Free EMR Newsletter Want to receive the latest news on EMR, Meaningful Use, ARRA and Healthcare IT sent straight to your email? Join thousands of healthcare pros who subscribe to EMR and HIPAA for FREE!!

Counter Intuitive Findings from Patient Portal Use

Written by:

The patient portal is becoming a really hot topic in healthcare. I think we can attribute much of the discussion to the EMR meaningful use requirements to engage with patients in a patient portal. I recently started a thread on LinkedIn based on a post by Jennifer Dennard called Opening up the Pandora’s Box of Patient Portals. The conversation in the thread was great, but David Voran, MD provided some incredibly valuable insight that I wanted to share with all of my readers. The following are Dr. Voran’s comments based on his experience using a patient portal.

Long have exploited the portal in our organization and we’ve now progressed to where the entire chart is available to patients. Can begin to list the results but here are my counter intuitive findings:
1) The more barriers a clinician erects between them and the patient the MORE work they wind up doing.
- Those of us physicians who have configured the portal to have most message types routed directly to the physician wind up answering less messages at the end of the day.
- Typically physicians will have all medication refill requests, questions about the last visit, requests for visits, etc. routed to a nurse or a pool to attempt to answer first. The majority of the time the person receiving this message can answer only part of the question and will then send a message to a physician for direction; the physician responds and then the nurse will interact with the patient; then the physician has to approve any orders or actions taken. This usually involves having the physician receive or respond in some way to 2 messages in their inbox. Those of us who receive the patient’s message directly answer one.
- Many other examples but typically those physicians who have barriers are answering or responding to 35-50% more messages than those who have no barriers.

2) The more the patient has access to the more engaged they will be and the more accurate the record will be. The patient is the best auditor of the record and will point out inconsistencies that can be corrected.

3) If the physician is the one to enroll or engage the patient. Those physicians who promote the portal will get 60-75% utilization of the portal. Those that are passive will see about 30% response rate.

4) Aggressive use of the portal will eliminate up to 8 hours of patient related phone conversations per nurse per week.

May 16, 2013 I Written By

John Lynn is the Founder of the HealthcareScene.com blog network which currently consists of 15 blogs containing almost 5000 articles with John having written over 2000 of the articles himself. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 9.3 million times. John also recently launched two new companies: InfluentialNetworks.com and Physia.com, and is an advisor to docBeat. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can also be found on Twitter: @techguy and @ehrandhit.

Meaningful Use Stage 3 Retires Measures that Doctors Don’t Do

Written by:

The other day I was spending some time going through the proposed meaningful use stage 3 measures. It’s quite an experience if you haven’t done this already.

As I was going through each of the measures I realized something that could be a little troubling. In a number of cases, they are proposing that certain measures should be retired from the meaningful use attestation process because essentially those measures have reached a percentage in meaningful use stage 2 that they’re fully adopted. I think this is generally a good idea. We don’t need clinics and hospitals reporting information just to report information.

Although, I did find a surprising trend when it came to the measures that were being retired in meaningful use stage 3. Almost all of the measures (possibly all, but I didn’t dig that deep) were measures that were done by someone other than the doctor. A few examples were vitals, smoking status, and demographics. I guess in some cases the doctor might enter these, but you can see how the vitals were likely entered by a nurse or MA and not the doctor.

On the one hand this is a really great thing. That means that in the previous meaningful use stages, the biggest burden was placed on someone other than the doctor while the doctor was only required to have a much smaller percentage. Unfortunately this means that the higher percentages required in meaningful use stage 3 put the burden largely on the backs of physicians.

February 19, 2013 I Written By

John Lynn is the Founder of the HealthcareScene.com blog network which currently consists of 15 blogs containing almost 5000 articles with John having written over 2000 of the articles himself. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 9.3 million times. John also recently launched two new companies: InfluentialNetworks.com and Physia.com, and is an advisor to docBeat. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can also be found on Twitter: @techguy and @ehrandhit.

