Portrait of Parmeeth M.S. Atwal

Transition to EHRs Improves Breast Cancer Survivor’s Quality of Life: Pam Crum’s Story

Parmeeth M.S. Atwal | October 7, 2011

Pam Crum is a seven-year breast cancer survivor. A busy mother of two young daughters, Pam also volunteers as a mentor for women who have been diagnosed with breast cancer.

When Pam’s cancer was diagnosed, she was pregnant with her second child. Her medical journey over these seven years has been a complicated one. During that journey, her health care providers were making the transition from paper-based to electronic medical records. Pam experienced the transition first-hand, and knows what a big difference it can make.

Read Full Post.
Portrait of Pierce Graham-Jones ,

Health 2.0 Exchange Connects Consumer Ehealth Innovators with Beacon Communities

Pierce Graham-Jones | September 26, 2011

This past weekend, the Beacon Community Program headed to the 5th Annual Health 2.0 Conference, a leading gathering of people working to leverage the power of consumer technology to drive health care improvement. As part of the proceedings, the Health 2.0 organizers hosted the first-ever “Beacon Innovation Exchange.” Over the course of an open five-hour meeting, six of the Beacon Communities met and exchanged ideas with more than 50 consumer ehealth technology companies. They had some coordination and facilitation help from three organizations who make it their job to understand this industry – Health 2.0,

Read Full Post.
Portrait of Dr. Doug Fridsma

Join Query Health in Developing National Standards for Population Queries

Dr. Doug Fridsma | September 23, 2011

The focus of our nation’s health care system is to improve the health of individuals and ultimately the health of the population as a whole. In order to positively impact population health, we need to be able to evaluate and react to emerging health issues and trends at both the local and the national level. In recent years, the use of distributed queries has become a growing focus of health information technology. Instead of relying on centralized databases,

Read Full Post.
Portrait of Dr. Daniel Hansen ,

Beacon Community of the Inland Northwest Uses Past Successes to Improve Care

Dr. Daniel Hansen | September 23, 2011

As the Inland Northwest Health Services (INHS) began establishing its Beacon Community—the Beacon Community of the Inland Northwest (BCIN)–we knew at least one thing: Evidence-based clinical best practices combined with a technology-based care coordination process could help improve patient outcomes.  How did we know?  INHS had already achieved successes for injured workers through its Centers for Occupational Health & Education (COHE).

Read Full Post.