Premier in the news
2007 archive
Teaming up; The Journal of Healthcare Contracting; 12/07 issue:
This article looks at the Colonial Regional Alliance and how it came to be
with guidance from Premier. "Premier is the glue that holds the organization
together," explains John Derr, director of materials management, Washington
County Health System.
Full
story
An industry left to its own devices?; Materials Management in
Health Care; 12/07 issue: Premier's Mike Alkire provides valuable
insight into what could come of orthopedic vendor-hospital relationships and
how changes could affect materials management.
Full story
Cover story: High-risk proposition; Modern Healthcare; 12/3/07:
This article discusses Medicare's plan for value-based purchasing and
features insights from Alegent Health and Hackensack University Medical
Center, as well as Premier's Blair Childs.
Full story (login required)
A call to action: Eliminating healthcare-associated infections;
Infection Control Today; 11/27/07: This article from Premier’s Dan
Peterson and Salah Qutaishat discusses what hospitals can do to eliminate
healthcare-associated infections.
Full story
Cover story: IT on infection detail; Healthcare IT News; 11/07
issue: This article discusses a recent survey by Premier regarding
healthcare-associated infections and what hospitals are doing to combat
them.
Full story
Medicare proposes hospital reimbursement overhaul; Modern
Healthcare and The Wall Street Journal; 11/27/07: On November 26,
the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services proposed to Congress a plan to
implement nationally Value Based Purchasing, also known as
pay-for-performance. Premier's Blair Childs, senior vice president of public
affairs, and Stacey Brown, vice president of communications and public
relations, were quoted in articles published in Modern Healthcare and The
Wall Street Journal.
Full story:
Modern Healthcare (login required),
The Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Cash incentives for Merseyside hospitals to improve care; Liverpool
Daily Post; 11/27/07: NHS North West in the United Kingdom will
today announce a scheme called ‘advancing quality’ which it hopes will lead
to higher standards of care across the NHS in the North West. The region’s
hospitals, primary care trusts and ambulance trust will receive extra cash
if they meet standards set by NHS North West. An American company, Premier
Inc., has been brought in to oversee the project.
Full story
Six Mass. hospitals lauded for quality, cost efficiency; The Boston
Globe; 11/26/07: Six Massachusetts hospitals have received the 2007
Select Practice National Quality awards from Premier | CareScience, a
nationwide association of not-for profit hospitals.
Full story
'Never' land; Hospitals & Health Networks magazine; 11/07
issue: This story focuses on transparency and the reduction of hospital
errors, featuring comments from the Premier Safety Institute's Gina Pugliese.
Full story
Premier launches expanded hospital quality initiative; Physician's
News Digest; 11/07 issue: This article features a Q&A session with
Premier Vice President and Medical Director Richard Bankowitz, MD, regarding
the Premier QUEST initiative.
Full story
Electronic surveillance systems aid ICPs in outbreak investigation;
Infection Control Today; 10/29/07: According to this article,
Premier’s SafetySurveillor is among several programs that can save valuable
time and remove uncertainty and inconsistency when it comes to tracking
methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, Clostridium difficile, and
other infections.
Full story
Does pay for performance pay?; HFMA; 10/07 issue: This article
discusses the Premier/CMS HQID project and the next steps with P4P.
Full story (.pdf) – Used with
permission of the Healthcare Financial Management Association's The Business
of Caring, www.hfma.org/boc
Premier launches comprehensive quality improvement project; Drug
Topics; 10/22/07: A new project called QUEST by the healthcare
alliance Premier Inc. is an aggressive attempt to develop performance
measures that improve quality and lower costs.
Full story
Bad bugs common; Pros to fight them scarce; The Wall Street Journal
health blog; 10/15/07: This Wall Street Journal health blog posting
highlights a recent Premier survey regarding healthcare associated
infections and features Premier client Virtua Health and Premier's Dan
Peterson, M.D. According to Premier's survey, in which nearly 800 hospitals
responded, almost half called "inadequate staffing" the biggest problem they
faced on the infection front.
Full story
QUEST: Toward a new healthcare paradigm; HealthLeaders Media;
9/27/07:
This bylined article from Premier President and CEO Rick Norling discusses
the keys to transforming the U.S. healthcare system to improve quality,
highlighting the Premier QUEST project.
Full story
Cover story: Shedding light on quality; Trustee Magazine; 9/07
issue: This article looks at today’s top healthcare quality initiatives, including
the Premier/CMS HQID project.
