According to the Wall Street Journal McDonald told the federal government it could drop health insurance coverage for 30,000 of its hourly-employees. The plan in question is one of those limited health care plan coined mini-med plans, and it cost each employee $14 a week, with a deductible is $2000.
So who is next?
If these plans cost less than the penalty the government imposed penalty for not offering health insurance to employees, companies will keep them, if not a lot of people will have to move to the government program.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Standardizing EHR - Stage on.
9/29/2010
According to health affair’s Health Policy Brief, Doctors, Hospitals and Clinicians will soon be receiving incentives under Medicare/Medicaid to make meaningful use of electronic health record but first certain objectives must be met by their systems, they must adopt “strict technical standard and be certified in meeting them”.
The goal of the Department of Health and Human Service (HHS) is to have a Nationwide Health information network, but in order for this to happen the Electron Health Systems must be standardized so that records can be shared securely between health entities. Before the current systems are adopted and or upgraded to be secure and remotely accessible someone has to come up with a set of criteria that all health care entity using the electronic health record must meet.
Well, Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), in this article about “Standardizing Electronic Medical Records” discuss this. The article also talks about the objectives set by HHS, in order for the incentives to be paid.
After the standards are set and the certification criteria are create then the actual challenge will begin, how many of the existing systems out there can be upgrades successfully, how much money will this all cost, and how long will this all take, will Doctors and hospitals agree to share information, will the patients agree?
I think creating standards and criteria is a good start because a standardized system will be a good value to patients, especially those patients who have and continue to see multiple clinicians and have to constantly list every ailment they have had and every drug and treatment they are on.
With technology there are always early and late adopters and people, who will never adopt it, but when all the kinks have been ironed out and the incentives stops, this will be the norm.
source: Health Affairs, Health Policy Briefing. http://www.healthaffairs.org/healthpolicybriefs/brief_pdfs/healthpolicybrief_26.pdf
According to health affair’s Health Policy Brief, Doctors, Hospitals and Clinicians will soon be receiving incentives under Medicare/Medicaid to make meaningful use of electronic health record but first certain objectives must be met by their systems, they must adopt “strict technical standard and be certified in meeting them”.
The goal of the Department of Health and Human Service (HHS) is to have a Nationwide Health information network, but in order for this to happen the Electron Health Systems must be standardized so that records can be shared securely between health entities. Before the current systems are adopted and or upgraded to be secure and remotely accessible someone has to come up with a set of criteria that all health care entity using the electronic health record must meet.
Well, Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), in this article about “Standardizing Electronic Medical Records” discuss this. The article also talks about the objectives set by HHS, in order for the incentives to be paid.
After the standards are set and the certification criteria are create then the actual challenge will begin, how many of the existing systems out there can be upgrades successfully, how much money will this all cost, and how long will this all take, will Doctors and hospitals agree to share information, will the patients agree?
I think creating standards and criteria is a good start because a standardized system will be a good value to patients, especially those patients who have and continue to see multiple clinicians and have to constantly list every ailment they have had and every drug and treatment they are on.
With technology there are always early and late adopters and people, who will never adopt it, but when all the kinks have been ironed out and the incentives stops, this will be the norm.
source: Health Affairs, Health Policy Briefing. http://www.healthaffairs.org/healthpolicybriefs/brief_pdfs/healthpolicybrief_26.pdf
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