ONC's Cures Act: Empowering Patients, Drive Innovation, and Spur App Economy
10/20/20 • 29 min
In this episode of TWIHT we focus on the ONC's Cures Act Final act which is all about "Empowering Patients with Their Health Record in a Modern Health IT Economy".
The ONC Cures Act Final Rule implements interoperability requirements outlined in the Cures Act.
Vik and Jimmy jump into the details about how this Act helps Patients. Putting the patient first in health technology enables the health care system to deliver:
- Transparency into the cost and outcomes of their care
- Competitive options in getting medical care
- Modern smartphone apps to provide them convenient access to their records
- An app economy that provides patients, physicians, hospitals, payers, and employers with innovation and choice
Vik mentions about the API access that has already been enabled by EHRs and how it is allowing patients to access their health information on iPhone and Android devices.
Vik indicates that this ruling will spur up an App Economy, starting from purchasing a health service by comparing services and pricing provided by healthcare providers.
Another example would be the way information would be available to patients instead of the standard patient portal, where understanding the health / medical record is not very easy for most patients.
This is going to promote better health and better outcomes since it puts patients first.
Jimmy comments that this does sound amazing for patients but could be bad for bad performing clinics and hospitals. Vik said it will definitely increase patient quality because now the data available will show patient outcomes for every provider.
Vik and Jimmy also discuss privacy and security concerns. Vik discusses that you still need to follow the security protocols, OAuth2 to access patient information. There is also governance and authorization and it's not just open data. Vik compares it to banking budgeting apps that have to be authorized by the user and also need a valid back-end connection with the bank. The same idea will be used with the FHIR API access in healthcare and privacy and security concerns will be addressed.
Jimmy asks if everyone is for this ruling and Vik indicates that not everyone is. Big Tech (Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon), even more EHRs (Cerner, AllScripts, Meditech, etc). are for the ruling. Epic EHR did oppose this ruling based on patient privacy concerns.
Vik comments that innovation is also going to benefit clinicians as the app economy will lead to the development of many apps for every service provided by healthcare.
Jimmy and Vik also comment on few other examples including sharing medical record between clinicians and hospitals.
Website: http://www.thisweekinhealthtech.com
Twitter: @TWIHT1
Tido Inc.: https://www.tidoinc.com/
Music Provided by Soundstripe.com
Linkedin: Vik Patel
Linkedin: Jimmy Kim
Support the show (http://www.thisweekinhealthtech.com/)
Listen to all This Week in Health Tech episodes
Vik Patel - LinkedIn
Tido Inc. - Website
Tido Inc. - LinkedIn
In this episode of TWIHT we focus on the ONC's Cures Act Final act which is all about "Empowering Patients with Their Health Record in a Modern Health IT Economy".
The ONC Cures Act Final Rule implements interoperability requirements outlined in the Cures Act.
Vik and Jimmy jump into the details about how this Act helps Patients. Putting the patient first in health technology enables the health care system to deliver:
- Transparency into the cost and outcomes of their care
- Competitive options in getting medical care
- Modern smartphone apps to provide them convenient access to their records
- An app economy that provides patients, physicians, hospitals, payers, and employers with innovation and choice
Vik mentions about the API access that has already been enabled by EHRs and how it is allowing patients to access their health information on iPhone and Android devices.
Vik indicates that this ruling will spur up an App Economy, starting from purchasing a health service by comparing services and pricing provided by healthcare providers.
Another example would be the way information would be available to patients instead of the standard patient portal, where understanding the health / medical record is not very easy for most patients.
This is going to promote better health and better outcomes since it puts patients first.
Jimmy comments that this does sound amazing for patients but could be bad for bad performing clinics and hospitals. Vik said it will definitely increase patient quality because now the data available will show patient outcomes for every provider.
Vik and Jimmy also discuss privacy and security concerns. Vik discusses that you still need to follow the security protocols, OAuth2 to access patient information. There is also governance and authorization and it's not just open data. Vik compares it to banking budgeting apps that have to be authorized by the user and also need a valid back-end connection with the bank. The same idea will be used with the FHIR API access in healthcare and privacy and security concerns will be addressed.
Jimmy asks if everyone is for this ruling and Vik indicates that not everyone is. Big Tech (Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon), even more EHRs (Cerner, AllScripts, Meditech, etc). are for the ruling. Epic EHR did oppose this ruling based on patient privacy concerns.
Vik comments that innovation is also going to benefit clinicians as the app economy will lead to the development of many apps for every service provided by healthcare.
Jimmy and Vik also comment on few other examples including sharing medical record between clinicians and hospitals.
Website: http://www.thisweekinhealthtech.com
Twitter: @TWIHT1
Tido Inc.: https://www.tidoinc.com/
Music Provided by Soundstripe.com
Linkedin: Vik Patel
Linkedin: Jimmy Kim
Support the show (http://www.thisweekinhealthtech.com/)
Listen to all This Week in Health Tech episodes
Vik Patel - LinkedIn
Tido Inc. - Website
Tido Inc. - LinkedIn
Previous Episode
How to Improve Provider and Patient Telehealth Experience
In this episode of This Week in Health Tech, Vik and Jimmy focus on telehealth experience and making changes to provide an optimal user experience for providers and patients.
