There’s been a ton of interesting news about investment in healthcare IT lately. Much of what I’m seeing is happening in the mobile health space. No doubt mobile health is a really exciting market right now and I think it’s also really exciting because the cost to develop a mobile health app these days is so low.

Here are some interesting investment groups, incubators, etc that are focusing on healthcare IT:
Healthbox – A leading venture capital firm and incubator for startup companies launched Healthbox to focus exclusively on the healthcare industry. They offer $50,000 in seed capital, along with standard incubator services (office, mentor/leaders, etc) and are based out of Chicago. The program will culminate in an investor’s day (I might have to get Neil Versel to attend the investor’s day).

Rock Health – Another startup seed-accelerator program that offers $20,000 along with mentorship and office space for 5 months. It just started this month in San Francisco and has connections to a lot of the major players in healthcare.

Blueprint Health – A startup accelerator based in New York City. It provides $20,000 of seed capital along with mentorship and a work environment to be able to build your idea. They’re initially planning for 10 companies.

Startup Health – This isn’t an investment vehicle yet, but I could see it becoming one very quickly. It’s part of the Startup America Partnership and has some big names like Time Warner Chairman and CEO, Steve Krein, Esther Dyson, and the founders of Health 2.0 Matthew Holt and Indu Subaiya.

I’m guessing that there are even more programs that I’m missing. I’d love to learn about others in the comments as well. Either way, it’s exciting to see all this investment happening in healthcare applications.

In the final interview by Matthew Holt at HIMSS, Jon Bush knocks it out of the park. Jon Bush is CEO of AthenaHealth and one of the most entertaining interviews I’ve seen. He agrees with me on CCHIT, but that wasn’t even the best part of the interview. Definitely a breathe of fresh air in the HIT and EHR world. Check out the video interview:

My favorite John Bush quote from the interview: “These legacy [EHR] systems have to die.”

This is basically the second part in a 3 part series of video interviews by Matthew Holt. This interview was at HIMSS of the heat of CCHIT Mark Leavitt. This video is a little long and dry, but it gives you a feeling of Mark Leavitt and his motivations with CCHIT.

To read my comments on CCHIT, then just read this whole blog. My short takes from the video:
CCHIT is looking at ways to measure usability.
CCHIT is looking at ways to measure successful EHR implementations.
My comment: Only took 4 years to start looking.

Mark Leavitt did state that CCHIT’s goal was to “reduce the risk of buying an EHR.” If that’s the goal, I’m a little surprised they aren’t measuring the results of this. Where’s the data that implementing a CCHIT certified EHR is any less risky than a non-certified EHR?

I finally had a few moments to watch the Matthew Holt interview of Glen Tullman, Allscripts CEO at HIMSS. Allscripts is no doubt a large player in the EHR industry (like it or not). This is especially true after Allscripts acquisition of Misys. So, Glen Tullman will have a large effect on the EHR industry so it’s worth listening to hear what he has to say. I’ll include a few quick comments of my own below the video.

Overall a pretty low key video. There were a few things that are worth commenting on.

The first thing that hit me was that Glen Tullman thought that the controversy over CCHIT was that CCHIT certified over 300 EHR vendors. Glen makes the argument that government wants a smaller footprint of EHR vendors and that 300 was too many. I guess I can kind of see why government might not want to certify 300 EHR providers since doctors just don’t have time to look through that many. However, it was the first I’d heard of that CCHIT controversy.

What does make a lot of sense is why the CEO of one of the largest EHR vendors would want the certified EHR vendor list to be a really small list that includes them. So, it would make sense for him to lobby the government to keep the list small.

I’m glad that Matthew Holt brought up at least another reason that CCHIT as the EHR certification is a problem. How about you just start with the controversy that CCHIT certification doesn’t provide benefit to doctors. Solve that one and we can find a way to deal with any other CCHIT controversies.

Of course, at the end Glen Tullman also said “CCHIT has done it [EHR certification] very effectively.” Effectively? Seriously? Can he provide me some data on how effective it is? It might be effective for his organization’s interests. So, maybe that’s what he meant.

Glen Tullman did make a great comment about SAAS EHR versus client server EHR. He basically said that most users don’t know the technology behind SAAS EHR and client server EHR. Glen suggested that most users just know the financing model of the two EHR options. A very fine point. I’d just add that they know the financing part AND the IT support part of the equation (ie. SAAS EHR means you [the EHR vendor] do the IT. Great!) Glen does seem to understand how to sell an EHR product to his customers.

There you go, there’s my quick comments. What can I say? I type fast.