Lee said he likes to refer to AI as augmented intelligence rather than artificial intelligence, because he thinks of this technology as being a set of tools that assist and augments a physician's ability to care for patients. “It's a lot like other ways that we support physicians with clinical decision support tools; AI just happens to be more advanced and more complex than other types of decision support,” he said. Lee described a number of ways they are using AI at Kaiser Permanente, including use cases related to natural language processing, computer vision, and predictive analytics. And of course, this helps our patients get timely responses to their health concerns,” he said. We know that diabetes is a leading cause of blindness, and considering the number of diabetic patients we have, using a tool that helps us determine whether a patient does or doesn't have diabetic retinopathy can allow us identify retinopathy sooner, which gives us the best chance to prevent someone from going blind.”

Finally, in analytics, Kaiser Permanente has been developing a number of algorithms to help it stratify COVID-positive patients so that they can better anticipate which patients are at highest risk for developing more severe symptoms. “We also have our advanced alert monitoring program, which helps us keep an eye on our hospitalized patients in real time, and predicts which patients are at risk for deteriorating and may require being transferred to the ICU,” Lee explained. With all of these examples, AI is augmenting the care of our physicians and our teams and when combined with clinical judgment, we create the potential for significant improvement in outcomes for our patients as well as efficiencies for our clinicians and our health system as a whole.” That involves EHR data, imaging, telemetry, and patient-reported outcomes data, organized longitudinally and then made available to investigators using what he calls an AI factory. We actually took a couple of years to cleanse the data,” he said. And we de-identified it so there would not be a lot of tricky IRB human subjects or privacy issues around the use of the data, but it is still stored in a secure cloud container with tools on top of it for all of our clinicians and all of our investigators at Mayo Clinic to create models.” “We've also established a variety of collaborations nationally and internationally to test the models to make sure they're fair, unbiased and useful for purpose.”

Point Robotics from Taiwan has received a US FDA 510(k) clearance for its surgical robot system. Point Robotics, maker of surgical robots in Taiwan, has received the US Food and Drug Administration's 510(k) clearance for its integrated robotic-assisted surgical system for spinal fusion surgeries. Mental health startup Lissun receives $1M in pre-seed funding Indian mental health platform Lissun has raised $1 million in a pre-seed funding round led by IvyCap Ventures.

FDA staff will be embedded at the VA Ventures Innovation Institute in Seattle to evaluate the risks and benefits of medical device innovations. VA staff will provide the clinical context for test development while FDA staff evaluate the benefits and risks of medical devices to accelerate the time it takes for them to reach patients. "We are eager to gain valuable insight from VHA clinicians and scientists using a real-world perspective, and we look forward to working with our federal colleagues to help ensure veterans and all Americans have access to the most innovative medical solutions and technologies to improve their health and quality of life," Jeff Shuren, director of FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said in a prepared statement. Through a two-year cooperative research collaboration with UL, the VA tested products to create standards and certifications for medical device cybersecurity.

HOBOKEN, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Semperis, a pioneer of identity-driven cyber resilience for enterprises, today announced the addition of Todd Greene, Vice President & Enterprise CISO at Charlotte, North Carolina-based Atrium Health, to its Strategic Advisory Board. Atrium Health participated in Semperis' recent Series C funding round of more than $200 million, led by KKR. In his advisory role, Todd will guide Semperis’ healthcare-specific initiatives and be a strategic resource for customers, including the world’s largest health systems. “Cutting-edge innovation is in Atrium Health’s DNA, and I admire Todd’s long track record of cybersecurity leadership – especially in the areas of threat exchange and research, disaster recovery and customer advocacy.”

Semperis is widely adopted in the healthcare sector, with a focus on protecting critical and persistently targeted identity systems, like Active Directory and Azure AD. Over time, he has been part of the organization’s growth into an integrated, multi-state health provider that now includes Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist, also in North Carolina, and Atrium Health Navicent and Atrium Health Floyd in Georgia. “Cutting-edge innovation is in Atrium Health’s DNA, and I admire Todd’s long track record of cybersecurity leadership – especially in the areas of threat exchange and research, disaster recovery and customer advocacy." Purpose-built for securing hybrid Active Directory environments, Semperis’ patented technology protects over 50 million identities from cyberattacks, data breaches and operational errors. Semperis hosts the award-winning Hybrid Identity Protection conference and podcast series (www.hipconf.com) and built the community hybrid Active Directory cyber defender tools, Purple Knight (www.purple-knight.com) and Forest Druid.

