Conmergence

2008 Fiber To The Home Conference & Expo September 21 - 25, 2008 Gaylord Opryland® Resort & Convention Center, Nashville, TN

<ed.note>The conference's theme is "Linking Communities at the Speed of Light" but more intriguing to me is the the scheduled appearance of Don Tapscott (The Naked Corporation: How the Age of Transparency Will Revolutionize Business, Digital Capital: Harnessing the Power of Business Webs, Creating Value in the Networked Economy, Blueprint to the Digital Economy: Creating Wealth in the Era of E-Business, Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation, The Digital Economy: Promise and Peril in the Age of Networked Intelligence, Who Knows: Safeguarding Your Privacy in a Networked World, Paradigm Shift: The New Promise of Information Technology)  adreessing his latest work, Wikinomics How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. Implicit in Tapscott's writings is management's buy-in of the distrubuted digital enterprise-enabled results-only collaborative work environment. If you happen to be one of those creatures (especially if you are from Nashville), I invite you to join the Linkedin.com Project Net-Work group and Technology Nashville.</ed.note>

Sunday, September 21, 2008
1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.	Registration Opens
Monday, September 22, 2008
7:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.	Registration Opens
8:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.	Developer Panel Workshop  *Additional fee*
8:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.	Home Networking Workshop  *Additional fee*
1:00 p.m. - 1:45 p.m.	Track Session - Series 100  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
1:00 p.m. - 1:45 p.m.	FTTH Executive Summit *By invitation only* Moderated by: Don Tapscott, Author
2:00 p.m. - 2:45 p.m.	Track Session Series 200  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
3:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.	EXPO Grand Opening & Opening Reception *Open to all registered attendees*
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
7:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.	Registration Opens
7:00 a.m. - 8:00 a.m.	Continental Breakfast *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
8:00 a.m. - 10:00 a.m.	Opening General Session    *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only* Keynote Speaker - Don Tapscott, Author Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything Sponsored by: FTTH Council Awards Sponsored by: FTTxcellence Awards Sponsored by:
10:00 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.	Refreshment Break    *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
10:15 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.	Global Carrier Keynote Panel   *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
11:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.	EXPO Hall Opens   *Open to all registered attendees*
12:00 noon - 2:00 p.m.	Luncheon in EXPO Hall  *Open to all registered attendees*
3:15 p.m. - 4:45 p.m.	ITCo Panel  *Conference Pass attendees only*
3:15 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.	Track Session Series 300  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
4:15 p.m. - 4:45 p.m.	Track Session Series 400   *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
5:00 p.m. - 5:45 p.m.	Track Session Series 500   *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.	International attendee Reception   *By invitation only*
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
7:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.	Registration Open
7:00 a.m. - 8:00 a.m.	Continental Breakfast  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
8:00 a.m. - 9:00 a.m.	Government and Regulatory Panel
8:00 a.m. - 8:45 a.m.	Track Session Series 600  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
9:00 a.m. - 9:45 a.m.	Track Session Series 700  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
9:45 a.m. - 10:00 a.m.	Refreshment Break  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
10:00 a.m. - 10:45 a.m.	Track Session Series 800  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
11:00 a.m. - 12:15 a.m.	Panel Session Series 900  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
12:15 p.m. - 1:00 p.m.	On Own for Lunch
1:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.	EXPO Hall Opens
4:15 p.m. - 5:45 p.m.	Closing General Session with Keynote Speaker  *Conference Pass and Day Pass attendees only*
7:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.	EXTRAVAGANZA - Closing Reception with Entertainment *Additional fee* "Don't forget your dancing boots!"
Thursday, September 25, 2008
8:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.	Post Conference Workshops

HITRUST Common Security Framework

HITRUST believes that a common security framework for use by all organizations that create, access, store, or exchange personal health information is necessary to advance the goals of health information technology. Standardizing a higher level of security will build greater trust in the electronic flow of information through the healthcare system.

The HITRUST common security framework will be comprehensive, leveraging existing industry standards and best practices where appropriate. The framework also will be flexible to adjust to an evolving security environment and scale according to type, size and complexity of the organizations that create, access, store, or exchange health information. Additionally, the common security framework will:

• Reduce confusion by implementing a single framework across multiple organizations
• Increase confidence by consumers, regulators and legislators in the industry's ability to address these issues and to proactively protect sensitive information and healthcare systems
• Establish a single standard for organizations for internal and external measurement
• Reduce the number and complexity of security audits or reviews that organizations impose upon their trading partners

HITRUST provides all healthcare organizations an opportunity/OR/opportunities to influence the direction of the common trust framework by applying to participate in the development of the security standards. Participant benefits include:

Interaction with peers and industry experts

Access to work papers and background materials

Serving on working groups to develop common trust framework

Ability to comment, influence and deliberate on framework drafts and final papers

Smart Phone Electronic Medical Record / Mobile Contactless Payment / Remote Monitoring, Developments Toward...

