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Hackensack University Medical Center is tapping new technologies to achieve more effective medication adherence, according to Hackensack UMC’s director of pharmacy Nilesh Desai. Hackensack UMC has been an early adopter of technologies and processes to advance medication safety and nurse workflows, Desai explained, along with interoperability between automated dispensing cabinets and EHRs. [Also: 11 essential quotes from notable HIMSS keynotes] Nurses are responsible for interacting with the automated medication dispensing cabinets, and the time they spend at the cabinets can be reduced significantly via more interoperable systems, for instance. Desai will discuss the hospital's progress in this realm during a HIMSS16 session titled “Impact of an ADC System on Medication Administration.” See all of our HIMSS16 previews Medical administration systems must be able to address patient-specific medications and offer robust inventory and data management processes, Desai said. Hackensack UMC tapped Omnicell, a provider of medication and supply management solutions and analytics software for healthcare facilities, to deliver automated medication management solutions throughout the 775-bed hospital. Twitter: @HealthITNews This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Telehealth provider VirtuMedix is homing in on emergency care. The company's software, as such, comprises a dashboard for tracking patients while they await consultation, as well as features enabling patients to log-in, view their medical record, and state the reason for a particular visit, according to Kannan Sreedhar, group vice president and general manager of VirtuMedix. Sreedhar said that VirtuMedix will be showcasing the latest version of its platform at HIMSS16 beginning in late February. [Also: 11 essential quotes from notable HIMSS keynotes] EMS physicians, for example, can use telemedicine technologies to give patients the ability to access provider organizations in an on-demand fashion, according to VirtuMedix group vice president Kannan Sreedhar. On the other side, patients can enter e-mails or mobile numbers to get messages alerting them when physicians are ready for their consultations, Sreedhar explained, adding that certain features enable patients to conduct online payments. “A parent might have three kids at home and one has an ear infection, and there’s the need to go to an emergency room, where a person might have to wait for three or four hours – that’s the usage of healthcare resources today,” he said. “But when a parent has the ability to use her smartphone or iPad and connect from home with physicians via telehealth, then she does not need to go to the hospital, and an emergency care physician can diagnosis the ear infection and send a prescription to the parent’s local pharmacy.” See all of our HIMSS16 previews According to a study by the American Academy of Family Physicians 15 percent of clinicians are using telemedicine tools today and 78 percent said they believe telemedicine improves access to care. VirtuMedix will be exhibiting at the HIMSS16 booths of partner organizations Allscripts and IDS, where it intends to showcase the latest version of its VirtuMedix platform. Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Atlantic Health cut operational costs $70 million in three years by effectively using predictive analytics, according to MaryPat Sullivan, chief nursing officer at Overlook Medical Center in Summit, New Jersey. “We have so many IT tools in the hospital setting,” Sullivan said, “but they’re only good if they actually get adopted." Overlook is part of the five-hospital Atlantic Health system. Sullivan spearheads healthcare literacy, diversity, and implementation of programs for pre-hospitalization, acute care and care transitions in the nursing department. When Overlook began its EHR transition, Sullivan’s team interviewed staff members to determine what data meant for them. While Sullivan thought culture change would hinder implementation, her staff actually embraced the transition. [Also: 21 awesome photos from past HIMSS conferences] “It’s a real find that staff were not only believing in the data, but were making decisions based on it,” she said. Sullivan will deliver a presentation titled “Reining in Labor Costs with Predictive Analytics,” at HIMSS16 later this month. Sullivan’s team spent a lot of time educating staff to help with the transition, she said, and found nurses felt “empowered to control their environment and to be good stewards to plan and evaluate.” Her team used business analytics to predict hospital productivity and analyze labor costs. By comparing data from previous years, Sullivan could create the best possible schedules to reduce costs and get the most from her staff. “We took the budget and the business analytics and married them,” Sullivan added. “It gives staff the control over their working environment and work in a way to maximize patient outcomes.” Even though it’s only Atlantic Health System’s first year with the data, there’s already been a big reduction in overtime and premium usage. See all of our HIMSS16 previews “There’s a million moving parts to this, but in terms of data, we’ve seen a quarter of a day length of stay less, and earlier morning discharges,” Sullivan said. Sullivan’s team is working toward the next steps of using the data to benefit the health system and apply the data concepts to other departments, like critical care. The session “Reining in Labor Costs with Predictive Analytics” is scheduled for March 2 from 8:30 – 9:30 a.m. in the Sands Expo Convention Center Palazzo E. Twitter: @JessiefDavis This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Orion Health at HIMSS16 will unveil a data platform aimed at enabling precision medicine and a new management app geared towards participants in the Medicare Shared Savings Accountable Care Organization Program. The new iteration of Amadeus, for instance, is meant to help providers move from the "who" of population health to the "what" of precision medicine, an Orion official said. By aggregating, storing and helping interpret data, the technology can help health organizations better devise treatment plans geared specifically to the patients deemed to be in need of particular attention. [Poll: What topics will define HIMSS16?] Meanwhile, Orion will also be touting its new MSSP Management app at the conference. By integrating data into the reporting and monitoring workflows while keeping tabs on quality measure thresholds, the tool aims to help ACOs wring value from the Medicare Shared Savings Program. What’s more, the company will be spotlighting client success stories at the show.  Arizona-based ACO Scottsdale Health Partners, for its part, will discuss how adopting Orion's data exchange, and population health tools have helped it tackle the Triple Aim. And executives from Cal INDEX, the biggest state HIE in the United States, intend to talk about how it has been able to mix clinical and claims data and, in turn, deliver those to clinicians at the point of care. Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Execs will point to specific examples where interoperability has worked in other industries and what healthcare can learn from how well those scale.