Healthcare Groups Want Meaningful Use Evaluated Before Stage 3

Written by:

Though the final rules for Meaningful Use Stage 3 aren’t due to take effect until 2016, ONC has already made the draft rules available for public comment.  And comments, to be sure, the agency is getting.

While various groups have chosen their own details to critique, the general consensus seems to be that ONC is getting ahead of itself and ought to give Meaningful Use Stage 1 and 2 a good hard look first.

Accordng to a nice summary from iHealthBeat, here’s where some of the major healthcare groups stand:

* The American Hospital Association is recommending that ONC fund a comprehensive evaluation of MU generally, and while it does, hold off on finalizing Stage 3 recommendations.

*  CHIME, too, is asking ONC to evaluate the existing Meaningful Use program to decide whether achieving stage 3 is realistically possible by 2016.

* The Federation of American Hospitals is also arguing that ONC needs to evaluate current Meaningful Use requirements.  Also, in its letter to ONC, the group argues that the existing structure of two years per stage doesn’t cut it.

* The AMA weighed in with its own recommendation that ONC evaluate Meaningful Use as is before moving ahead. It also suggested changing some thresholds to  make them more reachable; greater flexibility in program requirements; change the certification process to address usability; and improve HIT’s capability to share patient data.

Personally, I think the idea of doing an extensive Meaningful Use evalulation sounds like a good one, and I hope ONC actually does so.  When you’re setting new standards that affect so many providers, why not gather some data on how existing standards work?

January 16, 2013 I Written By

Katherine Rourke is a healthcare journalist who has written about the industry for 30 years. Her work has appeared in all of the leading healthcare industry publications, and she's served as editor in chief of several healthcare B2B sites.

Meaningful Use Potpourri – Meaningful Use Monday

Written by:

We’ve been publishing Meaningful Use Monday for exactly two years today. Most of the posts have been written by the wonderful Lynn Scheps from SRSsoft and I think they represent a wonderful asset to those interested in meaningful use. That’s close to hundred posts on the subject of meaningful use and EHR incentive money. Hopefully readers have found it as useful as I have in understanding the complexities of meaningful use.

Considering how much we’ve posted about meaningful use, I think it’s time to move meaningful use out of a featured space on the site. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure there are many more meaningful use posts to come. In fact, it’s likely a post a week will still be about meaningful use and the EHR incentive money in one way or another. However, I hope that we can also help many doctors move past meaningful use to actually meaningfully using EHR and other healthcare technology. For example, I’m planning a series of posts on the benefits of EHR in the current environment. I expect it to drive some really interesting conversation.

Before I end the Meaningful Use Monday series to a more random assortment of meaningful use posts, I thought I’d provide a potpourri of meaningful use thoughts. I think you’ll find them interesting.


This is an interesting title since the article says that most won’t be able to show meaningful use and then goes on to list the statistics for how many doctors are using EHR. So, they’re using EHR, but they don’t have the capability to show meaningful use? To me EHR adoption is the more important number. I also like that EHR vendors have all applied the same CCD standard for data portability. I’m ok if many doctors forgo meaningful use. Although, we’ll see how that plays out if the penalties indeed go into effect.


This is music to my ears. I’ve been preaching this message for a long time. The odd part is that this article references the same studies and data as the first. What is clear from the numbers is that EHR adoption is up. That’s a good thing for healthcare since we need widespread EHR adoption to take the next step to technology adoption in healthcare.


I don’t think this is true, depending on how you define “apply.” I know very few doctors who have applied to meaningful use and not gotten paid. If you know of stories that say otherwise, I’d love to hear them. This is particularly true in meaningful use stage 1. We might see more meaningful use payment rejections in stage 2 and 3, but so far the money has basically flowed out. I think this is by design. The worst thing for ONC would be many doctors working towards meaningful use and then not getting paid.


Yep, meaningful use stage 2 is still getting tweaked. It’s hard to keep up.


Almost a third of the way there. I love this “shovel ready” part of the ARRA economic stimulus package. Makes me laugh to think about it.