<ed.note>Since vendors are looking at remote monitoring for disease management I should list those as well. I'll also be on the look out for sensors which are car-based now that wi-fi is available in automobiles. There are some parallel developments which I guess I should mention: Major League Baseball and other event vendors as well as transportation providers and social networks are putting the cell phone closer to the center of their business models. ( Robert Neelbauer on social graphs here -- cells will eventually be tracked by them. ) Of course, on the other end of the spectrum is home automation.</ed.note>

Phillips (still using POTS lines)
Qualcomm
Nokia's Intellisync Call Connect for Cisco

Shout out to http://www.wirelesshealthcare.co.uk who usually gets these stories before anyone else.

The Tech Scene: Banking by Cell Phone - This Time It's for Real?,
Use of Mobile and Wireless Technology Jumps in Hospitals,

iPhone ? ? ? ( Remember Osirix ), icefirst, liferecord, Access, aKos, ARANZ Medical, Asia eHealth presentations, Banco do Brasil, Blackberry [2], Diebold, Docobo, ebay VOIP (Skype), Gemalto, Google [2][3][4], INSIDE Contactless, J/Speedy, mBlox, mFoundry, Microsoft, m-Wallet, Obopay, payWave, Mayo Clinic InTouch, NTT DoCoMo, PayPal Credit Card, Privium, Samsung, telSpace, Telzuit's Bio-Patch PDA,
Telemedicine & eHealth Directory 2005, Verisign, ViVOtech, FeliCa, [2], Mifare [2], NFC Forum, Blackberry, Ubuntu mobile, Globe Telecom and Smart Communications

Will Law Enforcement's Inability to Combat Identity Theft Render the NHIN Moot?

<ed.note>I don't know if you've had opportunity to see the "TO CATCH AN ID THIEF" episode of Dateline but it makes the case that the credit card networks are completely broken in terms of their ability to prevent ID theft. IRQ chat rooms exchange cracked and stolen data at a truly astounding rate - multiple country false charges to accounts to their limits in much less than five minutes. If you monitor the comments from the blog entry you'll see that virtually no one is getting any effective cooperation from local police or FBI for prosecutions. Sandra Kay Miller, in Invasion of the Identity Snatchers, adds some other factors to the topic.

The commentors from the Dateline blog also make the point that using the Luhn formula ( available everywhere in the public domain ) it is relatively easy to guess legitimate credit card numbers under the current regime -- a reality cited as a cause of ID theft in addition to, or comingled with, the theft of data.</ed.note>

If You'd Like To Advocate For FOSS in Healthcare

as Ignacio H. Valdes, MD, MS suggests, you might want to call in on the AHIC Successor Public Technical Assistance Meeting to be held 9:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Eastern on September 5, 2007, to ask detailed questions related to a Notice of Funding Availability (NoFA) to resource an entity designated to design and establish the AHIC successor by Spring 2008 and the role FOSS will play. 

Here's the current vision.

MIRTH 1.6 Released

Chris Lang for the Mirth Team writes:

We are very excited to announce Mirth 1.6. Mirth 1.6 adds NCPDP transaction support to Mirth's growing list of supported standards which include HL7, X12, EDI, and XML.

Mirth 1.6 also includes new enterprise features such as support for high-volume transaction processing and a plug-in architecture to simplify the inclusion and distribution of Mirth extensions.

Here is a list of some of the features added to Mirth in this release:

• NCPDP messaging support
• Plug-in functionality
• Enhanced message workflow
• Global scripting support
• Deploy, Shutdown, Postprocessor scripts
• Client-mode LLP Receiver
• Real-time connection status monitoring
• Web-Service authentication
• Dynamic listener/sender addresses
• Improved LLP, JMS, HTTP and TCP connectors
• Ability to poll by time of day (JDBC, File, FTP, SFTP)
• Ability to access sockets from transformer
• Compatibility fixes for Meditech, Centricity and .Net servers
• Backup and Restore
• Upgrade and Migration support
• JBoss compatibility

For the full list of enhancements and bug fixes in Mirth 1.6 see the
release notes at:
http://www.mirthproject.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=64
&Itemid=73

The Mirth Project resonates with Health Information Exchanges (HIE), EHR and PHR vendors, laboratories, hospitals, and HIT system integrators. NCPDP transaction support is a natural extension for Mirth to fast-track the pharmacy industry with low-cost interoperability solutions. The National Council for Prescription Drug Programs thought that NCPDP transaction support in Mirth is a great idea:

"Mirth is an open source, standards-based Health IT messaging system that supports NCPDP, X12N, EDI, and HL7 transactions and, as a result, aligns well with the messaging infrastructure advocated by the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs," said Lee Ann Stember, President of the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs Organization. "Being an OSS HIT interface engine solution, Mirth lowers cost barriers, fosters the NCPDP community, and could facilitate common infrastructures for pharmacy claims, Medication Therapy Management (MTM), and automated Prior Authorization (PA) systems, to name a few."