All but seven U.S. states have either passed or are working on legislation that would establish a state-sponsored, all-payer claims database – and that’s among the reasons these databases are in the spotlight for their promise to improve the way providers and insurance companies manage patient populations. This year at the HIMSS16, in fact, John Freedman, MD, president of Freedman Healthcare, and Linda Greene, vice president of Freedman Healthcare, will lead a session intended to shed light on what APCDs are and where they’re headed in the future. See all of our HIMSS16 previews APCDs as “large-scale databases that systematically collect medical claims, pharmacy claims, dental claims (typically, but not always) and eligibility and provider files from private and public payers,” said officials at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in a recent report. “States with APCDs are responding to a need for comprehensive, multi-payer data that allows states and other stakeholders to understand the cost, quality, and utilization of health care for their citizens.” “While enormous attention is focused on EHRs and the health record data they contain – deservedly so – the other data world of claims data has been quietly creating applications for public health, price transparency, performance improvement, population health management and health services research,” Freedman said. [Also: 21 awesome photos from past HIMSS conferences] Instances of all-payer claims databases, in fact, have tripled in the past decade. “The impacts of APCDs on healthcare are just starting,” he continued, “and they will be profound.” The session,“Implications of Expanding State All Payer Claims Databases,” will be held on March 3 from 1 - 1:30 p.m. in the Sands Expo Convention Center. Twitter: @HealthITNews This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

A high percentage of IT workers admit to not following the same security protocols they are expected to enforce, according to a new survey conducted across the United States by Absolute, a Canadian security firm. In fact, 33 percent admitted to successfully hacking their own or another organization and 45 percent admitted to knowingly circumventing their own organization's security policies. "The big surprise for us in this survey is that the gatekeepers are really the gatecrashers," said Stephen Midgley, vice president of global marketing for Absolute. Moreover, he said, while the survey of IT department managers included several industries, the findings apply across the board, with healthcare no exception. [Also: Hollywood Presbyterian gives in to hackers, pays ransom] "Given that IT is the security gatekeeper for an organization, it was alarming to see such high incidents of non-compliant behavior by IT personnel," he said. "Even if these actions are being performed to validate existing infrastructure, senior leadership should be aware that this activity is occurring. It may also be worthwhile to consider third-party audits to ensure adherence with corporate security policies." IT decision-makers bear the brunt of responsibility. Of those surveyed, 78 percent said the organization's security is primarily IT's responsibility. The report also showed that 65 percent of IT decision makers believe they would likely lose their job in the event of a security breach. "The gaps in current data breach response plans and in upholding general best practice policies must be addressed," Midgley said. As he sees it, when it comes to security – especially in healthcare, but also in other sectors – there's an accountability divide. "That is a very precarious space for IT to be in," Midgley said. "They are tasked with data security, but aren't actually responsible for the device that contains that data.” "I think in healthcare it's magnified," he added, "because of HIPAA, HITECH, PHI. So, you can have all the security in place, but at the end of the day, IT is reliant on the employee to ensure security is implemented correctly. Yet, what we find is those very same employees try to find ways to circumvent the security policies that have been put in place." There's a lot of work for IT in terms of bridging that gap, he said, and recommended that organizations implement technology that is adapted to their environment that gives them complete visibility and control of the devices. Midgley mentioned the example of one healthcare entity that has a policy of automatically wiping data from any device – laptop, tablet or phone – that goes beyond a certain location. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] "They assume that device has PHI on it," he said. "It's mitigating the risk of a data breach." The survey – which polled 501 U.S. adults who work in information security management roles in companies or organizations with 50 or more employees – found that security remains at the top of the IT spending list, with 87 percent of respondents expecting increased investment in security this year. Twitter: @HealthITNews

Nuance will unveil its Dragon Medical One Platform at HIMSS16, an evolution of its speech recognition and documentation tool that aims to redefine the relationship clinical users have with healthcare technology, the company says. According to Jonathon Dreyer, Nuance's director of cloud and mobile solutions marketing, increasing demands on physicians – not least the number of places they need to be and IT systems with which they're supposed to interact – has changed the equation, putting a premium on flexibility and mobility. Nuance touts its new cloud-based Dragon Medical One platform as a tool to offer physicians a unified speech recognition functionality – irrespective of care settings, workflows, devices or applications. The new version brings analytics functionality that keep tabs on the time spent documenting, helping health organizations track efficiency and productivity. Additionally, workflow enhancements such as Dragon Medical Advisor offer notes to help improve ICD-10 specificity, case mix index and more.  A pair of new features, PowerPack and PowerMic Mobile, enable users to tap into evidence-based content using a smartphone as a secure microphone to dictate, edit and navigate the EHR on any workstation. Whether they are dictating into EHRs or mobile messaging apps, the Dragon Medical One desktop app offers secure speech recognition wherever physicians need to document. With a unique Nuance Healthcare ID, doctors gain access to an ecosystem of personalized tools. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] "We are always interested in technology that improves productivity, and cloud-based speech supports the ways physicians work and eases the effort of entering clinical documentation into patient records," said Don Fosen, director of IT at Naperville, Illinois-based Edward-Elmhurst Hospital, in a prepared statement, noting that the tools "have let us scale voice recognition in a way that we simply couldn't have done in any other way." Nuance’s Dreyer added that the vendor has been seeing a shift in doctors’ workflow.  "There's a general trend of physicians being in more places, having to interact with not just the EHR but with other technologies as part of their daily workflow," Dreyer said.  Twitter: @HealthITNews This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

IBM executives say the purchase adds not only a massive repository of health data to the Watson Health Cloud, but also an extensive client roster to IBM's Watson Health unit.

(SPONSORED) IT in health systems is a collection of moving parts, often spread across facilities in multiple locations and, increasingly, dispersed to a growing number and type of devices.