Full story
Solve a unique challenge; Materials Management in Health Care;
9/07 issue: The health care industry has always known there’s been a
need for unique device identification, but not until recent events has the
urgency to act been so great. In October 2006, Premier surveyed its members
to better understand how the industry tracks and records medical device
recalls – and the results were telling. More than 80 percent of health care
professionals believe that an industrywide UDI for medical devices would
enhance patient safety. Other studies prove that billions of dollars could
be saved.
Full story
Hospital food that won't make you sick; The Wall Street Journal;
9/19/07: This article features executives from Premier Foodservice
members Avera Heart Hospital and Baptist Health South Florida discussing
high quality, healthy hospital food offerings at their facilities.
Full story
Involving R.Ph.s helped these hospitals nab Premier award; Drug
Topics; 9/17/07: Pharmacist participation in performance improvement
was indispensable to recipients of the recent Premier Inc. 2007 Award for
Quality.
Full story
Cover story: Is I.T. the key to preventing hospital infections;
Health Data Management; 9/4/07: This article looks at Edgewood,
KY-based St. Elizabeth Medical Center and its successes using Premier’s
SafetySurveillor.
Full story
Premier unveils QUEST program; Healthcare Finance News;
9/1/07: The Premier healthcare alliance is looking for additional
supporters as it plans to launch a project to test the viability of a
program intended to increase patient safety and healthcare quality,
while rewarding top performers with extra payments.
Full
story
Achieving higher value in health care; Greater Charlotte Biz;
9/07 issue: This feature article focuses on Premier’s ability to be
a visionary company under the leadership of Chief Operating Officer
Susan DeVore.
Full
story
Scoring high; Health Executive; 9/07 issue: Any improvement
in clinical quality scores can save patient lives, but only the highest
scores bring financial rewards to hospitals in a pay-for-performance model.
That’s what East Alabama Medical Center and more than 260 other hospitals
that are participating in the CMS/Premier Hospital Quality Incentive
Demonstration project have discovered.
("Full story" link no longer active)
Optimizing quality and cost; Repertoire magazine; 8/07 issue:
Premier stands at the “nexus of quality and cost,” and it intends to use
data to help it stay there. As a national GPO, San Diego-based Premier
remains concerned with the price and quality of the products for which it
contracts. But the organization kept its focus on the quality of patient
care at this year’s Breakthroughs Conference in Orlando, FL.
Full story
Bonuses spur 3 Charlotte-area hospitals to improve; The Charlotte
Observer; 8/5/07: Three Charlotte-area hospitals have received
financial rewards the past two years for meeting nationally recognized
standards of care of heart disease, pneumonia, and knee and hip replacement
surgery. Gaston Memorial Hospital in Gastonia, Stanly Regional Medical
Center in Albemarle and Cleveland Regional Medical Center in Shelby are
among 31 Carolinas hospitals – 250 U.S. hospitals total – participating in a pay-for-performance project sponsored by
Premier and CMS.
("Full story" link no longer active)
A report from the Perinatal Innovation Workgroup: Reducing harm to
infants during labor and delivery; Healthcare Technology Horizons,
supplement to Biomedical Instrumentation & Technology; 7/07 issue:
The work to date of the Perinatal Innovation Workgroup, a collaboration of
the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, Ascension Health of St. Louis, and
Premier Inc. and its member hospitals, recommends perinatal care bundles be
used when deciding whether to induce labor electively and for managing labor
that is not progressing. The project was initiated to change obstetric
healthcare delivery so that fewer infants are harmed during the delivery
process and that costs from avoidable medical errors and malpractice claims
are reduced. In the article, Premier Consulting Solutions' Kathy Connolly,
RN, M.S. Ed, CPHRM, managing principal of OB and ED Services, with
assistance from Carol E. Davis-Smith, CCE, senior consultant, Premier
Consulting Solutions, examined how technology can be employed to enhance the
implementation of these all-or-nothing bundling initiatives. They looked at
consistent terminology, electronic medical records, simulation technology
and smart pumps.
Full story (.pdf)
– Reprinted with permission from the Association for the Advancement of
Medical Instrumentation (AAMI). This article was first published in
Healthcare Technology Horizons, a supplement to AAMI’s peer-reviewed
journal, Biomedical Instrumentation & Technology. To learn more about AAMI,
visit www.aami.org.
Paying for quality; Healthcare Finance; 7/07 issue: England's
Department of Health recently confirmed that the health economy overseen by
NHS North West would be piloting a pay-for-performance system based on the
Premier/CMS Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration project. If successful,
the system could be rolled out across England.