You can download Mirth 1.6 at: http://mirthproject.org

2) ALL NEW WEBINAR SET FOR SEPTEMBER 4TH

We are pleased to announce an ALL NEW Mirth Webinar. This webinar will focus on a demonstration of Mirth 1.6 features and a Mirth Appliance solution.

Mirth 1.6 Webinar
Tuesday, September 4th, 2007 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM PDT
https://www.gotomeeting.com/register/734450238

Thanks for all your contributions and support!

Google and Microsoft Look to Change Health Care

August 14, 2007 By Steve Lohr, nytimes.com

In politics, every serious candidate for the White House has a health care plan. So too in business, where the two leading candidates for Web supremacy, Google and Microsoft, are working up their plans to improve the nation’s health care.

ASC X12’s Commitment to Collaboration Expedites Consensus on Patient Eligibility Look-up Parameters

Falls Church, VA, August 14, 2007 – In the spirit of collaboration for which it is known, the Accredited Standards Committee (ASC) X12 achieved rapid consensus with numerous stakeholders on difficult issues related to Required Alternate Search Options in the newest Health Care Eligibility/Benefit Inquiry and Information Response (270/271) Technical Report Type 3 (TR3). The stakeholders involved in this successful consensus process represented The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the Provider Caucus, the ASC X12 Insurance Subcommittee (X12N) Health Care Eligibility Work Group, other health plans, and key health care providers.

This newest TR3, version 005010, will significantly reduce efforts to identify patients and their providers and is being proposed as a replacement standard for adoption under Administrative Simplification provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996, so achieving broad consensus is critical for its future use in the health care industry.

“The accomplished resolution is a tribute to our constituents’ care and dedication,” said X12N Chair Alexandra Goss of Payformance Corporation. “X12 remains committed to effectively executing our proven consensus-driven environment that solicits input from the widest possible pool of industry stakeholders.”

Key to the resolution of these issues was X12N’s Provider Caucus, formed to strengthen providers’ voice in the development of X12 insurance-related standards, and co-chaired by Betsy Clore of Wake Forest University Health Sciences and Karyn White of BJC HealthCare. The Provider Caucus represents a wide range of health care providers, including physicians, dental practices, hospitals, labs, and many others. Provider Caucus representatives from numerous entities – including BJC HealthCare, Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, Mayo Foundation, Montefiore Medical Center, and Wake Forest University Health Sciences – worked with CMS’ Medicare Fee for Service and supporting offices to reconcile diverse business needs and achieve consensus in barely six weeks.

“We give special thanks to CMS for making individuals available on short notice from its Beneficiary Security, Provider Communications and EDI Components, and the quick approval of CMS upper management on the achieved consensus solution,” said Clore. “The provider voice is strong at X12, and the resolution of this issue showcases X12’s core values of collaboration and cooperation with diverse stakeholders to ultimately streamline and reduce the cost of doing EDI.”

“We commend X12’s willingness to listen to diverse business needs from multiple health care stakeholders and to foster an environment of collaboration, which enabled quick resolution of the issue,” said Tony Culotta, Director of Medicare Enrollment and Appeals Group at CMS. “Despite starting at opposite points of the compass, everyone kept an open mind enabling us to work toward a common solution that met everyone’s needs. We wish to recognize the essential role of X12 in the success of this effort.”

This collective agreement advances the new 005010 TR3 as a replacement standard, which features numerous enhancements and additional search options,” said Stuart Beaton, Co-Chair of X12N/TG2/WG1 – Health Care Eligibility Work Group. “The new TR3 now includes requirements that health plans return much more detailed 271 [eligibility, coverage or benefit information] responses including Plan and Benefit Begin dates, Plan Name, Primary Care Physician (if applicable), other Health Plans (if known), 10 high level benefits, as well as all demographic information needed to identify the individual on all other subsequent EDI transactions.”

