largest teaching hospitals -- Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and Children's Hospital Boston -- adopt the policy, it would create a uniform response across the Harvard system to some of medicine's most difficult situations. The Harvard hospitals also would join a growing number of US medical centers and malpractice insurers that are embracing immediate and open disclosure and apology to patients when medical care goes wrong.

Once Health Regulators, Now Partners
Washington Post, 7.26.2005

There’s a little-known network of private contractors called Quality Improvement Organizations, or QIOs. Each year, Medicare pays nearly $300 million to 53 businesses such as Indiana-based Health Care Excel to measure quality, work with hospitals and doctors to improve care, and investigate patient complaints. By law, QIOs, which are dominated by doctors and health executives, operate in secrecy with little oversight or accountability. Consumers say they are difficult to contact and rarely uphold complaints. At the same time, the number of sanctions QIOs recommend against doctors each year has dwindled from hundreds to a few. Today, QIOs are also leading proponents of a new brand of regulation that favors cooperation over discipline. QIOs increasingly view themselves not as regulators but as partners of hospitals, nursing homes and doctors, working to improve care. Some have leveraged their positions to become highly profitable businesses, paying generous salaries and perks to executives and board members.

Essay: Learning Words They Rarely Teach in Medical School: 'I'm Sorry'
The New York Times, 7.26.2005

There is nothing in the Hippocratic Oath that tells doctors what to do when they make a mistake with a patient. Nor is there much on this subject in medical school curriculums or in residency training programs. But there should be.

Plan Would Compile, Analyze Medical Errors
Washington Post, 7.29.2005

Nearly six years after the nation's most prestigious body of medical researchers reported that as many as 100,000 Americans die each year from medical mistakes, Congress this week passed long-debated legislation aimed at improving patient safety. The measure -- which was approved by the Senate last week and the House on Wednesday and now goes to President Bush -- would create a network for reporting and analyzing medical errors, with a goal of reducing future mistakes. Currently, 23 states have systems for collecting reports of mistakes, all but one of them mandatory. Hospitals and health providers have argued against mandatory reporting, contending that a voluntary system would be more effective at getting doctors and hospitals to participate. Under the new plan, hospitals would be encouraged to report their mistakes confidentially to groups that will be known as patient safety organizations. The groups could then contract with the hospitals to analyze their mistakes and develop ways to prevent errors. The federal government would play the role of coordinator, developing the computer network used by the safety groups to collect and analyze the data. The estimated federal cost over five years is $60 million.

Medical error law signed
Chicago Tribune, 7.30.2005

President Bush Friday signed into law legislation to reduce medical errors by encouraging medical care providers to report mistakes without the risk of the information being used against them in lawsuits. Doctors, hospitals and nurses say a significant hurdle to reporting such errors has been fear that such information would be used against them--leading to abysmal reporting of errors to the government or to non-profit health groups that collect such data. Error reporting is still voluntary under the new law, which has no federal penalties for failing to provide information.

Hospitals and Consumer-Driven Healthcare: Five Marketing Moves
HealthLeaders, 7.29.2005

Consumer-driven healthcare is a hot topic these days, but there are many misconceptions about what it actually is. To adequately plan for future initiatives, hospital executives need to have a firm understanding of the concept.

As Their Use Soars, Heart Implants Raise Questions
The New York Times, 8.2.2005

A little-known heart device, an implantable defibrillator, has been under a spotlight after the recent disclosure that a producer, the Guidant Corporation, did not tell doctors for years that one of its models had a defect that could render it useless. But well before that, medical experts had been increasingly debating other aspects of the device, namely its benefits and its costs.

New cleaning process reduces hospital risk of vCJD
Reuters via Yahoo, 8.3.2005

A new cleaning process can reduce the risk of hospital transmission of the human form of mad cow disease, scientists said. Doctors have been concerned that variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) could be transmitted by contaminated surgical equipment, since standard sterilizing procedures do not destroy the abnormal prion proteins that cause the illness. The new cleaning technique, which is described in the Journal of General Virology, could also be used to reduce infection risk from all forms of human prion diseases – progressive brain wasting illnesses for which there is no cure.