December 10, 2012 I Written By

John Lynn is the Founder of the HealthcareScene.com blog network which currently consists of 15 blogs containing almost 5000 articles with John having written over 2000 of the articles himself. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 9.3 million times. John also recently launched two new companies: InfluentialNetworks.com and Physia.com, and is an advisor to docBeat. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can also be found on Twitter: @techguy and @ehrandhit.

BYOD And HIPAA Compliance: Can You Have Both?

Written by:

With doctors among the biggest fans of smartphones around, hospitals and medical practices are having to face the reality that Bring Your Own Device is here to stay. The question is, is BYOD so hard to manage that it all but guarantees HIPAA breaches?

On the one hand, BYOD seems to have arrived to stay. According to a recent report by KLAS Research surveying 105 CIOs, IT specialits and physicians, 70 percent said they used mobile devices to access their EMRs Even this small group was accessing virtually every major enterprise EMR via mobile, reports MobiHealthNews.

But the pressures on hospitals to corral BYOD security gaps are growing.  Hospitals will soon have to provide increased protection of patient health information under Meaningful Use Stage 2.  And the HHS Office of Civil Rights will be doing stepped up HIPAA-compliance audits, which gives hospitals even less leeway than they’d have had otherwise.

Of course, hospitals have been dealing with doctors bringing one device — a laptop — for quite some time. One might think this would have prepared hospitals for dealing with security-hole-ridden portable devices that staff and clinicians bring to work.  But as we all know, laptops have proven to be major sources of security breaches, most typically by being stolen when loaded down with unencrypted data.

BYOD on the mobile side is if anything a riskier proposition.  For one thing, doctors and executive staff are likely to own more than one device, such as a phone and a tablet, multiplying the risk that an unguarded device could be stolen and bled for information.  And managing mobile devices calls for IT to support two additional operating systems (iOS and Android) configured in whatever way the user prefers.

Folks, I know I’m not saying anything crashingly original, but I’d argue it’s worth repeating: It’s time for hospitals to stop waffling and develop comprehensive protocols for BYOD use. It’s clear that left alone, the problem is going to  get worse, not better.

December 7, 2012 I Written By

Katherine Rourke is a healthcare journalist who has written about the industry for 30 years. Her work has appeared in all of the leading healthcare industry publications, and she's served as editor in chief of several healthcare B2B sites.

Final Rule for Stage 2 Brings Some Changes to Stage 1 – Meaningful Use Monday

Written by:

Lynn Scheps is Vice President, Government Affairs at EHR vendor SRSsoft. In this role, Lynn has been a Voice of Physicians and SRSsoft users in Washington during the formulation of the meaningful use criteria. Lynn is currently working to assist SRSsoft users interested in showing meaningful use and receiving the EHR incentive money. Check out Lynn’s previous Meaningful Use Monday posts.

Although Stage 2 requirements don’t become effective until 2014, the Final Rule for Stage 2 contains some changes that apply—or can apply—to providers before then, and some that will apply to all physicians in 2014, even those still in Stage 1. These changes fall into 3 categories in terms of timing:  those that are effective in 2013, those that can be adopted in 2013 at the physician’s discretion, and those that are implemented in 2014.

Effective 2013:

  • Conducting a test of the EHR’s capability to exchange clinical information (Stage 1 Core Measure 14) will be dropped from the requirements. It will be replaced in Stage 2 by measures that require actual and ongoing exchange of information.
  • A new exclusion for the ePrescribing requirement is being added for physicians who have no pharmacy within 10 miles that accepts electronic prescriptions.

At Physician’s Discretion in 2013 (and required in 2014):

  • The Vital Signs measure will be restructured to separate the reporting of height and weight from the reporting of blood pressure. This is good news for those specialists who consider some, but not all 3 of the vital signs, relevant to their practice. Along with this change in the measure are revised minimum ages: blood pressure reporting will be required for patients age 3 and over instead of age 2, and height (or length) and weight will be required for all patients, even those under 2.
  • An alternate calculation for CPOE will help physicians—again, likely specialists—who do not prescribe frequently enough to meet the Stage 1 (30%) threshold. The denominator will be limited to “medication orders created by the EP during the EHR reporting period,” instead of “unique patients with at least one medication in their medication list.”

