(04/25/2008) -- CMS recently announced tweaks to its 2008 Physician Quality Reporting Initiative, or PQRI, that should make it easier for family physicians and other eligible health care professionals to participate in -- and benefit from -- the program this year. More...
HHS Secretary Announces 12 Communities Selected to Advance Use of Electronic Health Records in First Ever National Demonstration
Louisiana Chosen as One of Only 12 Electronic Health Records Project Sites by Federal Government
Fax-To-Quit Louisiana Program For Healthcare Providers
Healthcare providers in Louisiana recognize the need to treat patients who use tobacco. They realize that a brief intervention provided in the clinical setting is an effective strategy for helping patients quit tobacco use. Read more...
Physician Recruitment and Health Care Access in Rural Louisiana
Louisiana Health Care Review Adds Executive Team Members -Industry Veterans Bring New Insights to Quality Improvement
Dr. Tony Sun to Leave Louisiana Health Care Review -Medical Director Accepts New Position in Kansas City
What's Your Medical Home IQ?-Announcing the TransforMED MHIQ Online Self-Assessment
A new Web-based self-assessment tool for primary care practices seeking to become Medical Homes is now available. TransforMED CEO Terry McGeeney, MD, MBA, appreciates the difficulty of practicing quality medicine while simultaneously transforming care and care processes. "Understanding and implementing the Patient Centered Medical Home concepts is neither intuitive nor easy for practices," he said. "The MHIQ tool is a valuable resource that walks practices through a process that helps them identify what specific areas of the Medical Home model need to be worked on to improve the performance of their practice." Read more...
PQRI Changes Offer Physicians More Reporting Options
CMS Aims for Increased Participation in 2008
Legislation to Increase Physician Payments on Horizon
Medicare, Rural Payments Addressed
(04/23/2008) -- Two members of the Senate Finance Committee have announced that they are working on legislation to address payment issues for primary care physicians. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chair of the Senate Finance Committee, is expected to introduce legislation in the next several weeks that will increase Medicare payments for primary care physicians, and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, has introduced legislation to resolve inequities in physician funding formulas that penalize physicians practicing in rural areas. More...
Health Care Notification Network
New Service Replaces Paper-based Product Safety Alerts With E-mails
(04/23/2008) -- "Imagine reducing the volume of paper and mail in your office, while improving patient safety and reducing your professional liability. All at no cost to you." That's the opening of a short video posted earlier this spring on the popular video-sharing Web site YouTube. The video describes the Health Care Notification Network, or HCNN, a free new service that soon will begin delivering FDA-mandated patient safety notices -- those "Dear Doctor" letters FPs now receive via snail mail -- to physicians and other health care professionals electronically. More...
NRN Sleep, Alcohol Study Seeks to Enroll More Participants
Early Results Show One in 10 Adults Exceeds Safe Drinking Limits
(04/22/2008) -- The AAFP National Research Network, or NRN, is renewing its call for participants for its Patient Sleep Problems and Alcohol Consumption Study. To date, the study has enrolled more than 70 clinicians and 1,200 patients. Researchers on the project are hoping to enroll a total of 100 clinicians by May 2008. More...
National Demonstration Project Concludes
TransforMED Practices Reflect on Successes, Challenges
(04/18/2008) -- More than 70 family physicians and other health care professionals representing 30 family medicine practices from across the country met April 11-13 in Kansas City, Mo., to mark the end of a national demonstration project launched nearly two years ago by TransforMED, a not-for-profit redesign initiative affiliated with the AAFP. More...
AHRQ Resource Helps Patients Take Medications Safely
(04/18/2008) -- According to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, or AHRQ, one in four Americans does not take prescription medications as prescribed. Often, it's because they don't understand how to take their medications or because they simply lose track of what they're supposed to take each day. To address this problem, AHRQ has developed free, online, step-by-step instructions patients can use to create a "pill card" at home. More...
MedPAC to Congress
Alter Payment, Delivery Systems to Promote Primary Care Services
(04/17/2008) -- The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, or MedPAC, has endorsed two key recommendations that, if approved by Congress, would shift the focus of the Medicare program toward a more primary care-based system. During an April 9 meeting in Washington, MedPAC voted to recommend to Congress two separate but interrelated proposals that would alter Medicare's payment and delivery systems to promote the use of primary care services. More...
FDA Approves New Vaccine to Prevent Rotavirus Infection
Product Shows No Increased Intussusception Risk
(04/16/2008)