Objectives To explore the challenges Health Information Technology (HIT) vendors face to satisfy the requirements for Meaningful Use (MU) and Electronic Laboratory Reporting (ELR) of reportable diseases to the public health departments in Kentucky. Methodology A survey was conducted of Health Information Exchange (HIE) vendors in Kentucky through the Kentucky Health Information Exchange (KHIE...

Government incentives and mandates to increase the meaningful use of electronic health records (EHR), with subsequent disincentives by Medicare, have made a significant push for dermatologists to adopt this technology into their practices. EHRs were originally developed for primary care physicians; however, owing to the unique features of dermatology, specialty-specific systems are a must. In t...

We outline the fundamental properties of a highly participatory rapid learning system that can be developed in part from meaningful use of electronic health records (EHRs). Future widespread adoption of EHRs will make increasing amounts of medical information available in computable form. Secured and trusted use of these data, beyond their original purpose of supporting the health care of indiv...

Introduction The Syndromic Surveillance Consortium of Southeast Texas (SSCSeT) consists of 13 stakeholders who represent 19 counties or jurisdictions in the Texas Gulf Coast region and receives health data from over 100 providers. The Houston Health Department (HHD) maintains and operates the syndromic surveillance system for the Gulf Coast region since 2007. In preparation for Meaningful Use (...

Since the passage of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act provisions included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) in February 2009, the government has released three sets of statutorily required regulations: one addressing breach notification requirements for protected health information (PHI) and two addressing Medicare and Medicaid i...

Health-information exchange, that is, enabling the interoperability of automated health data, can facilitate important improvements in healthcare quality and efficiency. A vision of interoperability and its benefits was articulated more than a decade ago. Since then, important advances toward the goal have been made. The advent of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Heal...

The establishment of the Meaningful Use criteria has created a critical need for robust interoperability of health records. A universal definition of a personal health record (PHR) has not been agreed upon. Standardized code sets have been built for specific entities, but integration between them has not been supported. The purpose of this research study was to explore the hindrance and promoti...

BACKGROUND Meaningful use, as defined by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, will require the aggregation of patient data to enable population assessment. Little is known about the proportion of physicians who are able to meet meaningful use criteria or their use of electronic health records (EHRs) to manage patient populations. OBJECTIVE To evaluate physicians' reports of EHR adopt...

OBJECTIVE To examine the effectiveness and meaningful use of paediatric surgical safety checklists (SSCs) and their implementation strategies through a systematic review with narrative synthesis. SUMMARY BACKGROUND DATA Since the launch of the WHO SSC, checklists have been integrated into surgical systems worldwide. Information is sparse on how SSCs have been integrated into the paediatric su...

UNLABELLED The field of ophthalmology has a number of unique features compared with other medical and surgical specialties regarding clinical workflow and data management. This has important implications for the design of electronic health record (EHR) systems that can be used intuitively and efficiently by ophthalmologists and that can promote improved quality of care. Ophthalmologists often l...