Effective 2014:

  • Currently, in Stage 1, if a provider attests to an exclusion for any menu measures, these measures can be counted towards the menu requirement. In Stage 2, this will no longer be true—excluded measures will not satisfy the menu requirement if there are other measures on which the provider could report instead. This will also apply to providers who are still reporting under Stage 1 in 2014—a change which those providers will likely perceive as inequitable since it did not apply to the earlier attesters. Those physicians who qualify for multiple exclusions—specialists, once again—will find that the menu set is really no longer a menu, as they will be left with few, if any, choices. 

So, while physicians do not have to focus on Stage 2 just yet, they should consider whether they might benefit from the 2013 changes described above.

September 10, 2012 I Written By

Lynn Scheps is Vice President, Government Affairs at EHR vendor SRSsoft. In this role, Lynn has been a Voice of Physicians and SRSsoft users in Washington during the formulation of the meaningful use criteria. Lynn is currently working to assist SRSsoft users interested in showing meaningful use and receiving the EHR incentive money.

Meaningful Use Stage 2 Final Rule: What You Need to Know—At Least For Now – Meaningful Use Monday

Written by:

Lynn Scheps is Vice President, Government Affairs at EHR vendor SRSsoft. In this role, Lynn has been a Voice of Physicians and SRSsoft users in Washington during the formulation of the meaningful use criteria. Lynn is currently working to assist SRSsoft users interested in showing meaningful use and receiving the EHR incentive money. Check out Lynn’s previous Meaningful Use Monday posts.

Without delving into all the specifics detailed in the 672-page Final Rule for Stage 2, what is important to comprehend—for now—is how Stage 2 raises the bar set by Stage 1 and how it intensifies the focus on health information exchange and patient engagement.

The following are some highlights of Stage 2:

  • The Final Rule not only confirms 2014 as the earliest effective date for Stage 2 (as expected), but it provides additional leeway for providers and for vendors by limiting the Stage 2 reporting period to 90 days in 2014, instead of a full year.
  • EPs must meet or exclude all 17 core measures and must meet—not “meet or exclude”—3 of the 6 menu measures. (Unlike Stage 1, exclusions of menu measures do not count unless the EP cannot find 3 relevant menu measures.)
  • All Stage 1 menu measures except syndromic surveillance become core measures.
  • 5 new menu measures have been added: access to imaging results, family history, progress notes, reporting to cancer registries, and reporting to specialized registries.
  • Stage 2 increases most Stage 1 thresholds.
  • CPOE is expanded to include lab and radiology orders, in addition to prescriptions.
  • Patient portals play an important role as a means of providing patients with access to their medical records. Physicians will have to ensure that at least 5% of the patients they see actually view, download or transmit their health information and that over 5% of the patients seen send them a secure e-mail message containing clinical information, (i.e., not just a request for an appointment.)
  • Clinical summaries of office visits must be available to patients within 1 day, instead of the 3-day timeframe in Stage 1.
  • The Stage 1 measure requiring a test of the ability to exchange clinical data with another provider has been dropped effective 2013, in favor of a more robust 2014 Stage 2 requirement for ongoing exchange of a significantly more extensive data set.
  • EPs will report on 9 of 64 clinical quality measures, and after the provider’s first incentive year, the CQM data must be submitted electronically, rather than by attestation.
  • In an effort to streamline the reporting process, Stage 2 offers opportunities for batch reporting by group practices and for consolidated CQM reporting for PQRS and meaningful use.
  • Penalties and hardship exemptions are defined, establishing October 1, 2014 as the latest date by which an EP can attest for the first time and avoid a 1% payment adjustment in 2015.

More information about Stage 2 will follow in future Meaningful Use Monday posts.