Staff also want to give patients all available payment options and the ability to pay their bills 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, using online technology. "We had a statement vendor in place and an online payment solution with another vendor," said Anne Goodwill Pritchett, executive vice president of revenue operations at Hackensack Meridian Health. "For example, we created the look and format of our patient billing statements, but there are times when you have to modify the content," she continued. "We wanted that patient responsibility comment code and the definition of what it means inserted on the statement," she added. "The former vendor couldn't do that." Lastly, Hackensack Meridian wanted a digital image of every statement, so if a patient calls with questions, the customer service team member can pull it up and see exactly what the patient received. "They offered print and mail production and return mail processing, statement archiving, and convenient retrieval of patient communications," she continued. The vendor demonstrated to Hackensack Meridian staff how they could quickly make any statement adjustments or changes and how they'd incorporate personalized messages on patient statements that staff could edit as required. "We also wanted to send patients a letter with their first statement explaining their rights under the No Surprises Act. We gave Nordis the letter, and using Expresso, associated the letter to the patient statement, which printed in-line with the statement itself." In addition to helping revenue operations work more efficiently across the organization, staff have accelerated payments and reduced phone calls, all while enhancing patient satisfaction, Pritchett reported. "Once we began utilizing Nordis and began generating patient statements that were clear and easily understood, and in conjunction with increased payment options, we saw an increase in our self-pay collections. "We'll use Expresso to develop, customize and deliver 1.8 million statements, letters and other patient financial communications this year alone," Pritchett reported.

A J.D. Power study indicates telehealth is the preferred method among consumers for receiving certain types of medical care. The J.D. Power 2022 U.S. Telehealth Satisfaction Study released today shows a stark increase in consumers preferring telehealth visits over in-person appointments for a broad range of routine care. Telehealth has the potential to increase access, convenience, care coordination and continuity, improve outcomes and fill in gaps in provider coverage, particularly in underserved areas.

The plan aligns with HIMSS’s commitment to strengthening the skills of a diverse digital health workforce and several ongoing HIMSS efforts, including the Global Public Policy Principles, support for the European Health Data Space and the work of the Digital Health Advisory Group for Europe, which addresses a much-needed workforce development.

Remote Patient Monitoring helps providers transition into the next generation of healthcare with new data-driven tools that support proactive care management

Taking a cue from other digitally mature industries, like retail, travel and financial services, hospitals, too, have taken on improving patient experience at every touchpoint, even before the visit commences all the way through follow-up care. According to a recent Deloitte-Scottsdale Institute survey, “Most survey respondents are hoping to achieve better patient experience (92%) as the top desired outcome from digital transformation.” Hospitals are using the automation stack for both nonvertical processes like staffing and running IT helpdesks and for vertical processes such as physician credentialing or verifying insurance eligibility. At Pre-Registration: As much information about the patient and their insurance as possible can be collected before any service commences. Hospitals are home to a number of applications for carrying out myriad tasks, from patient scheduling and settling payments to electronic health record management and verifying insurance claims. As healthcare matures to value-based care being delivered to patients wherever they are, every process along the delivery chain will have to be explored for automation potential. Patients have come to expect the same experience from healthcare that they do from other document-intensive industries such as banking and insurance.

The GHX Board has confirmed Tina Vatanka Murphy, division president, Value Based Care, to be appointed as the company’s next president and CEO. Her extensive knowledge of GHX, its broad and still expanding customer community and the complex healthcare industry at large positions her to lead the company into the future. "I am honored by the Board’s decision to entrust me as its next chief executive and I am humbled to carry on Bruce Johnson’s strong legacy of leadership," said Tina Vatanka Murphy, incoming president and CEO of GHX. Most recently, Vatanka Murphy served as division president, Value Based Care, and was instrumental in leading GHX’s award-winning response to the global pandemic in 2020, resulting in industry recognition such as the Silver Stevie award for “Most Valuable Corporate Response: COVID-19" and TrustRadius’ “Tech Cares” award. Over the years, Vatanka Murphy has been deeply involved in shaping and transforming GHX’s mission and vision as the healthcare industry’s needs and opportunities have shifted.