This new 005010 TR3 is presently available for public review and comment through September 7 at http://www.wpc-edi.com/products/publications/x279 or http://www.wpcedi.com/conferences/tg2/implementationguides , respectively. Following that, an ASC X12 Informational Forum to discuss all comments received and any changes made as a consequence will be held September 25 at the next ASC X12 Meeting, taking place September 23-28 at the Wilshire Grand Hotel in Los Angeles. Visit www.X12.org for additional meeting information.

About ASC X12
The Accredited Standards Committee (ASC) X12, chartered by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) in 1979, develops electronic data interchange (EDI) standards and related documents for national and global markets. With more than 315 X12 EDI standards and a growing collection of X12 XML schemas, ASC X12 enhances business processes, reduces costs and expands organizational reach. ASC X12’s diverse member base includes 3,000+ standards experts representing over 350 companies from multiple business domains. To learn more about ASC X12 and how to participate in its vital standards-setting role for health care, insurance, transportation, finance, government and many other industries, visit http://www.X12.org or call 703-970-4480. For additional information, contact: Julia O’Brien, jobrien@disa.org or 606-356-2999.

This Day in Connected Health

<ed.note>FasterCures SmartBrief pointed me here while Wireless Healthcare Weekly News pointed me here. This is, of course, serendipitous and synergistic given this, you know, if anyone in power pays attention.</ed.note>

Advancing Virtual Organizing: Potentials and Realities from Scientific Grid to Citizen-Service Communities - June 20, 2007

The purpose of the workshop is to envision greater possibilities for distributed citizen service communities, in light of grid-based, research and design communities. How can emerging public service communities learn "build to share" principles from distributed research communities already benefiting from cyberinfrastructures they have built? What are the implications for accelerating Service Oriented Architecture in public service communities?

By discovering how different fields of business, science and healthcare are using grid computing, participants will share in lessons learned and best practices to provide a common foundation for establishing next steps in planning projects that leverage all the advances associated with grid communities.

"...Grids are the integrated platforms for all network-distributed applications or services whether they are computationally or transactionally intensive." Paul Strong, Grid Today, Sept.11, 2006

In addition, the workshop includes a focus on the U.S. HealthGrid. Current priorities as seen through the National Institutes of Health Roadmap for example call for advancing collaboration in biomedical research and using biomedical data and information to improve the quality and outcomes of health care delivery.

The President's goal to make an electronic health record available for most Americans by 2014 and the development of the Nationwide Health Information Network under the leadership of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, present a timely opportunity to share and collaborate advanced HealthGrid projects, systems, data and knowledge. Through collaboration, open solutions and innovation, the grid community can contribute to advancing quality, electronic health records, population and bio-surveillance and personal health records to achieve higher levels of performance and interoperability.

Wired for Health Quality Act

here. <ed.note>Note: Sec. 403. Facilitating the Provision of Telehealth Services Across State Lines</ed.note>

Contactless Cards 2007 June 25th & 26th, London

SMi's Contactless Cards Conference will bring together leading industry players to discuss the latest opportunities and challenges within the market focusing on advanced transport systems, operator networks, payment applications, passports and IDs.

After the two-day event Consult Hyperion will also be holding a half-day interactive workshop - ?1+1 = 3? Contactless + Mobile = Something Special which will look at the question: Is the hype around NFC and mobile phones justified? The workshop will attempt to answer this question based on practical experiences developing NFC applications for clients in the finance, transport, telecommunications and technology sectors, while simultaneously acting as a mobile/NFC boot camp. For more information and to download the full conference programme visit:
www.smi-online.co.uk/2007contactlesscards11.asp

Companies already attending include:

Advanta National Bank USA, Alliance & Leicester, Bankalararasi Kart Merkezi, Bayern Card Services, DnB NOR, EDS, Elavon Merchant Services, ESP Systex, Euromonitor International, GMPTE, Komercní banka, MasterCard Worldwide, Tatra Banka AS, Thales Telecom Services, Trans Link Systems B.V... and many more

Places are limited so register now to secure your place. Smart Card Alliance members receive 20% discount.