Full story (.pdf)
Premier announces pay-for-performance initiative; Modern Healthcare; 7/26/07:
A new pay-for-performance project aims to improve patient safety and quality at
approximately 100 hospitals nationwide, Premier announced.
QUEST: High Performing Hospitals – which focuses on quality, efficiency,
safety, with transparency – is a three-year program in which participating
facilities will develop and share best practices in five areas: mortality ratio,
harm avoidance, appropriate care, efficiency and patient satisfaction. The
project, which is not part of a CMS demonstration project, builds on Premier’s
Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration and the Institute for Healthcare
Improvement’s 100,000 Lives and 5 Million Lives campaigns.
Full story (login required)
DeVore leads a bottom-up approach to improvement; Charlotte
Business Journal; 7/20/07: As the chief operating officer of
health-care company Premier Inc., Susan DeVore has implemented plans to
integrate all business units, rolled out efficiencies that improved the
bottom line and engaged employees at every level to help make improvements.
Full story (.pdf)
EPEAT products offer major environmental benefits, study finds;
GreenerComputing.com; 7/17/07: In January, President Bush signed an
executive order requiring all federal agencies to buy only Electronic
Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT)-registered products in its
computer purchases. Scot Case, EPEAT's outreach and purchaser relations
manager, cited Premier as an example of a company that took EPEAT to heart
from the beginning. "They actually take the Hippocratic oath, which is
'First, do no harm to your patients' very seriously. They specify EPEAT
products because they see the connection with their patients' health."
Full
story
Cashing in on performance; Nurseweek magazine; 7/16/07: Nurses
play a key role in Medicare's trend toward awarding pay-for-performance
incentives in hospital settings, but their rewards are coming in the form of
improved patient care standards rather than a paycheck bonus. This article
features top-performing hospitals from the Premier/CMS HQID project,
including Avera Sacred Heart Hospital, St. Joseph's Medical
Center/Carondelet Health, Sisters of Charity, Aurora Health Care, and
Fairview Health System, as well as Premier project manager Diana Jackson.
("Full story" link no longer active)
The long run; Healthcare Informatics; 7/07 issue: As
the P4P race continues, providers integrate evidence-based measures with
data-gathering systems to cross the finish line. This article features
interviews with Premier and top hospitals participating in the
Premier/CMS P4P project.
Full story
Command performance; Modern Healthcare; 7/9/07: Slowly
turning up the heat for several years now, the CMS has been preparing
hospitals for the first course in a major transformation of the Medicare
reimbursement system called value-based purchasing, or
pay-for-performance. About 250 hospitals presently participating in the
Premier Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration have an inkling of the
transformation at hand.
Full story (login required)
Bug-eyed: Hospitals are using automated surveillance systems to
track infections and thwart a new generation of superbugs; Government
IT News; 7/16/07: A handful of Veterans Affairs Department
hospitals are installing automated disease surveillance systems to help
clinicians track HAIs and other infections. The infections result in
hefty financial costs for hospitals. One study of cases complicated by
central-line associated bloodstream infections found that hospitals pay
an average of $26,839 in unreimbursed fees because of extended
admissions and treatment regimens, said Dr. Dan Peterson, vice president
and medical director at Premier, an alliance of nonprofit hospitals that
manages a subscription-based disease-surveillance system.
("Full story" link no longer active)
Tackling tube misconnections; The Wall Street Journal;
6/27/07: With growing concern about a small but steady number of
tube misconnection cases each year, hospitals, government agencies and
safety organizations are scrambling for solutions. The most significant
initiative is being led by Premier Inc., the purchasing alliance of
1,500 hospitals around the country, which is educating staffers on how
to avoid misconnection errors and working with medical device makers to
redesign equipment so that the connectors linking IV lines and feeding
tubes aren't compatible with each other.
Full
story (.pdf)
Standard terminology allows alternative product comparison; supplies
with hazardous ingredients targeted; Materials Management in Health Care;
6/07 issue: Catholic Healthcare West, San Francisco, is committed to
finding safe alternatives for products containing latex, mercury, PVC and
DEPH, but until recently, identifying alternatives was “hit or miss,” says
Keith Callahan, vice president for supply chain management at this
41-hospital system . . . . The problem is being addressed by Premier, and
San Diego-based group purchasing organization, and Cardinal Health, Dublin,
Ohio, the distributor.