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--mPulse Mobile, a leader in conversational AI and digital engagement solutions for the healthcare industry, today announced the appointments of Lara Stell as Chief Financial Officer and Sanjeev Sawai as Chief Product and Technology Officer. The appointment of these two executives will accelerate mPulse’s goals of escalating customer value from digital engagement and deliver on the company’s mission to improve health outcomes using innovative technology. "mPulse Mobile is helping healthcare organizations continue to expand the use of technology to better digitally engage with their members, providers, suppliers and partners to improve health outcomes," stated Bob Farrell, CEO. Following several years of high customer growth and technological innovations in the organization’s activation platform and digital engagement solutions, mPulse Mobile is now trusted by over 150 healthcare organizations, generating 1 billion tailored consumer touchpoints annually. Recently recognized as one of the Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Companies in the U.S., mPulse Mobile’s customer-centered approach and commitment to best-in-class technology have delivered innovation excellence across its health engagement solutions.

Today, Komodo Health announced a new partnership with the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy (UMSOP), providing its researchers and clinicians with access to Komodo’s technology platform and patient-level insights for a variety of population health research initiatives. “As we study the impacts of the pandemic on disease detection and preventive care, Komodo’s platform offers a window into patient-level insights that are not typically accessible for health outcomes research,” said Joey Mattingly, PharmD, MBA, PhD, associate professor at UMSOP. “By engaging in robust, multidisciplinary research, the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy is helping to deepen the industry’s understanding of social determinants of health and outcomes, including the pandemic’s ripple effects across the health system,” said Arif Nathoo, CEO and Co-Founder, Komodo Health. “We’re proud to support the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy in advancing research that could help inform public health policy, drive new strategies for disease management, and support the broader scientific community in understanding and addressing disparities in care to make a meaningful difference for the entire population.” In contrast to legacy health datasets and aggregators, Komodo’s platform offers access to unique, nuanced insights on patient outcomes, including clinical biomarkers and laboratory tests, patient-reported outcomes, and symptom scales, that will enable the UMSOP team to expand its research and, in turn, deepen education for the next generation of healthcare professionals.

CIOs and other healthcare executives gathered in Boston this week for the HealthLeaders Innovation Exchange, where they talked about moving past the pandemic and into a new era of connected health. The pandemic "was a splash of water in everyone's faces." Chaudhry was one of about two-dozen healthcare executives attending this year's Innovation Exchange, an annual event designed to bring CIOs and others together to discuss innovation strategy. When asked "who champions your causes most at the organization," 55% selected the CEO, indicating an emphasis on top-down support for innovation (10% selected the CMO or CNO, and 25% went with "someone else." But this question and the discussion around it highlighted the fact that innovation isn't necessarily channeled through one C-suite position or based in one department, and can and should be found in all areas and levels of the healthcare system. Bradley Crotty, MD, MPH, vice president and chief digital engagement officer at the Froedtert & Medical College of Wisconsin Health Network, as well as chief medical officer and chief product officer at Inception Health and an associate professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin, pointed out that the pandemic did give health systems a process that everyone followed to "get things done." That attention to one common goal worked, he noted, and showed healthcare organizations how to cut through the barriers to achieve a goal.

Amid "some of the worst" margins since the beginning of the pandemic, many hospitals and health systems around the United States have been forced to lay off workers, limit services, and even shut down, Dave Muoio writes for Fierce Healthcare. While some hospital layoffs have been the result of facility closures, others have been coupled with a promise to help some employees transition to other roles within the health system. According to the health system, the layoffs included directors, managers, and staffing coordinators, and they were encouraged to apply to one of 2,000 open positions within the organization. Bozeman Health Deaconess in early August cut 28 leadership and leadership support staff positions and closed 25 job openings, citing pandemic-induced economic challenges. Commonwealth Health announced that it will close its First Hospital psychiatric center and other outpatient locations at the end of October a move that will result in the termination of 245 employees. According to a notice filed with New York, Garnet Health on Nov. 9 will close five outpatient sites, which will result in 29 layoffs. In May, St. Charles Health System announced 105 layoffs and closed 76 job openings, with the health system's CEO citing expense increases, reduced surgery volumes, and relief paybacks that will lead the organization to "likely end 2022 in the red," adding that the reductions were necessary "to ensure the long-term financial stability of the health system." 14 notice, St. Vincent Charity Medical Center announced its transition from an acute care hospital to an ambulatory health services center—a move that will eliminate 978 positions, effective Nov. 15. In September, Yale New Haven Health laid off 72 junior and senior management employees and closed 83 job openings.