To register your place contact Marta Szymaniak on tel: +44 (0) 207 827 6180or email: mszymaniak@smi-online.co.uk

Speakers include:

Dr Toni Merschen, Group Head, Chip, MasterCard Worldwide

Randy Vanderhoof, Executive Director, Smart Card Alliance

Paul Marsh, Director, Cards and Fraud Control, APACS

Shashi Verma, Director of Oyster Card, Transport for London

Brian Byrne, Chair of the Board of Managers and Vice President, EMVCo

Guido Mangiagalli, Head of New Channels, Visa Europe

Greg Garback, Executive Officer, Division of Finance, Washington (DC) Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA)

Dominic Peachey, Policy Adviser, Financial Services Authority

Thomas Martin, Senior Product Manager, Debit Cards, Lloyds TSB Group

James Parsons, Vice President, EMEA Cards Product Development, JPMorgan Chase

A Vendor Challenge For Electronic Health Record Use Case - Semantic Interoperability Using Universal Data Element Framework (UDEF)

<ed.note>Update: a listserv conversation which may be informative to folks just becoming famliar to the UDEF EHR initiative.</ed.note>

...Approving extensions to the UDEF requires approximately a six week process once we have a set of proposed extensions ready for the review and approval process. The list ... represents that proposed list. We are trying to establish a subset of the Electronic Health Record extensions that will allow the vendor community to build products based on those extensions plus the entire approved UDEF that they can demonstrate at a future Open Group Conference. The goal is to allow us to establish a suitable schedule and associated press release announcing the vendor challenge.

To add the content of HL7 or LOINC to the approved list will require participation from experts in the two standards. Participation means mapping those standards (as data element concepts) to the UDEF and submitting the proposed extensions (as required) to the list. Collectively, the members of the UDEF Project are encouraging subject matter experts to take an active role. Up to this point in time, Arnold [ van Overeem of Capgemini ] and I have been creating sample mappings in the medical area to help educate those who have recently joined this list. I may be wrong, but I suspect that it will require many months to map the entire HL7 and LOINC standards to the UDEF.

We (The Open Group UDEF Project) are facing a chicken and egg dilemma. We need the vendor community to build products that will enable organizations such as the medical community to map their standards to the UDEF. At the same time we need participation from major domains such as medical to demonstrate the value that UDEF can bring. The vendor community needs a potential large market such as medical and the associated data integration with Electronic Health Records to help them justify their effort. We are hopeful that a subset of the medical domain vocabulary will be sufficient for the vendor challenge and that it will allow the vendors to demonstrate the UDEF’s value toward the goal of supporting Electronic Health Record integration.

Except for FDA, I didn’t realize we had a US focus. However, if we have, then perhaps it is to help us stay focused on those topics that apply to the Electronic Health Record initiative that is a US initiative. Future extensions can address organizations that are other country counterparts to the FDA.

I hope this answers your questions and hopefully encourages subject matter experts to take an active role in the process.

Ron Schuldt
Chairman The Open Group UDEF Project
ron.l.schuldt at lmco.com

See also:

April 25, 2007 presentation by Ron Schuldt, Chair, The Open Group Universal Data Element Framework (UDEF) Project.

Can Medical Banking Connect the Healthcare IT Dots for Politicians?

<ed.note>John Casillas testified today before the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) American Health Information Community concerning the medical banking vision of a unified view and unified platform to connect EHR|PHR, real-time adjudication, Healthcare Savings Accounts, High Deductible Health Plans, Consumer Driven Healthcare. AHIC decided at its November 29, 2005 meeting to form workgroups in the following areas: biosurveillance, consumer empowerment, chronic care, and electronic health records. Subsequently, at the May 16, 2006 Community meeting, two additional groups were formed: the Biosurveillance Data Steering Group as a sub-workgroup within the Biosurveillance Workgroup (renamed Population Health and Clinical Care Connections Workgroup), and the Confidentiality, Privacy & Security Workgroup, which was created as a cross-cutting workgroup responsible for an issue relevant to all the workgroups. More recent, at the August 1, 2006, meeting, the Community formed the Quality Workgroup to address the need for the development of quality measures; and at the October 31, 2006, meeting, the Personalized Healthcare Workgroup was formed to develop and make recommendations on standards for interoperable integration of genomic test information into personal e-health records.</ed.note>

LinkedIn OpenHealthCare Group Launched

<ed.note>In order to better network between the various OS efforts touching healthcare I asked LinkedIn to set up a group. If you're a biz dev, booster, coder, contributor, venture-type, the invite is here.</ed.note>

Navigant Capital Advisors Healthcare Services "Quarterly Dialogue"

<ed.note>I met Brad at a Medical Banking Project function and he has been kind enough to keep me in the loop:</ed.note>

2007 continues to be a strong period for the healthcare sector on top of a record year in 2006 as over 250 transactions were announced in Q1. Due to continued liquidity and a buoyant lending market, private equity groups have gained further purchasing power in the marketplace in pursuit of high growth sectors, such as healthcare services and healthcare information technology. Notable first quarter transactions include:

• In the information services sector, The Blackstone Group's $3.3 billion cash acquisition of Cardinal Health's Pharmaceutical Technologies and Services business unit;
• In the alternate site sector, Texas Pacific Group's announcement to acquire HealthSouth's Surgery Division for $945 million; and
• In the long-term care sector, Formation Capital and JER Partners' $1.3 billion buyout of Genesis Healthcare.

