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Physician adoption of electronic health records rose steadily between 2013 and 2014, with nearly 75 percent of doctors going digital, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Electronic Health Records Survey. The CDC’s four key findings based on the survey: In 2014, 74.1 percent of office-based physicians had a certified electronic health record system, up from 67.5 percent in 2013. The percentage of physicians who had a certified EHR system ranged from 58.8 percent in Alaska to 88.6 percent in Minnesota. In 2014, 32.5 percent of office-based physicians with a certified EHR system were electronically sharing patient health information with external providers. The percentage of physicians with a certified EHR system electronically sharing patient health information with external providers ranged from 17.7 percent in New Jersey to 58.8 percent in North Dakota. Access the full CDC report here.

MidMichigan Health, a nonprofit health system affiliated with the University of Michigan Health System, is ready to replace a mixed bag of technology with an electronic health record from Epic Systems, which will provide the clinical, administrative and billing software. The goal: to connect its hospitals, physician practices and outpatient care facilities on one platform for medical records, registration, scheduling and billing. Contract cost: $55 million. MidMichigan Health executives say they expect to recoup that investment within six years through efficiencies gained. They've named the endeavor the One Person, One Record project. [See also: 11 Epic stories worth reading again.] The health system's leaders announced the decision in a January 26 post on the MidMichigan Health website. The EHR rollout is one of several initiatives the health system is undertaking to put patients and their families at the center of care while enhancing safety and quality, patient experience, employee and provider engagement and financial stability, officials noted. Project team members have already begun traveling to Wisconsin for Epic training and will begin configuring the system in early 2016. MidMichigan anticipates the system will be fully operational at its hospitals and doctors' offices in April 2017. A second phase of the project in late 2017 will connect MidMichigan Home Care and other newly owned subsidiaries to the rest of the health system. "Our current state of multiple vendor systems requires us to maintain a large number of custom interfaces," said Dan Waltz, CIO. "This has simply become unsustainable, both in terms of the cost to maintain those systems and the potential risk and confusion that it introduces." [See also: Epic scores EHR contract from Vanderbilt University Medical Center, beats Cerner.] There is more to the project than setting up new technology. "As part of the process, we will be evaluating all of our workflows, comparing them to industry best practices and making improvements," said Pankaj Jandwani, MD, MidMichigan Health's CMIO, in the news release. "It's an opportunity for us to think differently about how we work and to design our tools and our processes around what patients and their families need. Jandwani added the changes would also help improve productivity and satisfaction, with tasks and roles "dramatically transformed." As a result of the project, patients will be able to schedule appointments online and self-check-in from home or at on-site kiosks. The health system will also offer virtual care options such as telemedicine and e-visits, and the ability to view and pay MidMichigan Health bills from one account.

While the development of accurate predictive analytics has the potential to head off debilitating and costly conditions among patients, one veteran of the burgeoning field says it’s important not to rush in without the proper planning. "The first thing to understand is you need to have the right technical infrastructure components in place and it has to address what you are looking to do with it," said David M. Seo, MD, associate vice president of IT for clinical applications and chief medical informatics officer for the University of Miami Health System. "But there is a lot people don't think about – like data curation and quality," he said. "Is the data you have good enough to even do predictive analytics? Because if it isn't, that prediction may actually harm you more than it helps. You may go off on a wrong tangent." Seo and Chitra Raghu, senior program manager and innovations officer for Lockheed Martin Health and Life Sciences, presented will be presenting the U of M system's experience in preparing its predictive analytics platform in "Predictive Analytics Drives Population Health Management" at HIMSS16 on Tuesday. Beyond the quality of the data itself, Seo said other factors, including the presence or absence of skilled data scientists; a thorough understanding of how to localize predictive models from other health systems; and how to best integrate existing investments in electronic health records with analytics technology, must be carefully considered before pulling the trigger on new platforms. "There are so many technologies," said Raghu. "You have to find what is the right one that will help hospitals achieve what they are trying to achieve, at the lowest cost." Seo added even health networks with a dozen or more hospitals are not likely to already have the necessary skill sets in-house. And even a platform that offers great analytics capabilities, for instance, may not be popular with either clinicians or financial executives if the caregivers need to toggle back and forth between an EHR and an analytics platform. "If I'm looking at a patient in front of me right now, I don't have time to go somewhere else, and when I've gone somewhere else I've already lost the advantage of this massive investment in my EHR,” Seo said. “So it has to be part of your system's ecosystem." The session "Predictive Analytics Drives Population Health Management" is slated for March 1 from 2:30-3:30 p.m. in, Palazzo I at the Sands Expo Convention Center.