Full story (.pdf)
Fighting for survival; Journal of Healthcare Contracting, 6/07
issue: Anna Jaques Hospital in Newburyport, MA, came close to closing
its doors. Now it’s looking at a surplus. Here’s how the hospital made a
turnaround.
Full story
An end to overtime; The Journal of Healthcare Contracting; 6/07 issue:
Perhaps one of the greatest challenges group purchasing organizations face
today is educating the healthcare industry that they are not, in fact, all
the same. The Journal of Healthcare Contracting interviewed six group
purchasing organizations – including Premier – to learn how each is attempting to differentiate
itself in today’s market.
Full story
Sweetening the pot; HealthLeaders; 6/07 issue: CMS'
decision to extend and expand the successful Hospital Quality Improvement
Demonstration project, which paid an average of $70,000 to hospitals last
year that met or exceeded quality standards, is being applauded by many
healthcare stakeholders. Measurements for the third year of the program will
be reported later this year, but starting in the fourth year, HQID will
begin testing new incentive payments and rolling out new quality measures.
Full story
Burr visit focuses on program; Charlotte Business Journal;
6/8/07: The chief executives of 17 Charlotte-region hospitals met this
week with U.S. Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina to discuss the $27
million saved in 2006 through Premier Inc.'s health-care alliance. Burr held
a question-and-answer session with the executives, and talk turned to the
state of health care in North Carolina, along with the importance of
nurturing the industry for the future.
Full story
New tools, old tricks usher in evolution of infection prevention and
control; Healthcare Purchasing News; 6/07 issue: An article in
the June 2007 issue of Healthcare Purchasing News about the prevention and
control of healthcare associated infections quotes Dan Peterson, MD, Mph, VP
and medical director at Premier. "It’s a poor use of human intelligence to
have infection control practitioners looking through hundreds of pages of
lab reports trying to figure out patterns," said Peterson, who previously
spent eight years at the CDC and was active in setting up the electronic
surveillance for reportable diseases. Peterson started Cereplex, which was
recently acquired by Premier.
Full
story
Following the leaders; Managed Care magazine; 5/07 issue:
Top pay-for-performance programs point to increased focus on hospital
incentives, efficiency measures, coordination, and standardization. This
article spotlights the CMS/Premier Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration
Project's success.
Full
story
Does where you live determine if you'll live?; USA Today;
5/23/07: Hospital death rates are among the best-kept secrets in
American medicine. That will begin to change in June, when the Centers for
Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) plans to post the first broad
comparison of the death rates for heart attack and heart failure on its
website, Hospital Compare (hospitalcompare.hhs.gov). The effort also marks
the beginning of a broader transformation of medicine, one in which
hospitals and doctors will be routinely judged on their performance. The
agency has been conducting a pilot pay-for-performance study with the
Premier Inc. network of non-profit hospitals, which involves about 260
hospitals in 37 states.
Full story
CMS P4P research finds consistency to be key; FierceHealthcare;
5/8/07: How can hospitals benefit from the research being done by CMS on
pay for performance? In part, just by accepting that improving quality
results requires a high level of commitment, according to Richard Norling,
CEO of Premier, which runs the P4P pilot on CMS's behalf.
Full story
Premier honored for ethics in business; Charlotte Business
Journal; 4/26/07: Premier Inc. is among three Charlotte
companies named the 2007 recipients of the Charlotte Ethics in Business
Awards. The awards, sponsored by the Charlotte chapter of the Society of
Financial Services Professionals, were presented Thursday. The awards
are presented annually to honor companies that demonstrate a commitment
to ethical business practices in their operations, management
philosophies and responses to crises or challenges.
Full story
Automated surveillance systems can significantly help lower
hospital-acquired infections; Drug Topics; 4/16/07: As many as
100,000 patients die every year from hospital-acquired infections (HAIs),
according to the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention. It doesn't have to be
that way. Tools exist that can significantly lower HAI mortality and morbidity
rates and reduce an associated $6 billion in excess annual health costs. One
powerful tool is the use of automated surveillance systems designed to track
antibiotic overuse and underuse, as well as infection patterns. A recent survey
by the Charlotte, N.C.-based healthcare alliance Premier Inc. found that of
about 150 hospital-based infection control specialists, four out of five believe
such technology would lower HAI rates at their facility.
Full story (.pdf)
CMS pay-for-performance pilot engages R.Ph.s; Drug Topics;
4/16/07: The clinical success of an ongoing pay-for-performance (P4P)
pilot project by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services requires
extensive participation by health-system pharmacists. Launched in October
2003, the CMS/Premier Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration (HQID)
project involves more than 260 hospitals, which submit data to Premier for
validation and analysis.
