On December 28, 2015, President Obama signed into law a hardship exemption for providers and hospitals under the Meaningful Use program. The legislation will create a blanket hardship exemption from 2015’s Meaningful Use Program penalties, due to be assessed in 2017. Eligible professionals have until March 15 and eligible hospitals until April 1 to apply for exemptions.

Americans Return to Healthcare.Gov for Coverage 

 

More than 8.5 million Americans have signed up for individual health insurance or renewed their previous coverage through the online exchanges according to a Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) report. Roughly 71 percent of enrollees renewed prior coverage. Sixty percent returned to healthcare.gov to update information, investigate options, or select new plans according to CMS. The report includes enrollees for 2016 coverage through December 26 in 38 of the 50 states that use the Affordable Care Act federal marketplace exchange. Hospitals, insurers, and investors are watching the numbers very carefully to determine future business trends. Projections indicate that 9.9 million people will be enrolled by the end of 2016.

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) released a request for information (RFI) entitled Certification Frequency and Requirements for the Reporting of Quality Measures under CMS Programs. The agencies are requesting feedback to improve the effectiveness of certifying of health IT, specifically certification and testing of EHR products that are used for the reporting of quality measures. CMS and ONC hope to streamline/reduce provider, hospital, and health IT developer burden.

Tele-ICU use improves performance and communication-Nurses

 

According to a study released this month in the American Journal of Critical Care (AJCC), telemedicine tools help intensive care unit (ICU) nurses communicate more effectively, improve performance, and accomplish tasks faster. The study surveyed 1213 nurses nationwide in tele-ICU facilities to evaluate their perceptions of telemedicine. Seventy-five percent of respondents said that the use of these tools improved care. Specific benefits include: detecting trends in vital signs, detecting unstable physiological status, enhancing patient safety, and providing medical management. The authors noted barriers to the use of telemedicine, including attitudes of staff, technical problems, perceptions of telemedicine as an interference, and interruptions in care. "The findings can be used to further inform the development of competencies for tele-intensive care nursing, match the tele-intensive care nursing practice guidelines of the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses, and highlight concepts related to the association's standards for establishing and sustaining healthy work environments,” the researchers concluded.

Accenture Report Finds Few Patients Utilize Hospital Provided Applications

 

According to a report from consulting firm Accenture, two thirds of the 100 largest hospitals nationwide offer their patients mobile health applications. However, only two percent of patients actually utilize the hospital-provided apps. The report attributes the low utilization rate to applications that do not properly align functionalities with patient expectations. According to the report, only 11 percent of hospital-provided mobile applications had one or more of the three most desired functions: access to medical records, prescription fill requests, and appointment scheduling.

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