August 27, 2012 I Written By

Lynn Scheps is Vice President, Government Affairs at EHR vendor SRSsoft. In this role, Lynn has been a Voice of Physicians and SRSsoft users in Washington during the formulation of the meaningful use criteria. Lynn is currently working to assist SRSsoft users interested in showing meaningful use and receiving the EHR incentive money.

MU Stage 2, ICD-10 Delay, Epic-Related Safety Errors, and Mobile EMRs – Around HealthCare Scene

Written by:

EMR Thoughts

Meaningful Use Stage 2 Final Rule Published

The long awaited MU Stage 2 final rule was published last week by CMS. No one will be required to follow the requirements until 2014, when the program is set to begin. The Stage 2 final rule is 672 pages long. The press release concerning MU Stage 2 mentions interesting facts, such as 3,300 hospitals have participated thus far.

ICD-10 Delay Finalized with New Unique Plan Identifier

In an announcement that was kind of lost in the midst of the meaningful use stage 2 final rule, the ICD-10 delay is official. As someone said on Twitter, you now have two years to get ready for ICD-10. You better get started now. The announcement of a Health Plan Identifier (HPID) is also very big news.

EMR and EHR

Nurses Raise Alarm Over Epic-Related Safety Errors

With any EMR, there is an adjustment period. However, there was an error recently at a prison clinic in California that could have been deadly that was related to the implementing of an Epic installation. Nurses have raised many concerns about the system, and have likely not been adequately trained. Is the issue with Epic because of the system, or because of inadequate training?

We Know What’s Right, but It’s Hard
Being healthy and overcoming illnesses takes works. And obviously, most of us know that if we don’t put in that effort, there will be negative consequences. Unfortunately, many people don’t put in that effort. Luckily, with the advent of being able to monitor health from home with smart phone apps and other gadgets, it is easier to do what we know is right. Is mHealth applications the answer to the question of how do we motivate ourselves to do what we know we should?

Happy EMR Doctor

Can We Talk? Challenges of SaaS Type EMR User Interfaces

SaaS EMR User Interfaces have a variety of challenges. The latest issue is ensuring that all the individual software work together in a way that doesn’t interrupt a practice’s workflow. This week, Dr. Michael West talks about how, when one component gets updated, it often causes others to work less efficiently. His office recently experienced this, and described the frustrating experience.

Smart Phone Health Care

Detecting Parkinson’s with a Phone Call

About 5 percent of adults over the age of 80 has Parkinson’s Disease. A new technology is being developed that supposedly can detect Parkinson’s Disease. And not only can it detect it, but with 98.6 percent overall accuracy. This raises the question, what can a smart phone not do? This is just the beginning of disease detection and treatment with smart phones. What’s next?

Five Health Communities Every Patient Should Use

It’s easier than ever to have a health problem. Okay, not really, but it’s easier to find support. There are many great communities online dedicated to helping patient’s find information about just about every health topic out there. Some offer free advice from medical professionals, and others implement social media. Here are five of the best communities everyone should join.

Hospital EMR and EHR

Survey: Virtually All Docs Want Mobile EMRs

9 out of 10 doctors want to be able to access their EMR on a mobile device, according to a recent study. It makes sense, since so many doctors are using iPads and smart phones nowadays. Luckily for these doctors, companies like Vitera and eClinicalWorks are working on mobile solutions for this. Hopefully these solutions will include things like reviewing and updating patient charts, and ordering prescriptions, which ranked among the top functions doctors are hoping a mobile EMR would include.

August 26, 2012 I Written By

Katie Clark is originally from Colorado and currently lives in Utah with her husband and son. She writes primarily for Smart Phone Health Care, but contributes to several Health Care Scene blogs, including EMR Thoughts, EMR and EHR, and EMR and HIPAA. She enjoys learning about Health IT and mHealth, and finding ways to improve her own health along the way.

Understanding Meaningful Use Stage 1 and Stage 2 Deadlines – Meaningful Use Monday

Written by:

The following is a guest blog post by Zubin Emsley, CEO of ChartLogic, Inc. I think readers will find this post by Zubin quite interesting. He brings up some important points, makes some strong assertions, and even makes some daring projections. I look forward to more discussion of the post in the comments. Are we at “the tipping point?”

