Welcome to the weekly edition of Healthcare IT Today Bonus Features. This article will be a weekly roundup of interesting stories, product announcements, new hires, partnerships, research studies, awards, sales, and more. Because there’s so much happening out there in healthcare IT we aren’t able to cover in our full articles, we still want to make sure you’re informed of all the latest news, announcements, and stories happening to help you better do your job.

News

• CHIME provided some clarity on the Smart Hospital Maturity Model initiative, noting it’s meant to “complement and enhance” the existing Digital Health Most Wired Program. The organization also announced CHIME is joining the Federation for Informatics Professionals in Health and Care in the United Kingdom.
• Amid the Change Healthcare cybersecurity breach, Availity announced it has established 33 new health plan connections and seen a 40% increase in the volume of claims it’s processing.

Reports

• ECRI’s list of top 10 patient safety concerns of 2024 include “unintended consequences of technology adoption,” especially as they relate to clinician workflows.
• The latest State of US Nursing Report from Incredible Health found 89% of nurses haven’t used AI in their roles and nearly two-thirds (65%) think AI will negatively impact the industry.
• Research from Paytient found 40% of people with employer-sponsored insurance delayed care due to high costs.
• The latest report from Strata Decision Technology found 52% of healthcare CFOs are optimistic for positive operating margins this year, though 92% said their organization needs to do more with financial and operational data.
• The latest from Epic Research looked at the most effective weight loss GLP-1 weight loss medications, the increasing rate of fentanyl toxicity in the ED, and the correlation between a mother’s BMI and the likelihood of childhood obesity.

More News from HIMSS 2024

• Real-time location system vendor CenTrak introduced its Bluetooth Low Energy Multi-Mode Platform.
• Cybersecurity vendor Claroty released its Advanced Anomaly Threat Detection Module. Additionally, the vendor released research indicating 23% of medical devices have at least one known vulnerability, along with 14% of EHRs.
• MEDITECH integrated ambient listening technology into Expanse EHR and announced two early adopters: New York’s St. Mary’s Healthcare and Indiana’s Decatur County Memorial Hospital.
• RamSoft added progressive loading to OmegaAI, its cloud-native radiology software built on Microsoft Azure.

Partnerships

• iRhythm Technologies is using Epic’s Aura platform to provide access to Zio, its continuous monitoring and telemetry services.
• Practice Better integrated with Claim.MD, enabling mental health professionals to run eligibility checks and submit claims.
• Valer and Encoda are partnering to reduce denials and gaps in prior authorization for mid to large physician practices.

Products

• Western New York HIE HEALTHeLINK launched its HEALTHeWNY Dashboard to support public and community health.
• EHR and practice management vendor CharmHealth launched CharmHealthApps, its marketplace for third-party technology.
• Televox unveiled Practice Edition to help practices address scheduling, patient communication, and reputation management.
• AKASA launched Authorization Advisor, a generative AI tool that supports prior authorization.
• Payment integrity vendor Apixio launched Health Data Nexus.
• The Vivalink Biometrics Data Platform now supports fully remote acute patient monitoring.
• Care coordination company Quantum Health launched a navigation service to support Medicare Advantage plans.
• Avalon Healthcare Solutions launched AvalonSelect Genetic Network, a service for genetic testing and management.

Sales

• Arkansas Heart Health is extending its use of Oracle Health EHR and RevElate Patient Accounting across its network.
• New York City’s Essen Health Care chose ReferWell for advanced scheduling and appointment coordination.

People

• Insurer Evry Health appointed Christina Rassi as Chief Growth Officer.
• Health equity platform Spatially Health named Leigh Ann Ruggles as an Advisory Board member.

If you have news that you’d like us to consider for a future edition of Healthcare IT Today Bonus Features, please submit, them on this page. Please include any relevant links and let us know if news is under embargo. Note that submissions received after the close of business on Thursday may not be included in Bonus Features until the following week.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!