Full story (.pdf)
Premier, CareScience deal's long-term potential; Modern Healthcare;
4/5/07: The acquisition last week by Premier of the CareScience clinical
data-mining unit of Quovadx will expand the reach and the breadth of
services for customers of both companies, but it will take several months
and maybe as much as a year before those customers can benefit from the
synergy, according to Stephanie Alexander, senior vice president for Premier
Healthcare Informatics, the data services and analysis division of the San
Diego-based group purchasing organization.
Full story
Commentary: Pay for performance movement gains evidence; Healthcare
Finance News; 4/1/07: "Regardless of how it’s funded, pay for
performance, or value-based purchasing, is coming. Congress has mandated
that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services develop a plan by late
2008 for hospital value-based purchasing. Recently, the Institute of
Medicine urged CMS to gradually phase in P4P nationwide as a way to
accelerate quality improvement. CMS is hard at work developing that plan,
and its Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration project with the Premier
healthcare alliance will be one model they examine closely" writes Rick Norling, president and CEO of Premier; and Stephanie Alexander, senior vice
president of Premier Healthcare Informatics.
Full story
CMS extends hospital quality incentive demonstration; Healthcare
Finance News; 4/1/07: A program that provides financial incentives
to hospitals that meet quality of care standards has been financially
restructured and extended three years by the Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services. Premier Inc. ’s Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration,
under which top-performing hospitals have received cash rewards for quality
improvements, has been modified to make more participating hospitals
eligible for rewards.
Full story
Cover story: Businessman of group purchasing: Premier's Mike Alkire believes
IDNs can improve both financially and clinically – with the right plan;
The Journal of Healthcare Contracting; 4/07 issue: In many ways,
Mike Alkire reflects the way group purchasing organizations are
evolving. His background is business- and information-systems oriented,
not hospital-purchasing- or materials-management-oriented. While keenly
aware of the need for low contract prices, he expresses his vision for
Premier in terms of operational efficiencies and greater shareholder
value. And he embraces the broader goal that Premier has set for itself
– helping its members improve their financial and clinical performance.
Full
story (.pdf, 2 MB)
Automating infection surveillance efforts; Materials Management in
Health Care; 4/07 issue: A recent survey of 150 infection control
specialists concluded that automated surveillance systems (computer or
Web-based programs that track patient infections) can protect patients from
hospital-acquired diseases. However, the same survey also found that only
about 13 percent of the respondents use the technology, according to
Premier, the GPO that sponsored the survey. Dan Peterson, M.D., Premier vice
president and medical director, discusses this apparent contradiction and
offers advice on how infection control departments can justify the hundreds
of thousands of dollars required for an automated surveillance system.
Full story
(.pdf, 2 MB)
Premier alliance chosen for national data project; Charlotte
Business Journal; 3/23/07: The bunker-like technology department of
Premier Inc.'s Charlotte office, which can quickly process and analyze
millions of patient records, will be kept busy by a federal program designed
to improve quality and outcomes at hospitals across the country. Premier was
recently tapped for another three-year run of a test program initiated by
the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the federal administrator of
Medicare and Medicaid.
Full story
Premier receives Baldrige quality award; The San Diego Union-Tribune;
3/14/07: Vice President Dick Cheney presented the Malcolm Baldrige
National Quality Award trophy yesterday to Premier Inc., a San Diego-based
health care group purchasing organization. It was one of three 2006 winners
of the federal government's most prestigious business honor. Premier Chief
Executive Officer Richard Norling accepted the award for the company during
a ceremony at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium in Washington, D.C.
Full story
U.S. laying footing for health care efficiencies; Milwaukee
Journal Sentinel; 3/3/07: Throughout the economy, the practices
are commonplace: Providing information on prices and quality. Using
information technology to become more efficient. Rewarding good
performance. In health care, they come close to being radical proposals.
Those seemingly simple ideas are the cornerstones of a nascent
initiative by the federal government to remake the $2 trillion health
care system. Michael Leavitt, secretary of the U.S. Department of Health
and Human Services, is scheduled to visit Milwaukee on Wednesday to
promote that change and what is being called the "Value-Driven Health
Care Initiative." In Wisconsin, Aurora's hospitals are among the roughly 260
throughout the country participating in a CMS/Premier
pay-for-performance project.