In addition to the volume of healthcare M&A transactions, underlying valuations continue to be lofty, as numerous transactions were completed at acquisition multiples in excess of 10.0x TTM EBITDA. Further, public equity returns through Q1 were equally impressive; 12%-15% returns enjoyed in the healthcare distribution, healthcare information technology and long-term care segments. Given these factors and the overall market performance within the healthcare services sector, we expect significant transaction volumes for the remainder of 2007.

In response to these market trends and our sole focus on serving the middle market, the Investment Banking Group at Navigant Capital Advisors has enjoyed significant success having completed more than $1.7 billion of merger, acquisition, divestiture, and recapitalization transactions over the past year. In combination with our cadre of dedicated restructuring professionals, the NCA Investment Banking team now numbers more than 50 professionals, led by seasoned deal professionals focusing on the middle market transaction needs of companies, private equity groups, lenders, and management teams competing in the Healthcare, Business Services, Consumer Products & Specialty Retailing, Industrial Growth, and Insurance sectors.

We welcome your comments and hope that you continue to find our Quarterly Dialogue informative.

Best regards,
Brad Burkett
bburkett@navigantcapitaladvisors.com

CORE Competencies

Providers, Hospitals Can Now Access Consistent Health Insurance Coverage Information in Seconds

New CAQH CORE Rules Dramatically Streamline Administrative Healthcare Data Exchange

Washington, DC – (April 3, 2007) - Healthcare providers and hospitals can now access in seconds consistent eligibility and benefits information required to verify patient health insurance coverage thanks to new standard business rules developed by the CAQH Committee on Operating Rules for Information Exchange (CORE).

Currently, provider practice staffs often spend hours researching and making follow-up calls at significant cost to obtain and verify insurance information. The CORE rules, which build on the HIPAA eligibility (X12 270/271) transaction, make electronic administrative data communications seamless, streamlined and predictable, regardless of the technology – in many cases eliminating the need for practice staff phone calls.

This significant improvement was made possible because nearly 20 leading health organizations have begun voluntarily exchanging patient administrative data in accordance with the CORE rules. Those organizations are ACS EDI Gateway, Inc.; Aetna, Inc.; athenahealth, Inc.; AultCare Corporation; Emdeon Business Services; Emerging Health Information Technology; Health Net; HTP, Inc.; Mayo Clinic; McKesson Provider Technologies; MedAvant Healthcare Solutions; Medical Informatics Engineering, Inc. (MIE); Montefiore Medical Center; NaviMedix, Inc.; Passport Health Communications; Siemens Medical Solutions; and WellPoint, Inc. and its 14 Blue Cross and Blue Shield-licensed subsidiaries.

All of these organizations recently completed CORE certification testing, a process ensuring that their IT systems and products comply with the CORE rules. They join The SSI Group, Inc., which was the first healthcare organization to receive CORE certification seals. More than 50 million Americans are covered by the health plans now using the CORE rules.

“Quick access to reliable patient insurance information eliminates a huge administrative headache for all healthcare providers,” said William F. Jessee, M.D., FACMPE, FACPM, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Medical Group Management Association. “All of the CORE-certified organizations and those seeking certification are to be applauded for taking a bold step to fix an age-old problem.”

CAQH launched CORE to simplify eligibility and benefits data transactions, promote better health plan/provider interoperability and improve provider access to administrative information. CORE’s vision is provider access to eligibility and benefits information before or at the time of service using the electronic system of their choice for any patient or health plan, effectively reducing administrative burden and costs. To date, the voluntary industry-wide CAQH initiative has brought together nearly 100 industry stakeholders – health plans, providers, vendors, CMS and other government agencies, associations, regional entities, standard-setting organizations and other healthcare entities – to collaborate on the rules.

“Interoperability should be at the heart of any long-term solution for improving healthcare administration,” said Bob Greczyn, CAQH Board chairman and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina President and CEO. “The CORE rules are a revolutionary step toward that goal. They are a foundation and model for all health plan/provider electronic administrative communications.”

Several other healthcare entities, including Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina; Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Tennessee; GHN-Online; Health Plan of Michigan; MedData; NoMoreClipboard.com; the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs; and VisionShare, Inc. are committed to CORE rules compliance by no later than June 30, 2007.