Iatric Systems intends to unwrap a set of analytics services to help healthcare providers meet federal mandates at HIMSS16. The vendor specializing in patient privacy, analytics, EHR optimization and interoperability, said that it will debut a new offering dubbed Analytics On-Demand at the conference, which begins late next month. “Analytics On-Demand was built to help provider organizations move to value-based care,” said Frank Fortner, president of Iatric Systems. “It comes with prebuilt modules. Initially, these modules will be heavily weighted toward things like quality measure management, meaningful use and the value-based model – all coming together under one program.” See all of our HIMSS16 previews Readmission management, population health management – providers are struggling to get good tools around these kinds of things, Fortner said. “For us, this is just a starting point,” he said. “It’s about helping providers transition to value-based care, but not stopping there. Executives will be able to create their own modules in a DIY dashboard style and address many of the hot-button issues in healthcare.” The rules in healthcare change every year and, as such, provider organizations suddenly find they need to report on new or different measures; as a result, analytics is a challenge, he added. [Also: Making analytics work for quality improvement?] “Our goal is to provide a quick, one-stop shop that can handle all this reporting for healthcare executives, as well as bring professional services around these areas,” he said. While the 26-year-old Iatric Systems will be debuting Analytics On-Demand at HIMSS16, it also will focus its efforts at the annual conference and exhibition on the various core components of its business including interoperability, patient privacy and electronic health records optimization. Iatric Systems will be in booth 7730. Twitter: @SiwickiHealthIT

Patricia Mechael has been appointed executive vice president, Personal Connected Health Alliance at HIMSS, effective April 15, HIMSS President and CEO Steve Lieber announced on Thursday. Mechael will serve as consultant for HIMSS until her official appointment. She'll facilitate market analysis, business planning processes and guide immediate term goals. At PCHA, she hopes to advance trends toward self-care technology as a way to address challenges such as chronic illness management and mental health. [Also: The making of an mHealth maven] Mechael most recently served as executive director of the mHealth Alliance and as Principal and Policy Lead for HealthEnabled. She also has collaborated with the mHealth Summit for more than seven years. She has 15 years of experience in field building and thought leadership. At HealthEnabled, she concentrates on global thought leadership and advocacy, research and policy work in Nigeria, South Africa and Uganda, while working with the World Health Organization to create a Global Health Index and State of the World's Digital Health Report. She was recently awarded a Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center fellowship for a study entitled, the Future of Health is Digital that highlighted the use of technology to improve patient outcomes and strengthen the health system. Twitter: @JessiefDavis

Despite the record number of major healthcare breaches in just the past year, 74 percent of consumers surveyed by the National Cyber Security Alliance said they trust healthcare providers the most with personal information, according to a study released Thursday to mark Data Privacy Day. The day is an annual international effort launched by the NCSA to create awareness about the importance of securing personal information, both as a consumers and as organizations. This year's theme is "Respecting Privacy, Safeguarding Data and Enabling Trust." [Also: Flint hospital hit with cyber attack] "These are the three legs of the stool for the Internet," said NCSA Executive Director Michael Kaiser. "We believe everyone needs to have respect for the information."  The findings in the TRUSTe/NCSA Consumer Privacy Index show that people have a trust-based relationship with their providers, Kaiser said. "I think the expectation is that when they provide personal information, it's protected." To keep that culture of mutual respect, healthcare providers need to better communicate with patients about how their data is treated, he said. At the same time, providers have to build a culture of privacy within their organization -- one where privacy and security aren't just occasionally mentioned but frequently talked about. After all, healthcare providers are stewards of precious information. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] "The data that healthcare providers have is extremely valuable," said Kaiser. "It's valuable to several different kinds of sources in the cybersecurity arena. We've seen this with some of the insurance breaches, where nation states gathered information of citizens through private data." Kaiser said the best way to protect data is to ask: What data do you have? Where does it go? Who can access it? Where is it? And what are you doing to protect it? Data Privacy Day began in North America in January 2008. It's an extension of Europe's Data Protection Day, which commemorates the 1981 signing of the first legally binding international treaty to deal with privacy and data protection. Twitter: @JessiefDavis

