Healthcare CIOs -> Don’t sleep on ‘low code’

Healthcare has often been the victim of hyped-up technology, so it’s no surprise that CIOs are wary of new trends. Welcome to the buzz surrounding low-code software.

Low code offers the potential to facilitate the development of solutions by using a graphical user interface instead of the traditional approach of relying on hand-coded programming, thus requiring little to no coding to build applications and processes.

This more visual approach to software development is on the rise, particularly after a Gartner prediction that low-code application development would represent about 65% of application development…

Allscripts Q1 Analysis

• Pickup of 2 hospitals and one medical group practice on the sunrise EMR platform
• 6 Ambulatory business pick up
• Veradigm analytics platform has to be their core investment as Allscripts picked up 2 new health plan clients.
• Microsoft Azure partnership is also helping as Allscripts is pushing the EMR hosting and analytics platform to Azure pushing healthcare organizations towards the power of cloud solutions.
• Potential deeper discussion with Microsoft on the massive data from Allscripts on payer, pharma, ambulatory, and inpatient as a close loop ecosystem for research.
• Huge potential in the Ad business still especially with…

Vaccine Passport

A vaccine passport is a Covid19 immunization proof for individuals. It could be in the form of a smartphone app or a written card that we have received with many individuals trying to laminate the card.

New York and San Francisco

New York was the first to issue a digital vaccine passport using IBM’s Excelsior Pass app. Brooklyn Nets and New York Rangers hockey tested the app at a game last month.

Do you want to attend a San Francisco Giants game? The stadium now requires proof of vaccination or a 72-hours-old (or less) negative COVID test result…

Healthcare thoughts of the week!

Organizational DNA

We agree that speed and getting things done quickly has not occurred historically in the healthcare provider sector. Prominent tech CEOs have thrown out comments such as organizations have seen two years’ worth of transformation in 2 months during the pandemic.

It is not about buying the latest technology, but the organization’s DNA must be technology savvy at the leadership level. We have all heard about the Domino pizza use case where they transformed from a pizza company’s DNA to a technology company, and it shows in their stock.

Amazon forges ahead with its health care solution for its employees, now opening that up to other patients in other states. Currently, Amazon care is only available in the Seattle, Washington area (https://amazon.care), but Amazon care is looking to expand in 17 different states.

Digital health “blank check” or “shell” companies are everywhere. 2021 have so far generated 137+ SPACs, raising over $42 billion. Some of the healthcare SPACS generating attention are:

• BFFL (Butterfly Network), a mobile “whole-body imaging” device.
• CLOV (Clover Health) is selling Medicare Advantage plans, focusing on customer experience and leveraging technology (ML, AI, etc.) …

Here is the hottest news related to healthcare IT for the week.

What’s up with Intelerad?

• Intelerad made three acquisitions in six months, most recently with Lumedx, leading cardiovascular information systems (CVIS). This acquisition will lead to major academic medical centers and large non-profit health systems using legacy PACS products. The timing is perfect as many organizations are at their 5–7 year lifespan with PACS and are exploring alternatives.
• The challenge for Intelerad is will they pitch that their solutions all integrate or keep them as separate standalone.

Jeopardy winner is shutting down.

• IBM Corp. is offloading its Watson Health…

2020 was a nightmare of a year for healthcare providers. But it was also a year for information technology to prove its worth to healthcare organizations.

As the pandemic struck, healthcare delivery and patient encounters made a rapid right turn to virtual encounters. Analytics came to the forefront, enabling organizations to see trends in advance and detect whether COVID-19 patients could be transferred or had demographics, vital signs, or comorbidities that signaled potential problems. Digital records were shared as patients moved to different care venues.

Healthcare IT aside, the months ahead will be challenging, and IT execs will still have…

Surprise Bill for “out of network” Services

December 22, 2020, Congress passed a government funding deal, which includes a long-awaited federal fix for “surprise billing.” Most of the new requirements take effect with plan years beginning January 1, 2022

The new law ensures that patients receiving services in a hospital ED, or standalone ED

• Must assume the same cost-sharing responsibility for such services, regardless of whether the provider is in-network.
• Receive credit towards any applicable in-network deductible or out-of-pocket maximums for these payments.

Providers and payers will be able to resolve payment disputes through either negotiation between the parties or…