Health Care Reform as a Technology Innovation Stimulus

---Paul Dausman, CEO, Valiant Health  See also http://www.valianthealth.com/blog/health-care-reform-as-a-technology-innovation-stimulus/

The regulatory and compliance requirements emanating from the Affordable Care Act, coupled with incentives for providers to move manual processes to automated ones has stimulated the growth of technology and service vendors to enable health care businesses to stay in the game.  Some entrepreneurial vendors are aiming their innovative solutions at the patient; others are focused on the doctor’s office and the information which is needed while care is being rendered.  Many are focused on cost management, fraud detection, or waste reduction at the population health or plan level.    

It has occurred to me, however, that solutions that consume the publicly available data and that data gathered by the doctor or member at the point of care will afford only a part of what is needed. 

In fact, the change (as described in the New York Times Opinion piece link below) that is coming will require a complete re-engineering from the top to the bottom of the existing health plan and provider care models.  Healthcare Performance Management (HCMP) systems will enable all parties within a program to be on the same page in terms of developing priorities and sound action plans. 

Thomas L. Friedman noted in his NYT article that while the US has had the best but most expensive health care in the world, the goal of the new health care law is to “flip this fee-for-services system (which some insurance companies are emulating) to one where the government pays doctors and hospitals to keep Medicare patients healthy and the services they do render are reimbursed more for their value than volume.”

Proving that the “flip” is successful or just “cheaper” is going to require data, fed into HCMP systems that will shine a light on what health care organizations need to do first and whether or not they are risking failure over the course of time in any specific measurable area or for any specific patient.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/26/opinion/sunday/friedman-obamacares-other-surprise.html?ref=thomaslfriedman&_r=1&

Paul Dausman is the CEO of Valiant Health, LLC, and has an extensive history as an entrepreneur in the health care and information technology areas.

New “Safety” Technology Assists Pharmacists with Drug Identification - PROVIDER

By----Terri Bernacchi, PharmD, MBA,

Health Advisory Professionals 

People often take their meds out of the pill bottle and mix them together so that they don’t have to carry around a dozen bottles; this is especially true if you travel because it’s a hassle to carry around that big bag.  Or, for the sake of convenience, they put them in a pill box, by the day or week. 

Unfortunately, when removed from the ‘label’ that describes what they are and how to take them, a family member or health professional, trying to assess what med is being taken and when, is lost as to what is going on.

Having worked in a hospital pharmacy for a number of years, I can vouch for the following:  It is not uncommon for a patient to arrive (sometimes unconscious) with pills that are mixed in a bag or bottle, without proper identification.  The patient or family is not sure what the drugs are or why they are taking them and the urgent identification of the drug profile is critical to properly care for patients, avoiding potential lethal drug interactions. The pharmacy or doctor’s office profile on the patient may not be up-to-date, so a simple call to one or the other is helpful, but not complete.  And (I know it is shocking), people sometimes share meds that were prescribed for someone else.  The hospital pharmacist is called in to assist with the identification process which consumes precious time in an urgent situation.

Centice Corp has announced the development of a new technology that will “sense” the compounds in these pills, offering not only a safety net for such situations in the real world, but a practical means for helping the pharmacist or physician to identify meds in a regular outpatient setting.   

Centice first optimizes patented computational sensor technology (based on electromagnetic spectrometry) to rapidly generate a unique chemical fingerprint for each sample which is tracked to specific drug compounds.  The product is marketed under the name “PINPOINT Rx” and helps physicians and pharmacists to identify prescription drugs.

For more on this technology, read the link:  http://www.centice.com/news-events/entry/pinpointrx/

Terri currently works for a large health sciences firm serving payers, pharmaceutical and device manufacturers and other stakeholders in health care as a Senior Principal in Managed Markets.  The thoughts put forth on these postings are not necessarily reflective of the views of her employer nor other Health Thought Leader colleagues.   Terri has had a varied career in health related settings including:  9 years in a clinical hospital pharmacy setting, 3 years as a pharmaceutical sales rep serving government, wholesaler, managed markets and traditional physician sales, 3 years working for the executive team of an integrated health system working with physician practices, 4 years as the director of pharmacy for a large BCBS plan, 12 years experience as founder and primary servant of a health technology company which was sold to her current employer three years ago.   She has both a BS and a PharmD in Pharmacy and an MBA