chronically ill

A group of large U.S. and European companies have announced plans to create digital employee health records linking hospital, physician and pharmacy data. By linking this data, these companies hope to help consumers better coordinate and drive their own care. The companies, which include Intel, Wal-Mart and British Petroleum, are beginning the effort by developing a joint records standard. Later, each plan to kick in $1.5 million to construct a joint "data warehouse" for storing the …

When chronically ill patients are discharged from the emergency department, chances are they'll be back soon without further help. In response, health plans have increasingly been assigning "health coaches" to such patients, tasked with making sure patients are doing what they can to stay well. The health coaches, typically registered nurses, stay in regular touch with the patients, sometimes with home visits and sometimes over the phone, helping them schedule appointments, decipher …

> According to a new study by Harris Interactive, many Americans feel that hospitals and managed companies should face more regulation. Of course, there are just a few regs in place already... Release

> The juggernaut keeps rolling. Wal-Mart is rolling …

> Care Improvement, a Medicare Advantage HMO, has launched a health plan targeting chronically ill seniors in Georgia and South Carolina. Release

> The West Nile virus pops up in Missouri. Article

> It's the tale of a Petaluma, Calif.-based hospital …

> Cleveland Clinic-affiliated Fairview Hospital has kicked off a program using letting physicians perform remote fetal monitoring using smart phones and PDAs. Article

> Children's Hospital of Denver is planning a $25 million upgrade of its IT infrastructure. The investment is part of the planned $400 million construction of its new main campus facility. …

A three-year Medicare demonstration program in California's Northern San Joaquin Valley is bringing back an almost extinct medical practice--at-home doctor's visits. The purpose of the program is to provide medical care to chronically ill patients before their problems escalate and land them in the hospital. Though only about 5 percent of Medicare patients have multiple chronic conditions, they are the most expensive to treat and rack up an incredible 40 …

A new study from the Mayo Clinic reports that intensive care accounts for 30 to 40 percent of hospital spending, with the majority of care given to elderly patients with chronic conditions. In Olmsted County, NY, where the Mayo Clinic is based, patients in the last year of life accounted for one of every four days spent in the ICU. Treatment in this expensive setting contributes to the overall rise in healthcare costs. In another recent conducted study by the Center for the Evaluative …

New York's Mount Sinai has crafted a creative deal with the state that supporters say is helping New York keep Medicaid costs down and reducing ER visits to the hospital at the same time. Mount Sinai is offering residents in some areas of Harlem free preventative care in return for increased Medicaid reimbursement rates. The pilot project, which has the support of a $2.3 million grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, provides chronically ill patients suffering from …

A new study by researchers at Kaiser Permanente finds that spending caps on prescription drugs don't save insurers money and may end up harming the health of patients--especially those who are chronically ill. The research, which appears in the New England Journal of Medicine, followed about 200,000 Kaiser Permanente patients in Northern California who had Medicare+Choice (now referred to as Medicare Advantage). The study found that those with limits were more likely to end up …

> World Health Organization officials said yesterday that a suspicious cluster of deaths at a remote Indonesian village were probably not caused by human transmission of the H5N1 virus. Article

> Officials in New Jersey are on the defensive after this week's Dartmouth study on the cost of end of life care for the chronically ill. …