Hanging on a Hit; Company's Stent Is a Superstar, but What About an Encore?
The New York Times, 8.9.2005

Few companies have ever enjoyed a product success like Boston Scientific did when it introduced its Taxus stent to the American market 16 months ago. Taxus blew by records for a new health care product -- even such high-profile drugs as Viagra -- topping $2 billion in domestic sales in its first year. And the stent, a tiny drug-coated metal sleeve inserted into arteries near the heart to keep them open after doctors remove blockages, is unusually lucrative for a medical device, generating profit margins of more than 90 percent. But Taxus has proved to be a decidedly mixed blessing for Boston Scientific. It has transformed the company from one known for a broad but obscure array of medical devices into a cash-rich powerhouse -- but one dependent on a single high-profile product for more than half its earnings.

Hospital's design a healthy start

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8.7.2005

Most patients won't give any thought to the windows at the new St. Joseph's Hospital, but they could be healthier for them. The windows - in most hospitals, a breeding ground for germs - were designed to lessen the risk of infection, one of the hazards of being hospitalized. The blinds, as difficult to clean in a hospital as a home, are enclosed in the window panes. The hospital's designers also put heating vents above the windows to reduce the condensation that lets germs thrive. The windows are just one of dozens of features that make the new hospital safer by design. But that kind of detail is why St. Joseph's Hospital has attracted national and even international attention. The small, 80-bed hospital, which opened Sunday, is being praised as a model for how design can reduce medical errors and improve the quality of health care.

Claims say Jewish Hospital caused infections
The Louisville Courier-Journal, 8.9.2005

Ten former patients and the estate of an 11th have sued Jewish Hospital, claiming they developed serious infections because of unsanitary conditions at the hospital. The cases bring to 69 the number of suits that attorney Joseph White has filed since late 2003 claiming people have contracted various infections that resist treatment with common antibiotics.

Technology aids tracking of patients

Kansas City Star, 8.11.2005

When disaster strikes, communities can be sent into disorder trying to keep track of the injured. But this fall, the Kansas City area expects to be among the first in the nation to tackle the problem with an electronic tracking system. The system is to be launched — perhaps as early as October — in the eight Missouri and Kansas counties covered by the Mid-America council. Using neck tags with bar-code technology, the new system will track the location and medical status of all patients through a central database. The system can be used for major disasters or for confusing scenes.

N.C. Patients Discuss Surgical-Tool Fiasco

Associated Press via Yahoo, 8.12.2005

Patients whose surgeons unknowingly used instruments washed in hydraulic fluid instead of detergent held their first group meeting, sharing stories of delayed recoveries and distrust of their doctors. About 50 people attended the meeting, organized by a freelance medical writer who was among 3,800 patients to undergo surgery with instruments washed in the fluid in late 2004 at two hospitals owned by Duke University Health System.

Imaging companies aim to make worth clear

The Boston Globe, 8.15.2005

Medical imaging companies want to give regulators a clearer picture of their work. Stung by criticism from insurers and hospitals that costs are out of control for magnetic-resonance imaging and other scans, equipment makers including Siemens Medical Solutions USA Inc. and Philips Medical Systems of Andover are fighting back, saying that the techniques pay off in better healthcare overall.

In the Hospital, a Degrading Shift From Person to Patient

The New York Times, 8.16.2005

Entering the medical system, whether a hospital, a nursing home or a clinic, is often degrading. The small courtesies that help lubricate and dignify civil society are neglected precisely when they are needed most, when people are feeling acutely cut off from others and betrayed by their own bodies. Larger trends in medicine have made it increasingly difficult to deliver such social niceties, experts say. Many hospital budgets are tight, and nurses are spread thin: shortages are running at 15 percent to 20 percent in some areas of the country. Average hospital stays have also shortened in recent years, making it harder for patients to build any rapport with staff, or vice versa. Some hospitals have worked to address patients' most serious grievances. But in interviews and surveys, people who have recently received medical care say that even when they benefit from the expertise of first-rate doctors, they often feel resentful, helpless and dehumanized in the process.

Building a Lean Healthcare Business
HealthLeaders, 8.17.2005

American hospitals are making little significant improvement in cost, quality and safety of care despite efforts by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement and others. A recent report by the HHS Office of the Inspector General finds that 20 percent of consecutive inpatient stay sequences were associated with poor quality care, unnecessary fragmentation of care, or both. The current organization and management of hospitals is a broken system that cannot effectively address these issues. We have continued to believe that we can keep doing the same thing and expect a different outcome.

Wired hospitals help staff, soothe patients

The Detroit News, 8.17.2005

When first-time parents learn to swaddle, bathe and burp their new babies at Huron Valley-Sinai Hospital, the lessons don't come from a nurse. Instead, instructions are beamed to their bedside through a flat-screen monitor hovering over their hospital bed. The device, among other things, can link patients to the World Wide Web, call up X-rays and other medical data and stream in a host of customized videos and tip sheets.

