Health IT News from Federal Agencies and Capitol Hill – Edited by Carolyn Bloch
The Wisconsin Office of Rural Health is seeking proposals for their “Rural Emergency Health Care Services Frequent User Project.” The Office will award one planning grant for up to $5,000 to a rural Critical Access Hospital (CAH). (more…)
Due to the growing cost of medical coverage, increasing number of beneficiaries, more services being covered, and the increasing cost of operating the Military Health Service (MHS), the budget for healthcare in the military is projected to grow to $95 billion by 2030. To effectively manage the system, DOD is looking to support the oversight and the management of what will be a new agency called the Defense Health Agency (DHA). (more…)
Eight innovative fast-growing Canadian companies in life sciences and information and communication technologies will join the new Canadian Technology Accelerator (CTA) program in Boston. The initial participants will undertake a three month intensive program at the Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC) near MIT where they will be able to access resources and be mentored by business leaders and venture capitalists. (more…)
The 2012 Ohio Medicaid Assessment Survey (OMAS) conducted by RTI International was able to deliver needed health and healthcare data to public and private organizations to provide insight into the health status of the state’s Medicaid and Medicaid-eligible populations. The sample size interviewed included 22,929 adults 19 and older and 5,515 children up to age of 18.
Administered by Ohio Medicaid with the assistance of the Ohio Colleges of Medicine Government Resource Center, the OMAS is the key to assessing how Ohioans are in terms of clinical healthcare, insurance status, chronic and acute conditions, and mental health, along with surveying health status stressors such as poverty, joblessness, and low socioeconomic status. (more…)
NIH awarded over $7,000,000 for 3 years to the Association of Asian Pacific Community Health Organizations (AAPCHO) to develop new Health IT strategies. The plan is to increase screening for chronic Hepatitis B Virus (HBV) to reduce the impact of Hepatitis B among high-risk Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) populations.
Many AAPIs with chronic HBV are not receiving the care that they need and are disproportionately impacted by this disease. It happens that over half of the estimated 2 million people infected with HBV in the U.S. are AAPIs.
This is going to be the first study to research how health IT can improve HBV outcomes for medically underserved AAPI populations at risk and infected with HBV. This research challenge will be accomplished with the help of one of the AAPI member community health centers called International Health Services (ICHS).
The project will enable AAPCHO and ICHS to use health IT to improve care at the provider and patient level. The project will work to create health IT tools that will help diagnose health problems sooner, reduce medical errors, and provide safer and more comprehensive care.
Through the use of health IT, providers will be able to give HBV testing and vaccination reminders to patients, work with ICHS to conduct interviews, surveys, and focus groups, and use the findings to develop culturally tailored HBV interventions that incorporate health IT.
On April 5, 2013, California Correctional Health Care Services (CCHCS) issued RFP #12265 seeking proposals for a Healthcare Provider Network (HCPN). The HCPN will enable community-based Specialty Medical Services Providers and a Third Party Administrator (TPA) to process claims for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR).
This RFP is the result of the State of California’s ongoing failure to provide medical care to prison inmates at constitutionally acceptable levels. The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California appointed a Receiver to assume executive management of the California prison medical system. (more…)
A team at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center is applying two well-tested applications in new ways in an attempt to improve mobility in people who have suffered a stroke. Researchers specializing in rehabilitation use smart phone technology to evaluate the progress of stroke survivors who are learning to walk again.
“In our study, we’re measuring how well people walked before and how they walk after intervention with a new system of wireless sensors that use the same technology found in cell phones and tablets,” said Stephen Page PhD, Associate professor of Occupation Therapy at Ohio State’s School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences. “This is the first time this approach has been used.” (more…)