MedQuist is now M-Modal; athenahealth's Bush offers suggestions for Meaningful Use;

> In aligning its clinical documentation solutions effort-s with efforts to push advanced speech and language understanding technologies, medical transcription and coding, MedQuist Holdings also is changing its company name to M-Modal, officials announced this week. Announcement

> In the first chapter of an interview with healthsystemCIO.com, Chuck Christian-CIO at Vincennes, Ind.-based Good Samaritan Hospital-talks about his extensive work with health information exchange and what the technology can do to improve care for patients. Interview

> Athenahealth CEO Jonathan Bush, in his latest blog post, said that the nation is further behind on Meaningful Use efforts than many people think, and offered three suggestions for catching up. "We need to hold ourselves accountable for practical, tactical outcomes before we even talk about grand outcomes like 'total quality,'" he said. Post

> Stephen C. Schimpff, professor of medicine and public policy at the University of Maryland Medical Center, in a guest post for KevinMD.com, said that even the best advancements in technology are of little value if culture isn't simultaneously addressed. "Healthcare professionals and hospitals will need to address fundamental issues of individual and institutional culture and human factors, and then incorporate many of the new technologies described," he said. Commentary

And Finally... Need a hug? Try these people. Article