Health IT Innovation and ACC Physicians

On April 2-5, I attended the 60^th Annual Scientific Session & Expo, of the American College of Cardiology in New Orleans, La. The ACC ‘s website states it is a 39,000-member nonprofit medical professional society that is leading the way to optimal cardiovascular care and disease prevention through health policy, standards and guidelines and support of CV research. I can attest to the organization’s efforts to lead the way in introducing new technologies to its members.

On Sunday April 3, HIMSS sponsored two HIT Spotlight sessions dedicated to the adoption and use of information technology. The EHR Meaningful Use for ARRA featured the James T. Dove Lecture and Lessons from the Trenches with cardiology private practice EHR lessons.

Farzad Mostashari, M.D., Sc.M., the newly appointed National Coordinator for Health IT, was the keynote speaker of the Spotlight sessions where he challenged physicians to use health IT and electronic health records as part of achieving excellence in providing patient care.

The conference use of technology for its attendees included:

• 300+ hours of education in a comprehensive digital library;
• Presenter slides with fully synchronized live audio, embedded video and mouse movements where anyone could view content exactly as if they were in the room;
• Viewable sessions on a USB drive or online;
• Stream content from the iPad® or iPhone®; and
• Downloadable MP3 files available online.

The ACC exhibit floor had hundreds of vendors and a dedicated EHR pavilion with two interactive sessions for members included: an “EHR Tour” in the EHR Pavilion and a “Gadget and Gizmo’s” tour on the exhibit floor with experienced physicians who had already adopted the EHR and use other technologies for their practices. The physicians could see first-hand the value and use of health information technology.

The American College of Cardiology’s highlighted its PINNACLE Registry that helps cardiology practices collect, store and use patient data to improve office visits, coordinate care and generate performance reports for quality improvement and Pay-for-Performance programs.

The PINNACLE Registry surpassed the 1.5 million patient record mark and is the largest cardiovascular outpatient database. With a focus on the four most common cardiac conditions:

• coronary artery disease,
• hypertension,
• heart failure, and
• atrial fibrillation,

the 1.5 million patient records represent valid patient encounters from hundreds of outpatient cardiologists nationwide. This Registry is part of the ACC’s National Cardiovascular Data Registry, the largest and most comprehensive outcomes-based cardiovascular patient data repository for quality improvement in the US.

According to Jack Lewin, M.D., CEO of the American College of Cardiology, “The Registry continues to be successful since it uses technology that delivers value without disrupting physician workflow, which is exactly the way health IT is supposed to work.”

Royal Philips Electronics and its partners demonstrated how personalized management of a patient from hospital to home can help reduce hospital readmission rates for patients with cardiac conditions. At the conference, Philips and its partners showcased the Hospital to Home (H2H) Interactive Learning Destination. The demonstration area illustrated how cardiologists, home health providers and other healthcare teams can work together with the patient during the critical transition from the inpatient to outpatient setting with the goal of avoiding unplanned hospital readmission.

The demonstration emphasized specific requirements to consider:

• Viewing this patient’s journey from the hospital to the home presented a real-life scenario emphasizing the need for clinicians and caregivers throughout the continuum of care to better manage pre- and post-discharge treatment.
• The gap in information exchange and the relationship between inpatient and outpatient providers make it difficult to deliver high quality, patient-centered and coordinated care.
•  Collaboration, communication and advanced technologies are essential to proper disease management and reduced hospital readmissions.

“Together with the ACC, we are highlighting how currently available technology in hospital and home health care solutions can help hospitals reduce cardiovascular-related hospital readmissions,” said Philips Healthcare CEO Steve Rusckowski. “Innovations in clinical informatics and home health care solutions can improve the transition from inpatient to outpatient status for individuals hospitalized with cardiovascular disease by providing critical support throughout the patient’s journey – whether by providing clinical decision support to clinicians, better education and information to patients or ongoing surveillance of chronic illness in the home.”

All in all, the ACC meeting provided an excellent overview of cardiovascular care; the researchers and clinicians in attendance truly understood the need for continued innovation with health information technology and the importance this technology lends to improving patient care and quality outcomes.  Great job ACC!

Now, I have a question for you:  How are physicians using innovative health information technologies in their practices today?