Science of tiny generates big developments

Baltimore Sun, 8.17.2005

For the past decade, nanotechnology has been a key to developing super-strong materials, such as carbon tubes, that are expected to lead to high-performance clothing, microchips and satellites. But at the two-day conference that ended yesterday, scientists from around the world praised nanoparticles as important tools for delivering drugs to diseased tissues and creating imaging techniques that make it easier to detect cancer and other ailments. While therapies using nanoparticles are still years from approval, a number are being tested in clinical trials.

Insurer Reveals What Doctors Really Charge
The Wall Street Journal, 8.18.2005

The growing effort to enlist consumers in reducing health-care costs has been stymied by the fact that most people just don't know what medical care costs. Private and government health coverage has helped shield them from bills. And even with newer consumer-driven plans that employ Health Savings Accounts, which give people more of a financial stake in the issue, pricing information can be hard to come by.

M.R.I.'s Strong Magnets Cited in Accidents
The New York Times, 8.19.2005

The pictures and stories are the stuff of slapstick: wheelchairs, gurneys and even floor polishers jammed deep inside M.R.I. scanners whose powerful magnets grabbed them from the hands of careless hospital workers. The police officer whose pistol flew out of his holster and shot a wall as it hit the magnet. The sprinkler repairman whose acetylene tank was yanked inside, breaking its valve and starting a fire that razed the building. But the bigger picture is anything but funny, medical safety experts say. As the number of magnetic resonance imaging scanners in the country has soared from a handful in 1980 to about 10,000 today, and as magnets have quadrupled in power, careless accidents have become more frequent. Some have caused serious injuries and even death. No one knows how many have occurred. But the safety experts say there is no doubt they are on the rise, and their growing frequency is prompting widespread calls for more regulation.

Physicians as Retailers: Banking on Convergence
HealthLeaders, 8.19.2005

A funny thing happened to healthcare on the way to the bank: Common interests of banks, HSAs, high-deductible consumer plans, information technologies and physicians converged. Doctors realized electronic records would allow them to be paid promptly, completely and reliably at the point of care, through cash or credit, debit or smart cards, just as with any other retail transaction. Banks realized they could market and serve as repositories for HSA funds. Consumer-driven plans realized banks could serve as powerful marketing and claims processing partners. Suddenly everyone knew that a new era -- with physicians as retailers with lower practice overhead; quicker, more transparent transactions; satisfied and more informed consumers; and efficient payment of physicians in their offices -- was at hand.

Hospitals beef up their security measures
HealthLeaders, 8.24.2005

When people posing as JCAHO inspectors gained entry into three hospitals in Boston, Detroit and Los Angeles last spring, alarm bells belatedly sounded for hospital leaders. While the imposters' identities and motives remain unknown, their actions underscored a tricky balance hospitals must strike. How do you keep out unwanted visitors -- whether they be fake JCAHO inspectors, gang members, thieves scoping for purses or drugs, or even terrorists-without turning your facility into a defensive Fort Knox for the patients and families you're serving?

Health group's triage: safety first
The Indianapolis Star, 9.14.2005

In hospitals, simple oversights can be fatal. A heart attack victim might not get an aspirin early enough. Or a doctor might prescribe a medication that could have a dangerous reaction with another drug the patient is taking. The Indiana Hospital & Health Association on Tuesday detailed its plan to avoid such errors and improve patient safety at hospitals across the state. The group also said it intends to lead the development of a mandatory system for hospitals to report medical errors to the Indiana State Department of Health.

Healing by design: New hospitals create places that improve patient outcomes
The Business Journal of Milwaukee, 9.19.2005

Hospital design has come a long way from years ago, when floor plans were based on where the doctors gather. In the traditional hospital, space was arranged by department and specialty: radiology was one department, nuclear medicine another. It was up to patients to find their way around from one service to the next -- often guided by multi-colored tape along the floors. Today, architects and health care planners say, design is focusing more on creating an environment that's conducive to healing. That means surroundings that soothe patient anxiety; reduce stress levels for physicians and staff; bring in more natural light; guard patient dignity and privacy; minimize the spread of infection and improve patient safety.

