Telemedicine reimbursement and other regulatory flexibilities enabled providers to quickly pivot operations for COVID-19, but temporary policies also poised the health policy landscape for significant change after the pandemic. In the wake of the first confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the US, policymakers quickly relaxed long-standing healthcare regulations, including telemedicine reimbursement and healthcare fraud prevention […]
With concerns of COVID-19 having a disproportionate impact on certain individuals, such as minorities and the elderly, public health experts are requiring more detailed data, provided on a real-time basis – further supporting the reliability and integrity of data being central to healthcare. Though rates of new COVID-19 cases in the U.S. have somewhat stabilized, […]
In the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak many health care practices were forced to implement telehealth as quickly as possible, and often didn’t have enough run way to deeply consider an ideal long-term workflow. If your practices’ initial reaction was to put something in place that was good enough for now but could be phased […]
From predicting outbreaks to devising treatments, doctors are turning to AI in an effort to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Why it matters: While machine learning algorithms were already becoming a part of health care, COVID-19 is likely to accelerate their adoption. But lack of data and testing time could hinder their effectiveness — for this pandemic, […]
According to the proposed rule, CMS projects total Medicare spending on inpatient hospital services, including capital, will increase by about $2.07 billion in FY 2021. CMS’ fiscal year (FY) 2021 Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) proposed rule, released May 11, includes a proposed increase to hospital payment rates, the creation of a new Medicare-Severity Diagnosis-Related Group […]
A case in point is the information infrastructure of the American healthcare system, which will play a critical role in understanding and battling the COVID-19 pandemic. Just as the capacity of some national health systems have been overwhelmed by the number of COVID-19 cases—most notably in Italy—healthcare providers and professionals in the U.S. run the risk […]
CMS wants all providers to cancel or postpone all low-acuity surgeries. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is limiting “all non-essential planned surgeries and procedures, including dental, until further notice,” according to statement the agency released March 18. This measure is designed to have a twofold effect: increase the amount of ventilators and […]
For the past several decades, patients, providers, and payers have lamented the health of the U.S. healthcare system. Just this past fall, JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association, estimated that close to 30% of healthcare spending in the U.S. “may be considered waste.”1 Over these same several decades, an important technology — artificial intelligence […]
Physicians will potentially have a lighter documentation burden and more time to spend with patients in 2021 thanks to an overhaul of Medicare Coding guidelines for outpatient evaluation and management (E/M) services. “The whole point was to have people not document stuff that was not necessary, not relevant to the clinical management of the patient,” […]
Improving data analytics in healthcare has potential includes cost savings and improved patient health and wellness. Here are the two ways through which this improvement can be accomplished: Adopt a business analytics strategy that process huge amounts of healthcare data, rather partnering different analytics tools that results in high IT expense and reduced user adoption. […]