“Today’s announcement is the product of a unique collaboration in healthcare administration,” added Jay Gellert, Health Net, Inc. President and CEO, and Chair of the CAQH Administrative Simplification Committee. “Adoption of the CORE rules by these pioneering organizations proves that the industry is actively contributing ground-breaking solutions. We encourage all organizations with an interest in insurance verification to pursue CORE certification as soon as possible.”

The CORE rules were recently included in the Health Information Technology Standards Panel (HITSP) Consumer Empowerment Interoperability Specifications as part of a national model for populating and maintaining robust patient insurance information in patients’ personal health records. CORE’s second set of rules, expected to be announced later this year, will address additional eligibility components (X12 270/271) and claims status (X12 276/277), both of which are addressed under HIPAA.

More than 20 organizations have endorsed the CORE rules, including Accenture, the American Academy of Family Physicians; the American College of Physicians; the American Health Information Management Association; CalRHIO; Claredi, an Ingenix Division; Edifecs, Inc.; the eHealth Initiative; Foresight Corp.; the Greater New York Hospital Association; the Healthcare Financial Management Association; the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society; the Medical Group Management Association; Michigan Public Health Institute; Microsoft Corporation; MultiPlan, Inc.; NACHA - The Electronic Payments Association; Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman, LLP; the International Smart Card Alliance Council; URAC and the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange.

About CAQH
CAQH is a catalyst for healthcare industry collaboration on initiatives that simplify and streamline healthcare administration. CAQH solutions help promote quality interactions between plans, providers and other stakeholders, reduce costs and frustrations associated with healthcare administration, facilitate administrative healthcare information exchange and encourage administrative and clinical data integration. Visit www.caqh.org for more information.

Incenting Healthcare Disparity [ was: Toward a National Rural Telehealth IT Support Policy [Update] ]

<ed.note>I noted earlier that "The American Health IT sector needs to incent less with promises of stock options and more with upfront offers of educational loan repayment. While there is federal school loan repayment help for healthcare workers ( the National Health Service Corps Loan Repayment Program ) and healthcare researchers ( the National Institutes of Health Loan Repayment Program ), there is no similar help for those healthcare IT workers who will lay the "backbone" for telehealth."

Bank of America is actually helping primary care doctors, which is laudable -- although the actual need appears to me to be a lack of CYBER.NURSES. Instead of intentionally seeking a hybridization of nursing and IT ( via the NHIN related grants ), we underpay nurses and offshore HIT.</ed.note>

HCA, HDHP, HSA

Sunday, 03/04/07, "HCA to list prices for hospital care", By TODD PACK, The Tennessean.com

It's effort to get users to control health spending

UDEF and Electronic Health Records

Ron Schuldt writes:

For those who have not read the President’s Health Information Technology Plan, I recommend that you see the following 

I offer the following based on my assumption that an individual’s electronic health record will include topics such as:

Electronic Health Record Information (identification)

Patient Information (identification, address, phone number, date of birth, gender)

Primary Care Doctor Information (identification, address, phone number)

Insurance Coverage Information (identification, address, phone number)

Medical Conditions (identification and time period)

Medical Treatment Process (identification and time period)

Medical Treatment Substances (identification and time period)

Assuming the above topics and probably others are expected to be an integral part of an individual’s electronic health record, I offer the following UDEF names and IDs for each topic. Note: Proposed UDEF extensions are in italics

ASC X12 WEDI Real-Time Adjudication Conference – Schedule Overview

DAY 1, Tuesday, February 13, 2007

7:30 a.m. – 5:15 p.m.: Conference Registration

7:30 a.m. – 8:30 a.m.: Continental Breakfast

8:30 a.m. – 9:00 a.m.: Welcome Presentation & Conference Overview

Dan Kazzaz, ASC X12 Chair

Jim Whicker, WEDI Chair

9:00 a.m. – 10:15 a.m.: Current State of Batch Claim Processing

J Robert Barbour, VP Finance for MD Services & Tech Development, Montefiore

Medical Center

Rick Click, CIO, Molina Healthcare

Brian Cutler, President, Mercury Data Exchange

10:15 a.m. – 10:45 a.m.: Networking Break

10:45 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.: Spurring Healthcare into “Real-Time” Through

Collaboration

Jim Lacy, CFO & General Counsel, ZirMed

Fran Watkins, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida

Kenneth Willman, Director of Provider Interface, Humana

Ginger Wright, HIPAA Compliance Manager, The Availity Health Information

Network

12:00 p.m. – 1:00 p.m.: Conference Luncheon

1:00 p.m. – 2:15 p.m.: Roadblocks to Real-Time Adjudication

Lynne Gilbertson, Director of Standards Development, NCPDP

Gwendolyn Lohse, Project Director, CAQH

Maggie Ohara or Tara Mondock, IVANS

Fred Richards, CTO, HTP, Inc.