Gainsharing dusts off
HealthLeaders, 8.25.2005

Give it enough time, and the old becomes new again in healthcare. Never has that saying held more truth than with gainsharing, which is making a return to respectability after recent government decisions. The practice is now back on hospital administrators' radar screens following the issuance of six advisory opinions in February by the Department of Health & Human Services Office of the Inspector General. The opinions-involving cardiology and cardiovascular services at four hospitals-made it possible for the facilities to reward physicians financially for helping achieve cost reductions. Since then, hospital executives have been evaluating the merits and legal nuances of gainsharing and are beginning to develop arrangements similar to the ones approved in the advisory opinions.

Hospitals must beat the bugs
New York Daily News, 9.23.2005

If you think you may have to go into the hospital soon, keep reading. A new report highlights one of the gravest dangers you'll face - the risk of getting a hospital infection that antibiotics cannot cure. The report, in the medical journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, raises alarms about the growing number of hospital bugs that can kill you because they are resistant to antibiotics. How big is your risk? In the U.S., one out of every 20 hospital patients gets an infection. An estimated 103,000 people die from hospital infections every year. These infections are almost all preventable.

Broadlane gets in the fast lane for growth
San Francisco Business Times, 9.26.2005

San Francisco's fast-growing Broadlane Inc. is taking a broad swipe at handling group purchasing and related chores for hospitals and doctors nationwide, and expects to parlay that into more than $170 million in revenue this year. That's 37 percent more than 2004's total of $124 million, and triple the total three years ago. "I don't see anything different. Growth this year should be consistent," said CEO Charles Saunders, M.D.

Rethinking supply chain management
HealthLeaders, 8.26.2005

Yesterday, maybe you bought a new box of Band-Aids only to find a nearly full box in the cabinet as you put them away. Or you could have sworn you had a new bottle of aspirin. Those flubs might cause seconds of frustration and cost you a few bucks. But translate that slack accounting for supplies into a business behemoth like a hospital, which orders thousands of items per month ranging from cheap latex gloves to expensive surgical supplies, and those nickel-and-dime inefficiencies grow quickly to thousands of lost dollars.

Hospitals, insurers mull spending more on digital mammograms
The Business Journal Serving the Greater Triad Area, 10.3.2005

A major national study has helped validate the choices of two Triad hospitals to invest in digital mammography equipment, and is prompting some insurance companies to reconsider how they reimburse for the procedure. However, several doctors say that although digital mammography will likely become more common in the next few years, for the time being traditional film mammographies will remain the most widely used procedure. At stake is not only the health of tens of thousands of Triad women, but also the precarious finances of mammography, a critical screening tool that radiologists and hospitals say is, at best, a break-even proposition.

Getting your health care at Wal-Mart
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette/The Wall Street Journal, 10.5.2005

Americans can increasingly get basic medical care in the same place they buy toothpaste and light bulbs. In a development that has broad implications for the nation's primary-care system, a rising number of major pharmacy and retail chains -- including CVS Corp., Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Target Corp. -- are opening in-store health clinics. They offer patients fast access to routine medical services such as strep-throat tests, sports physicals and flu shots. The clinics, which typically charge between $25 and $60 per visit, don't require an appointment and are open during pharmacy hours including evenings and weekends. To keep costs down, they are staffed by nurse practitioners, who can legally treat patients and write prescriptions in most states.

Emerging Technology: Hospitals turn to RFID
HealthLeaders, 8.26.2005

Despite its potential, RFID has been slow in coming to healthcare, says Luis Taveras, a partner with the health and life sciences division of New York-based Accenture. Lack of awareness has worked against RFID, he says. In addition, RFID implementations can be costly, particularly if a hospital lacks the wireless infrastructure needed to support far-flung applications, such as equipment tracking.

The Quality of Care Chasm: 10 Questions Hospital Executives Should Be Asking
HealthLeaders, 8.31.2005

Finally, in the healthcare industry, we have the marriage of quality performance and financial reward. Or at least we have the courtship. The fairly recent decision/announcement by CMS to more favorably compensate hospitals and health organizations based on their outcomes data is no small thing. At the very least, it represents an attempt to incentivize healthcare providers to improve the caliber of patient care and increase patient safety. Who can argue with that reasoning? No one. At least not in good conscience.

Minimally invasive is becoming a standard operating procedure
Minneapolis Star-Tribune, 10.12.2005

At St. Joseph's Hospital in St. Paul, patients having their kidney stones removed go home after a night's stay instead of three. At Robbinsdale's North Memorial, hysterectomy surgery patients are home within a day and recover in days rather than weeks. It's all thanks to minimally invasive surgery, in which surgeons manipulate slender instruments through tiny incisions. It's a trend that doctors and patients have embraced as a medical breakthrough worthy of a Star Trek sick bay.