For instance, several years ago, the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) in New York started working with a company called Osso VR, which offers a surgical training and assessment platform to help residents and fellows practice surgical techniques. “If you ask a physician if they think that they have been adequately tested, they'll say yes,” Ast said. So I don't think it is a controversial thing to say we don't have a standardized way to assess surgical proficiency.” He says there are two main problems with training in-practice surgeons on a new technique or device. Osso VR seeks to solve that problem by offering on-demand, immersive modules that allow surgical teams to train in a virtual environment before ever stepping foot into a real operating room. Medical device companies also use Osso VR to introduce new techniques or devices.

Because HHS is the one of the oldest and one of the most structured of all of the residencies, Ast says, it is built to take on something new and see if it works, and it has a lot of surgeons in one building. Vanderbilt's orthopedic residency program teamed up Osso VR to educate and train residents on how to perform a range of surgical procedures. Pediatric orthopedic surgeon Justin Barad, M.D., Osso’s CEO and co-founder, said Osso VR has done studies with a variety of academic medical centers, including a study at UCLA involving 20 trainees. Ten were trained in Osso VR to a set level of proficiency, and 10 were trained traditionally. The group that was trained with Osso VR performed 10 points better on an objective structured assessment of technical skill, he said. “So it is 10 times harder to learn, yet the way that we've been training is around the same,” he said. “The emphasis of Osso right now is on the early career surgeon and we are working mainly with the medical device companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Stryker, but we also have about 20 residency programs where Osso is used,” Barad said.

New research shows that digital health and telehealth technology can improve hearing care access by enabling audiology assessments to be conducted remotely. Published in The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, new research shows how various digital health solutions, including telehealth technology-based intervention methods, can work to enhance hearing care access. In this study, researchers found that an audiology assessment conducted via telehealth could help improve access to hearing care. Robler and other researchers from UAMS are also conducting studies in rural Alaska, using collaborative research to close hearing health disparities. "There is much work to be done to ensure everyone has equal access to hearing health care, regardless of where they live, and that the evidence generated in hearing-related clinical trials is robust and representative," said Robler.

Veradigm is a healthcare technology company that drives value through its unique combination of platforms, data, expertise, connectivity, and scale. Some healthcare technology companies deliver clinical data for biopharma and health plans, some help turn that data into insights, others serve healthcare providers directly by providing point-of-care clinical software and patient outreach platforms.

Ordr, the leader in connected device security, today announced new capabilities and enhancements to its AI-powered platform to help organizations discover, gain essential context, and secure their connected devices everywhere. New integrations expand the more than 80 integrations within the Ordr Data Lake, to empower organizations with a single source of truth about connected devices and assets in their on-prem, remote, data center, private, public, and hybrid cloud environments. In addition, enhancements have been made to Ordr's automated segmentation capabilities that help organizations accelerate and scale adoption of a true Zero Trust security posture to protect every connected device. Ordr announced enhancements to help organizations discover, gain essential context, and secure their connected devices. The new integrations are a good leading indicator of challenges organizations face, and Ordr is defining how connected device security needs to continue to evolve." Ordr Data Lake enrichment - Integrate with more than 80 tools across the IT infrastructure to gather and enrich connected device details, establishing a single source of truth.

CrowdStrike - See every managed connected device, identify unmanaged devices, and know more about device vulnerabilities and risk, combining Ordr insights with CrowdStrike security data. Organizations have struggled to achieve a true Zero Trust security posture because they lack insights needed to understand their connected devices and create appropriate security policies. To truly achieve Zero Trust, organizations need deep visibility into connected devices – to understand how and what they're communicating with – in order to to define, manage, and enforce segmentation. "Ordr provides the visibility and context into all connected devices to advance our segmentation journey with Cisco ISE," said Shawn Fletcher, Senior Systems Administrator, St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton. The feature enhancements in Ordr 8.1 will further simplify and optimize how we create and enforce segmentation policies for every connected device," said Larry Smith, Manager, Cybersecurity Architecture and Engineering, El Camino Health. For more information about how Ordr can help security and IT teams deliver visibility and security for their connected devices, from ground to cloud. Ordr Systems Control Engine uses deep packet inspection and advanced machine learning to discover every device, profile its risk and behavior, map all communications and protect it with automated policies.

