Veria Living, which provides a multiplatform approach to health and wellness information, has acquired dLife, which provides information and a social community for patients with diabetes.
Cloud-based EHR provider Kareo has raised about $30 million to bring its free core application to more physicians. Kareo makes money by selling add-on capabilities.
A perspective in the New England Journal of Medicine points out that although the Medicare physician value-based purchasing program starts this year, doctors generally are unprepared and unengaged and there are more issues with this program than the comparable one for hospitals, including a lack of predecessor programs, sample size and measure issues and reward/penalty design.
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1311957
Jan232014
Research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds that severely obese patients who underwent bariatric surgery generally had significant weight loss in the three years following surgery, but other outcomes related to diabetes, blood pressure and lipids were more variable.
According to a study in the New England Journal of Medicine, eating more nuts is correlated with a lower risk of total and cause-specific mortality, so go nuts on nuts!!
A study in the journal Stress and Health finds that people with private or no insurance had lower levels of psychological stress than those with public coverage like Medicare or Medicaid and people with a change in insurance coverage status in the last year also had higher levels of stress, but the relationship is modest, and other factors likely play a larger role in an individual's stress level.
According to a Markets and Markets report, the health care data analytics products and services industry will have over $21 billion in global sales in 2020.
A British Medical Journal study finds extensive variation in charges for normal and Caesarean baby deliveries in California hospitals, from $3296 to $37227 for normal, and $8312 to $70908 for Caesarean, with no apparent differences in quality or services provided during the delivery.
The Centers for Disease Control released a report on usage of electronic medical records by physicians, finding that 78.4% of physicians have some kind of EHR in 2013, up from 51% in 2010, but only 48.1% are using a "basic" system, one that would support meaningful use requirements.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db143.pdf
Jan212014
HealthSmart, a diversified health benefits administration company, has acquired Benefit Management Systems, a Mississippi-based TPA.
According to the Patient Centered Primary Care Consortium implementing a medical home has astounding benefits, including reductions in cost, better health outcomes and higher patient satisfaction. The Group published its annual report of the state of the evidence on the benefits of medical homes, which unfortunately contains methodological issues too numerous to detail.
The Healthy Skeptic is a website about the health care system, and is written by Kevin Roche, who has many years of experience working in the health industry. Mr. Roche is available to assist health care companies through consulting arrangements through Roche Consulting, LLC and may be reached at khroche@healthy-skeptic.com.
The Healthy Skeptic is a website about the health care system, and is written by Kevin Roche, who has many years of experience working in the health industry. Mr. Roche is available to assist health care companies through consulting arrangements through Roche Consulting, LLC and may be reached at khroche@healthy-skeptic.com.
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