Stent maker to offer free replacements
The Boston Globe, 10.14.2005

Battling to keep its share of one of the world's largest medical-device market, Boston Scientific Corp., said that it would provide a free new Taxus coronary stent to any hospital treating a patient whose artery clogs around the device. Starting in January, if a patient requires a procedure to reopen an artery within 12 months of having a Taxus stent put in, the company will provide the hospital with a free replacement, the Natick device-maker said.

ASCs vs. hospitals: Whose side is Medicare's payment system on?
HealthLeaders, 9.19.2005

Like a suitor hoping to make a good impression, the ambulatory surgery center industry used a study to softly coo into the federal government's collective ear earlier this year. The nature of the flirting: If certain surgical procedures were to be performed in ASCs rather than hospital outpatient departments, Medicare could save more than $1 billion a year.

Doctor writes book on HealthSouth
The Birmingham News, 10.14.2005

An Indiana physician whose surgical center once partnered with HealthSouth Corp. has penned a book about the company under former Chief Executive Richard Scrushy and the online community that arose amid a federal accounting fraud investigation. In "Going South," Dr. William Cast attempts to provide an insider's view of HealthSouth and "the real story of the man and the company he created and controlled." It will be released Dec. 1 in bookstores by Dearborn Trade Publishing, a division of Kaplan Professional Co. that specializes in business publishing. The price is $25.95.

Plasma TVs with Internet access: In a hospital room?
Orlando Business Journal, 10.17.2005

Next month, Florida Hospital will break ground on its new $250 million, 240-bed patient tower in downtown Orlando. And once it's done in 2008, look for patients to start clamoring for the facility's comfortable, high-tech, private rooms. Indeed, the hospital has spent almost two years coming up with the best possible design for patient rooms meant to coddle patients and their families, as well as to bring smiles to nurses and hospital cleaning crews.

Emerging Technology: The patient-accessible EMR
HealthLeaders, 9.19.2005

Welcome to the world of the high-tech doctor-patient relationship. Their EMR installations behind them, growing numbers of hospitals and medical groups are taking the next logical-though controversial-step of granting their patients online access. Often combining chart access with other services, such as appointment and referral requests, such portals are gaining wide popularity among patients. Using sites like these, patients can access information that's otherwise difficult to obtain. Likewise, physician champions of online records access-dismissing fears of patient misuse-contend that the systems enhance the doctor-patient relationship.

Repeated Defect in Heart Devices Exposes a History of Problems
The New York Times, 10.20.2005

The sudden death by cardiac arrest of a 21-year-old student who suffered from a genetic heart disease set off a series of events that would expose flaws in how producers of critical heart devices disclose defects to doctors and patients. It also would reveal that the Food and Drug Administration's oversight of the fast-growing heart device industry is, at best, loose.

Hospitals rework their disaster plans
USA Today, 10.21.2005

For emergency planners, Hurricane Katrina challenged a long-held assumption: that help will arrive within 24 to 48 hours. After the rescues of patients from New Orleans in the wake of Katrina — and the widespread evacuations before Rita — medical centers are beefing up their disaster plans.

Room design with IT in mind
HealthLeaders, 10.18.2005

In planning for advanced information technology, Thomas Tinstman, M.D., likes to ask questions nobody else does. It's why Tinstman, executive director of clinical information systems at UC Davis Health System, spearheaded a nine-month planning effort prior to the implementation—now under way—of a suite of clinical documentation technologies. He wanted to know how a picture archiving system and electronic medical record package would fit in with clinician workflows at the Sacramento, Calif.-based acute-care hospital and its 45 primary-care and specialty physician clinics. Moreover, Tinstman wanted to know which access devices would mesh best with the inpatient and outpatient settings.

Doctors study risk of clots in new stents
The Boston Globe, 10.21.2005

With drug-eluting coronary stents implanted in more than 2 million people worldwide, some doctors and researchers are now concerned about a long-term problem they see in a small number of patients who have received stents: blood clots inside the stents themselves. Although the rate of serious clotting is extremely low, with manufacturers reporting just a handful of clots in more than 1,500 patients they are following, the cases concern doctors because clots nearly always cause heart attacks or death.

Around the Nation Archives
2004 ● 2006 ● 2007

Lawsuit: Surgical robot is defective Sacramento Business Journal 1.3.2005

Micromachine grows its own muscles New Scientist, 1.17.2005