Schellman, a leading provider of attestation and compliance services, is pleased to announce the introduction of HIPAA Express, a new service offering aimed at reducing the risk of data breaches and ransomware attacks for large healthcare systems and regional healthcare providers. Through this third-party assessment, Schellman can help these organizations protect the considerable amount of sensitive data they maintain, identify evidence of due diligence to comply with HIPAA, and set them up for success in the event of an OCR audit—with the potential to even reduce fines resulting from an OCR breach investigation. With over 90% of OCR enforcement actions calling out an insufficient HIPAA Risk Analysis / Risk Management program, Schellman made this area a focal point of the HIPAA Express assessment. Schellman’s new offering includes a workshop and meetings with various levels of an organization, as well as a report that details the summary letter, scope of the environment, details around the essential elements of the HIPAA Security Risk Analysis and Risk Management processes, a table showing the compliance status of requirements, and a detailed description of any findings from the assessment.

Published on August 11, 2022

New tech helps leading addiction and mental healthcare provider get patients the resources they need throughout the healing and recovery process

The need for nursing leadership in digital is clear. A contributor to the RCN’s (2018) consultation on the digital future of nursing called for nurses to step up and take leadership of digital systems: “We need nurses to lead and make decisions… Too often it is realised after money has been spent that it’s been on the wrong things.” The RCN’s (2018) report showed that even well-established digital nursing posts were vulnerable to downgrading or axing, as one former nursing leader revealed: “I was the clinical lead for informatics at a senior-nurse level for two years. It would be wrong to assume that the progress achieved in response to the Covid-19 pandemic means senior nurse leaders in digital are now valued appropriately. To date, nurses with an interest in digital have found their way to leadership roles by various routes and with no requirement for an informatics qualification. NHS England’s (2022) guidance for nursing on the What Good Looks Like (WGLL) framework for digital transformation, aimed at board-level nurse leaders, details the essential ingredients for success in integrated care systems and organisations, including ensuring there is a digital nurse leader with accountability across the nursing workforce, who has the digital expertise and time to lead transformation.

Dr Phillips, in partnership with Health Education England (HEE), is undertaking a review of the skills and support nurses and midwives need to practise and lead a digitally enabled health and care system. The Phillips Ives Nursing and Midwifery Review, led by Dr Phillips and Dr Jeanette Ives Erickson, builds on HEE’s (2019) Topol Review of the impact of digital technologies on the future NHS workforce. Support and protection for nursing leadership in data, information, knowledge and technology is key to unlocking the benefits of digital in healthcare (RCN, 2018). The clinical lead at NHS Digital, who is also a nurse, spelled out why seniority matters: “Without digital leaders in senior positions, there is a danger that digital strategies won’t truly address the requirements of digital transformation – it is about so much more than the technology. Dr Phillips has spoken of the need to build clinical leadership “from top to bottom” and has said one of her key ambitions is to “create a community that can support each other” in digital nursing (Ford, 2020).

To develop many more digital leaders, the NHS Digital Academy is expanding its flagship Digital Health Leadership Programme (aimed at the most senior leaders such as CNIOs, chief information officers and CCIOs) and providing new support for aspiring leaders at a less-senior level (HEE, ndb). Much of the literature on nurse leaders in digital has emphasised the need for nurses to retain their professional identity and remain rooted in nursing priorities (RCN, 2018). The move to professionalise digital nursing, heralded by England’s chief national CNIO, means that leaders in the near future should have a firm grounding in specialist informatics and be valued for this expertise. Leading digital transformation is complex, so nurses should not be expected to take on these roles without specialist training and recognition. Nurses at all levels were essential to the digital progress achieved during the Covid-19 pandemic; they will need support to build on that progress, guard against the risks and unlock the benefits of the digital age.