Full story
CMS extends, restructures hospital quality incentive program;
Healthcare Finance News; 3/2/07: A program that provides financial
incentives to hospitals that meet quality of care standards has been
financially restructured and extended three years by the Centers for
Medicare and Medicaid Services. Premier Inc.'s Hospital Quality Incentive
Demonstration, under which top-performing hospitals have received cash
rewards for quality improvements, has been modified to make more
participating hospitals eligible for rewards.
Full story
Cover story: Inside the Premier/CMS pay-for-performance project;
Hospitals & Health Networks; 3/07 issue: Pay for performance is no
passing fad. It’s real and it’s here to stay. Private payers, employers and
the federal government are all devising ways to pay hospitals to improve
patient care. The 800-pound gorilla in payment policy, the Centers for
Medicare & Medicaid Services, under congressional mandate, is devising a
plan to deploy pay for performance on a broad scale by fiscal 2009. Under
the Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration, a joint effort between CMS and
Premier Inc., quality indicators for 260 participating hospitals rose by
11.8 percent over two years.
Full story (.pdf, 14 MB)
Premier leaders on Charlotte radio show; WBT-AM; 2/24/07: Premier Chief Operating Officer Susan DeVore and Stephanie Alexander, senior
vice president, Premier Healthcare Informatics; along with Jan Mathews,
director of clinical performance improvement at Gaston Memorial Hospital,
were featured on a Charlotte radio show – WBT 1110 AM's "Health Headlines"
with Stacey Simms. The discussion focused on Premier's pay-for-performance
project and Premier's success in helping hospitals safely reduce the cost of
care.
("Full story" link no longer active)
Software identifies hospital infections; The Charlotte Observer; 2/14/07: Dr. Dan Peterson heard "Gee, that's nifty" a lot five years ago when he
pitched his computer software that helps hospitals track deadly illnesses
germinating in their buildings.
Full story (.pdf)
Pay for performance: Will it help nurses reap rewards in patient care?;
Nurse.com; 2/12/07: The Daughters of Charity system took part in a
three-year Medicare P4P demonstration project by San Diego-based Premier
Inc., a nonprofit healthcare alliance that evaluated the performances for 33
quality care measures for five conditions at 270 hospitals in 38 states.
("Full story" link no longer active)
I.T. tracks pay for performance; Health Data Management; 2/9/07: Patient
care at 260 hospitals participating in a pay-for-performance project is
improving and those facilities are receiving additional compensation as a
result, according to survey results from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid
Services. CMS announced that it would award incentive payments of $8.7
million to 115 of the top-performing hospitals. Premier Inc., a San
Diego-based provider coalition and group purchasing organization, and CMS
are managing the P4P project at the 260 hospitals.
("Full story" link no longer active)
Post enhancements: Is your PACS all it can be?; Medical Imaging
magazine; 2/07 issue: "It should be no surprise that PACS, like any
other new technology, requires constant fine-tuning. The good news is that
it continues to get better and better. Focus on opportunities, take
advantage of technology changes and new levels of integration to bury all
those workarounds, and look strategically toward the future," writes Vicki
Peterson, director of the PACS consulting program for Premier Consulting
Solutions.
Full story
Hospitals get bonuses for quality of care; Government Health IT; 1/29/07: A demonstration project that Medicare officials describe as groundbreaking
has improved the quality of patient care at participating hospitals, and
according to hospital officials, saved the lives of 1,284 heart attack
patients.
("Full story" link no longer active)
Hackensack hospital keeps its top rating in U.S. program; AP/The Philadelphia
Inquirer; 1/27/07: For the second year in a row, Hackensack University
Medical Center has emerged as the top hospital in a nationwide Medicare
program meant to demonstrate whether financial incentives can improve
patient care.
("Full story" link no longer active)
Bonus pay by Medicare lifts quality; The New York Times; 1/25/07:
Paying a hospital to do the right thing is a lot harder than it looks. The 266
hospitals participating in a Medicare experiment that pays them more to follow
medical recommendations have steadily improved the quality of patient care. The
latest results in the three-year experiment show that more heart attack patients
are getting aspirin when they arrive at the hospital, for example, and more
patients are getting vaccines to prevent pneumonia. Premier Inc. is managing the
project.
Full story (.pdf, 1.7 MB)
Rise in heart failure means increased prices for CRMs; Materials
Management in Health Care; 1/07: According to the American Heart
Association, heart failure is a major unresolved public health concern with more
than 5 million individuals in the United States affected by this condition.
Full story