Like it or not, this pandemic has pushed telehealth to the forefront and usage has gone up more than a hundred percent.
Vik flips the script on Jimmy and in this episode wants to ask questions to Jimmy, so listeners learn audio, video, and other technical aspects of a video visit from Jimmy.
They start out by focusing on audio since that according to Jimmy is the number one important factor of a video visit. Even though it needs to be visual, is because audio adds depth to the visual. You can't really show empathy that well on a video visit but using audio you can clearly hear and show empathy. Especially dealing w/ sensitive health information.
Jimmy likes apple AirPods because it allows you to move around freely and the sound quality is the top-notch however battery life of the AirPods is definitely challenging.
Vik and Jimmy comment that most times it seems that physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners use mobile phones or tablets for the virtual visit, and it does not seem like there is a dedicated desk for virtual visits.
Vik indicates that he uses a wired Samsung Q2U microphone, it was inexpensive, and the sound quality is quite good. Jimmy uses a Blue Yeti microphone which has lots of settings for a single speaker or group of speakers. Microphones were out of stock when everyone started working from home but it does look like more microphones are now available in online stores.
Vik indicates that connectivity is also very crucial for a video visit and providers and patients and recommends using home internet connection over phone wireless connection for better quality. If possible to use a wired connection, especially for providers in a hospital or clinic setting, then that should be used for better quality.
Jimmy comments about video quality and there are many kinds of video cameras available for desktops. There are even tools available to make the high-quality back camera of a phone into your main video conference camera. There are also surround cameras available for work or home office, so even if you move around and look at different screens, you won't go out of focus on the video call.
Jimmy recommends having the video at face level, it should never be below face level.
The other aspect of making the telehealth experience seamless is that the visitor experience starts with scheduling the video visit. Patients should be able to easily pick open timeslots, pre-register online, and then receive very clear video visit instructions. This compares to the traditional way when a patient's visit experience is impacted by parking, building elevator, wayfinding, etc.
Jimmy also recommends having very good online manners and having a quiet space without distractions for the video visit. It is also a good idea to close apps on your phone or tablet to improve performance and reduce distractions before the telehealth visit.
Website: http://www.thisweekinhealthtech.com
Twitter: @TWIHT1
Tido Inc.: https://www.tidoinc.com/
Music Provided by Soundstripe.com
Linkedin:
Listen to all This Week in Health Tech episodes
Vik Patel - LinkedIn
Tido Inc. - Website
Tido Inc. - LinkedIn
Next Episode
There's never enough testing - Test Automation with Ryan Neaves and Laura O'Toole
In this episode of This Week in Health Tech, we welcome Ryan Neaves, VP, Care Applications from Novant Health, and Laura O'Tool, President, Santa Rosa Consulting. We focus on test automation for Electronic Health Record systems and also for digital testing of mobile and web applications.
As some wise person noted, there is never enough testing to provide the best user experience and satisfaction. Tido Inc. has test automation packages which help end to end testing of all workflows for EHR and also for the growing number of mobile and web applications with digital transformation in healthcare.
Laura comments that we are always scrambling to do testing or cover all the workflows. Testing is required for multiple reasons including whenever we are upgrading EHR or health systems. And we need to do enough rigorous testing because we care about patients and providing the best healthcare. So it is important all the scenario testing, integrated testing are covered in an automated fashion. This also frees up resources to actually focus on patient care. Especially in these difficult pandemic times, it is crucial to allow key resources to have confidence in health systems and not be bogged down by testing or incorrect workflows.
Ryan comments that it has been a great journey for Novant health and implementing test automation. There were also some unintended consequences of the test automation strategy. He also indicates that test automation has been used in other industries forever. While in healthcare we do testing with getting people in a room and running through workflows once.
Laura indicates that we have increased innovation in healthcare and Ryan agrees that we search for opportunities, and as the industry changes, there are a lot of tools available.
Vik agrees with Ryan that he has been part of those testing calls that Ryan mentioned where resources get together in a room. But a lot of times, there was no documentation of scenarios, it was mainly just relying on clinical personnel remembering workflows.
Ryan comments that traditionally you are relying on the key 3 or 4 personnel, and even when you do the testing manually once, it is still only done once! Laura provides an example of how many different data elements or workflows that have to be considered so testing once is definitely not enough.
The other issue Ryan highlights are that key resources don't enjoy testing as it takes away from more important tasks at hand. Vik asks Ryan what were some of the challenges with test automation implementation.
Ryan indicated that culture shift or change of mentality was one of the main challenges. It was wrestling that control and providing confidence to staff that test automation will test applications thoroughly and intended as it needs to be tested.
Vik comments that with the COVID situation, digital transformation is happening rapidly, so from a digital strategy, there will be an increasing number of mobile and web apps. Ryan indicates that Novant is looking at everything including machine learning and AI. Ryan provides the example of telehealth and how they went from a few hundred users to 30000 users and it highlighted issues that were not known below. Laura comments that because of COVID through health systems into the frying pan and really highlighted the skills of healthcare staff and forced us to be more innovative and utilize automation.
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Vik Patel - LinkedIn
Tido Inc. - Website
Tido Inc. - LinkedIn
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