Electronic Health Records (EHR, EMR)

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT wants to use EHR certification criteria to make it easier for physicians to report patient safety events. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality will encourage providers to report adverse events to patient safety organizations, and ONC will propose certification requirements that, where appropriate, EHRs can report safety events in AHRQ's Common Formats.

The U.S. Coast Guard has awarded a $17 million contract to Science Applications International Corporation to provide services and operational support for USCG's Integrated Health Information System (IHiS), officials announced this month.

"Concerned, but not panicking," is how Allscripts' biggest customer describes his reaction to the EHR vendor's switch at the top -- one that has CEO Glen Tullman stepping down, and former Cerner executive Paul Black, now steering the ship. Allscripts customers give both men kudos for leadership, but say the turnaround has to be decisive -- and quick.

Thinking of gift ideas for that special health IT someone this holiday season? Want to explore the creative side of gift-giving and outdo last year's gift of that Epic EMR or RTLS tracking? Look no further.

Allscripts CEO Glen Tullman has resigned, and Paul M. Black, former chief operating officer at Cerner, is taking the reins as president and CEO of the company after months of turmoil and speculation on its potential sale.

For the coming new year, healthcare groups and their business associates need to get their privacy and security houses in order, as they will be facing new audits and more monetary enforcement surrounding data breaches -- this according to Leon Rodriguez, director of the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) at the Department of Health and Human Services.

The recommendations for Stage 3 of meaningful use are now out for comment. Coincidentally or not, there is a new degree of pessimism about when health IT interoperability will ever be achieved.

In 2011, Micky Tripathi, founder and CEO of Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative (MAeHC) and health IT industry expert, found himself in unfamiliar territory after an unencrypted MAeHC laptop containing 14,475 patient medical records was stolen from an employee's locked car. After working to rectify the situation transparently, Tripathi said no one is immune from data breaches.

As Tim Zoph sees it, it's decision time for patient data security -- a defining moment for "one of the issues of our time in healthcare," that demands healthcare leaders everywhere step up. Zoph, CIO of Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago since 1993 and a CHIME/HIMSS CIO of the Year, headlined the Healthcare IT News and HIMSS Media Privacy & Security Forum Dec. 12 in Boston.

At the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology 2012 Annual Meeting, held Dec. 12 in Washington, DC, Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) told attendees that interoperability is a lynch pin for health IT advancement, and it is currently lacking.