SCIO Health Analytics has acquired Westlake Village, California-based Clear Vision Information Systems, the companies announced Thursday. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Clear Vision provides software-as-a-service analytics focused on risk adjustment and quality metric strategies for health plans and providers. SCIO Health Analytics CEO Siva Namasivayam said combining Clear Vision's analytics offerings and outreach services with SCIO's predictive and prescriptive analytics tools will help clients better manage the transition from fee-for-service to value-based care. Namasivayam points to the government’s goal of tying 30 percent of payments to value-based mechanisms such as accountable care organizations by the end of 2016, and 50 percent by the end of 2018, and said the combined offering will help ease the shift. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] The acquisition of Clear Vision – whose clients include government and commercial health plans/payers, providers, medical groups and ACOs – adds to SCIO’s offerings in the ever-growing analytics market. "The two sets of technologies dovetail nicely to deliver a well-rounded picture of the changes organizations need to make to achieve their goals,” said Tom Peterson, founder, president and CEO of Clear Vision, in statement Peterson founded Clear Vision with Pam Klugman in 2006. Both will join SCIO Health Analytics in executive roles. Twitter: @HealthITNews

For the sixth straight year, Epic has secured the top spot for Overall Software Suite in the Best in KLAS: Software & Services report, which is compiled based on feedback from healthcare providers. Epic was also named the best Overall Physician Practice Vendor and received Best in KLAS awards in seven segments. The Verona, Wisconsin-based behemoth also won for best acute care EMR, ambulatory EMR, and patient portal. Epic also notched a win in the health information exchange category, for its Care Everywhere technology. Impact Advisors, meanwhile, was tops in the Overall IT Services Firm category for the fourth year running, also winning Best in KLAS for IT Advisory Services. Also, with a 20 percent score increase from last year, Medicity won recognition as the overall most improved vendor for its population health technology. Among vendors who received multiple Best in KLAS awards, Merge earned three for cardiology, radiology and VNA/image archive; athenahealth, CareTech Solutions, CureMD and Galen Healthcare each earned two awards. "As healthcare continues to evolve, it is imperative that we seek innovation and constantly address the needs of a shifting market," said Adam Gale, CEO and president of KLAS in a statement.  "KLAS is honored to work with talented healthcare providers who willingly share their experiences with us and make the Best in KLAS report possible," he said. "We also commend all the vendors who strive to improve their products and services in order to provide the best possible healthcare." Here is the full list of winners: Award Category Recipient Award Category Recipient SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Acute Care EMR Epic EpicCare Inpatient EMR (Large - Over 200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Ambulatory EMR (1-10 Physicians) CureMD EMR (1-10 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Ambulatory EMR (11-75 Physicians) athenahealth athenaClinicals SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Ambulatory EMR (Over 75 Physicians) Epic EpicCare Ambulatory EMR (Over 75 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Business Intelligence/ Analytics Dimensional Insight The Diver Solution SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Cardiology Merge Cardio SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Claims and Clearinghouse ZirMed Clearinghouse SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Community HIS MEDITECH C/S Community HIS (v.6) (Small - 1-200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Document Management and Imaging Hyland OnBase SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Emergency Department Wellsoft EDIS SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE ERP Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Global (Non-US) Acute EMR InterSystems TrakCare EPR SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Global (Non-US) PACS Sectra PACS (Non-US) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Global (Non-US) Patient Administration Systems Cerner Millennium Patient Administration System (Non-US) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Health Information Exchange (HIE) Epic Care Everywhere SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Homecare Thornberry NDoc SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Laboratory McKesson Lab SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Long-Term Care PointClickCare SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE PACS Sectra PACS (Large - Over 200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Access Experian Health eCare NEXT (Passport) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Accounting and Patient Management Epic Resolute Hospital Billing (Large - Over 200 Beds) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Portals Epic MyChart SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Population Health IBM Population Health Management Suite (Phytel) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Practice Management (1-10 Physicians) CureMD PMS SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Practice Management (11-75 Physicians) athenahealth athenaCollector (11-75 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Practice Management (Over 75 Physicians) Epic Resolute/Prelude/Cadence Ambulatory (Over 75 Physicians) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Radiology Merge Unity RIS (DR Systems) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Speech Recognition - Front End Dolbey Fusion SpeechEMR (EMR) SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE Surgery Management Epic OpTime SEGMENT LEADERS: SOFTWARE VNA/Image Archive Merge iConnect Enterprise Archive SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Application Hosting (CIS ERP HIS) Cerner Application Hosting (CIS/ERP/HIS) SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Extended Business Office Navigant Cymetrix SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Extensive IT Outsourcing CareTech Solutions SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES HIT Enterprise Implementation Leadership Navin, Hafty & Associates (NHA) SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES HIT Implementation Support & Staffing Galen Healthcare SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES IT Advisory Services Impact Advisors SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Partial IT Outsourcing CareTech Solutions SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Revenue Cycle Transformation Deloitte Consulting SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Technical Services Galen Healthcare SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Value-Based Care Advisory Services Premier SEGMENT LEADERS: PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Value-Based Care Managed Services Lumeris CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE 340B Management Systems Macro Helix 340B Architect CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Acute Care EMR (Community) Cerner Millenium PowerChart/CommunityWorks Clinicals CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Alarm Management Connexall CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Anatomic Pathology Cerner CoPathPlus CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Anesthesia Epic Anesthesia Information Management System CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Cardiology Hemodynamics Merge Hemo CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE CDI Software Chartwise CDI CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Chargemaster Management Craneware Chargemaster Toolkit CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Claims Management MedAssets Claims Management CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Care Plans Zynx Health ZynxCare CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Order Sets Zynx Health ZynxOrder CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Point of Care Clinical Reference VisualDx (Logical Images) CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Clinical Decision Support - Surveillance Wolters Kluwer Pharmacy OneSource Sentri7 CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Computer-Assisted Coding Optum Optum360 Enterprise CAC CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Decision Support - Business Strata Decision StrataJazz Decision Support CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE ECG Data Management Epiphany Healthcare cardio Server CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Enterprise Advanced Visualization Philips IntellisSpace Portal CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Enterprise Scheduling Streamline Health Looking Glass Enterprise Scheduling and Resource Management CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Image Exchange DICOM Grid DG Suite CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Infection Control and Monitoring BD MedMined (CareFusion) CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Integration Engines Corepoint Health Integration Engine CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Interactive Patient Systems TVRC pCare CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Labor and Delivery Clinical Computer Systems OBIX Perinatal Data System CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Laboratory (Small/Ambulatory) Orchard Harvest LIS CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Medical Device Integration Systems Capsule DataCaptor CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Medical Records Coding 3M Codefinder CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Mobile Data Systems Ingenious Med impower & MedAptus Pro Charge Capture CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Oncology Varian ARIA CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE PACS (Ambulatory) INFINITT PACS CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE PACS (Community) INFINITT PACS CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Accounting and Patient Management (Community) MEDITECH C/S Patient Accounting CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Flow TeleTracking Capacity Management Suite CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Patient Privacy Monitoring Iatric Systems Security Audit Manager CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Pharmacy - Outpatient (Retail) QS/1 NRx CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Point of Use Inventory Management PAR Excellence Systems CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Quality Management Nuance Clintegrity 360 Quality Management Solutions CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Secure Messaging Imprivata Cortext CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Single Sign-On Imprivata OneSign Single Sign-On CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Speech Recognition - Back End Dolbey Fusion Speech CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Staff/Nurse Scheduling GE Healthcare API Healthcare ShiftSelect CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Talent Management Halogen Software TalentSpace for Healthcare CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Time and Attendance Kronos Workforce Timekeeper CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Treatment Planning Varian Eclipse CATEGORY LEADERS: SOFTWARE Urgent Care Practice Velocity VelociDoc Tablet Urgent Care CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Business Solutions Implementation Services Xerox CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES CDI Services PwC CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Go-Live Support Apex Systems CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Outsourced Coding Oxford Healthcare IT (On Assignment) CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Release of Information MRO Corp CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Revenue Cycle Outsourcing MedAssets CATEGORY LEADERS: SERVICES Transcription Services FutureNet Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN

The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute has approved $70 million for nine new patient-centered research projects. The new studies will focus on conditions ranging from a type of very early-stage, localized breast cancer to diabetes, chronic lung disease and migraines. [Also: PCORI adds $142M for big data research] With these latest awards, PCORI has now approved or awarded more than $1.2 billion for research. The new studies will compare: active surveillance to traditional treatments, effectiveness of two common medications for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, varying approaches to smoking cessation among adults with mental illness, competing approaches to managing chronic migraines and the use of inhaled corticosteroid versus symptom-based use in treating asthma exacerbations.  PCORI is an independent, nonprofit organization authorized by Congress in 2010. Its mission is to fund research to provide patients, their caregivers, and clinicians with evidence-based information needed to make better-informed healthcare decisions. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] PCORI also awarded $6.7 million to three members of PCORnet as part of its ongoing work to establish a national patient-centered clinical research network. That money will go toward studying population health policies and interventions for type II diabetes. The agency awarded another $5.2 million to researching the effectiveness of wellness coaches for African Americans with uncontrolled diabetes. And PCORI allocated $3.8 million for a study to determine the optimal dose of aspirin for preventing heart attacks and strokes. Twitter: @HealthITNews

MedicFP LLC, a new vendor that focuses on combating phantom billing and other healthcare fraud, and Fujitsu will debut an identity validation product that scans palm veins at HIMSS16.