With all the controversy surrounding the CMS’s proposed Meaningful Use Stage 2 requirements, it is easy to forget that the clock is ticking on the Stage 1 requirements. Physicians who have not yet qualified for the Stage 1 incentives are at risk of leaving $5,000 of incentives on the table if they don’t get started immediately.

The comment period on the proposed Stage 2 rules is now closed and the CMS is expected to incorporate the comments and issue final rules around August 1. The Stage 2 program is currently scheduled to take effect for eligible providers on Jan. 1, 2014; however, there is a good chance this date will be pushed back.

Physicians who want to qualify for the full, five-years’ worth of meaningful use incentives ($44,000 total) must register, adopt a certified EHR system and submit 90-days’ worth of data by Jan. 1, 2013. That means your practice must have incorporated your EHR system into its workflow and be collecting the needed data sets by Oct. 3, 2012.

Since most medical groups need several months to select an EHR vendor, get their new system installed, and get physicians and staff trained, that means time is running out for those who have postponed a decision.

If you miss this year’s deadline, you may still participate in MU Stage 1 next year (2013); however, you will only be eligible for four years of payments ($39,000 total). Those who wait until 2014 to qualify will only be eligible for $24,000 in payments.

We have reached “the tipping point” in terms of EHR adoption. Penalties for failing to e-prescribe began this year, and in 2014 and 2015, physicians will face mounting financial penalties from Medicare and Medicaid if they don’t adopt an EHR. Commercial insurers are also adopting various kinds of accountable care programs that require submission of clinical data. Within five years, the only way a physician practice will be able to operate without an EHR would be if it moved to an all-cash, concierge type model.

Zubin Emsley is chief executive officer of ChartLogic, Inc., a national EHR vendor based in Salt Lake City. For more information see www.chartlogic.com

June 11, 2012 I Written By

John Lynn is the Founder of the HealthcareScene.com blog network which currently consists of 15 blogs containing almost 5000 articles with John having written over 2000 of the articles himself. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 9.3 million times. John also recently launched two new companies: InfluentialNetworks.com and Physia.com, and is an advisor to docBeat. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can also be found on Twitter: @techguy and @ehrandhit.

Patient Relationship Management Taking on the Patient Portal and PHR

Written by:

The other day I had the chance to get a demo of Avado‘s PRM (Patient Relationship Management) system from Dave Chase. I’d seen a lot of the writings of Dave Chase throughout the internet. He’s been really smart to go after a number of really high profile tech blogs to get some good exposure for Avado. This isn’t a good strategy for a lot of healthcare IT companies, but it can work really well for the right ones. Either way, I was fascinated by many of Dave Chase’s writings and so I knew it would be an interesting experience.

Needless to say, Dave Chase and Avado are looking at the physician patient relationship quite different from many others. At some point, I may do a full write up of the Avado service, but I think this slide that Dave Chase showed me summed up the comprehensive way that Avado looks at the physician patient relationship. Take a look at the comparison of Avado with a patient portal (I wish PHR was included in the chart as well):

I love companies that look at situations in a really comprehensive manner. Avado seems to be a company that does that. I think it’s still early to know if Avado will be able to execute on this comprehensive approach, but I think it’s a good starting point. Many who have looked at patient portals and PHR software in the past probably wondered why many of the things listed in the chart above weren’t features of the portal or PHR.

I must admit, my next idea for this list is to take it and see how the various PHR and portals handle each of the items on the list. Considering the new emphasis on the patient portal thanks to meaningful use stage 2, physicians might want to give a little extra thought into what the patient portal they adopt is able to do.

May 8, 2012 I Written By

John Lynn is the Founder of the HealthcareScene.com blog network which currently consists of 15 blogs containing almost 5000 articles with John having written over 2000 of the articles himself. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 9.3 million times. John also recently launched two new companies: InfluentialNetworks.com and Physia.com, and is an advisor to docBeat. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can also be found on Twitter: @techguy and @ehrandhit.