> Practice Fusion, the free electronic medical records (EMR) company based in San Francisco, announced that it now has more than 100,000 medical professional users serving 16 million patients. The company started the year with 55,000 users (an 82 percent increase) and 6 million patients (a 166 percent increase). More than 10,000 medical professionals sign up for the free, web-based EMR each month, the company says. Article
> Seattle Children's Hospital said it is testing a new data aggregator that focuses on the front-end user's experiences--rather than the underlying technology--to provide a more complete picture of a patient's condition and status. The technology is designed to encourage patient-centric communication and allow clinicians to provide better and more coordinated care. Article
> CCHIT announced July 13 that five more healthcare systems have joined Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, in certifying complete or modular EHRs under CCHIT's EHR Alternative Certification for Healthcare Providers (EACH), an ONC-ATCB 2011/2012 certification program for already installed EHR technology. Those organizations are: Health Management Associates, Naples, Fla.; New York University Langone Medical Center; Northwestern University, Chicago; Tenet Healthsystem Medical, Inc., Dallas; and Modular EHR Hospital University of North Carolina Health Care Chapel Hill. Announcement
> NaviNet Doc Xchange will be available in August as a health information handler (HIH) under the first phase of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' (CMS) electronic submission of medical documentation (esMD) pilot program. CMS' esMD pilot was developed to assist providers in submitting medical documentation to CMS electronically. Article
And finally... He's prepared for the flying spaghetti monster. Article