News From Around the Web
> The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation today awarded patient social networking site PatientsLikeMe a $1.9 million grant to create what's being called world's first open-participation research platform to develop patient-centered health outcome measures. Announcement
> The Health Information Trust Alliance announced last week that it plans to create a new working group to support the White House Cybersecurity Executive Order issued earlier this month. The Cybersecurity Working Group initially will focus on setting up a baseline framework to reduce cyber risk to critical infrastructure. Announcement
Provider News
> Efforts to curb prescription drug abuse at hospital emergency departments appear to be spreading, as more hospitals sharply restrict their use of opioids to treat patients complaining of pain. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced last month that patients at public hospitals would no longer be able to get painkillers like Oxycontin or methadone, and could receive no more than three days' worth of drugs including Vicodin or Percocet, the New York Times reported. Article
> Congressional politics have stymied an independent commission formed to study how shortages of doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers complicate the execution of healthcare reform, the New York Times reported Sunday. Created in 2010 under the Affordable Care Act, the 15-member National Health Care Workforce Commission has never met--because Congress refused to fund it, the Times reported.
Health Insurance News
> Despite being one of the most ardent critics of the reform law, Florida Gov. Rick Scott announced last week that he would green light the expansion of the state's Medicaid program. The move likely makes Scott the most significant of the seven Republican governors to expand Medicaid since he spearheaded the challenge to the reform law, taking it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Article
And Finally... Proof that it's never too late to take up a new hobby. Article