2:15 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.: Really Real Time Implementations of Real-Time Adjudication

David Boucher, AVP of Healthcare Service, BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina

Allen DeGraw, Founder & CEO, Post-N-Track Corporation

Barnet Dreistadt, Director, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida

Amy Hinrichs, Director, Provider Portal, UnitedHealthGroup

3:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.: Networking Break

Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council

The PCI Security Standards Council is an open global forum for the ongoing development, enhancement, storage, dissemination and implementation of security standards for account data protection.

The PCI Security Standards Council’s mission is to enhance payment account data security by fostering broad adoption of the PCI Security Standards. The organization was founded by American Express, Discover Financial Services, JCB, MasterCard Worldwide, and Visa International.

By establishing an independent body to govern the security standards for the payments industry, the founding members of the PCI Security Standards Council are creating a unified, global system that is more accessible and efficient for all stakeholders – merchants, processors, point-of-sale vendors, financial institutions, and payment companies alike.

The PCI Security Standards Council owns, develops, maintains and distributes the PCI Data Security Standard (DSS). To improve compliance and reduce costs and lead times for implementation of the standard, the PCI Security Standards Council also defines qualifications for Qualified Security Assessors (QSAs) and Approved Scanning Vendors (ASVs); and trains, tests and certifies QSAs and ASVs.

ebBP News - ebBP in OASIS Standard Vote!

Everyone, The ebBP v2.0.4 vote for OASIS Standard vote began 16 November (vote: http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ballot.php?id=1150) and continues to 30 November 2006. The response thus far has been favorable. In support of business collaboration, ebBP is a valuable addition to the OASIS Standard specification set and to the marketplace. We encourage those that work with OASIS or have voting organizational members to cast their affirmative ballot by 30 November 2006 and to enable the next step to promote to ISO-15000 standard. For those of you that have voted or encouraged your community to do so, we appreciate the support. For others, we trust you will pass along this information on our behalf.

The ebBP (ebXML Business Process Specification Schema) is a business collaboration process standard useful for monitoring rather than an executable language. The ebBP enables the collaborative or eBusiness processes relevant to trading partners across enterprises or collaborating parties.  It could also map to WS-BPEL that engage processes within an enterprise.As a business collaboration definition targeted specifically for and developed by business communities, ebBP is well-positioned for eBusiness. For example, our TC has worked with user communities in Italy, the Netherlands, Asia, and the United Kingdom on sample or actual real-world process definitions. We've also worked with Universal Business Language (UBL) to create modular process definitions that support that OASIS standard and ebBP.

The permanent locations for the v2.04 packages are found at: http://docs.oasis-open.org/ebxml-bp/2.0.4/. The public web site is located at: http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=ebxml-bp.

ebBP is also in the news:
1. METU has provided an updated ebBP Editor Tool. See: http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=154705. Their cumulative efforts are important to eHealth and to the domain of businessprocess in general. Congratulations to METU!
2. We've now posted sample Japanese process definitions from JEITA. See: http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/20133/ecom-jeita-ebbp-samples-definitions-aug2006.zip.
3. ebBP and the framework ebXML technologies were recently featured at Linux World. Stay tuned for more information.
4. More is to come too from Object Management Group as ebBP has contributed to their work on Business Process Definition Metamodel (BPDM) and Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN). The experience around and requirements for choreography and business collaboration from ebBP experts has positively received by those groups. As their work evolves, so will the functionality to support our primary areas of interest.

All referenced information and more is available on our public web site that includes:

Frequently Asked Questions

ebBP Overview

Multiple sample process definitions for including those from UBL SBS, Italian knit wear, CPP/A negotiation, JEITA and more.

Business signal examples

Links to the current ebBP editor

The ebBP TC would greatly appreciate your support and vote for advancing ebBP to OASIS Standard.

Regards.
Dale Moberg, US Axway
Monica J. Martin, Sun Microsystems
[for the OASIS ebXML Business Process TC (ebBP)]

Mobile J/Speedy™ Near Field Communication Mobile Payment Pilot Project Successfully Launched in Europe by JCB Led Team

<ed.note>Please see also "Cingular Bank"</ed.note>

AMSTERDAM, October 12, 2006 – JCB, the global payment brand, in cooperation with CCV Holland B.V., Gemalto, KPN, Nokia, NXP Semiconductors (formerly Philips Semiconductors), PaySquare, and ViVOtech, announced that they have successfully launched Mobile J/Speedy™, the Near Field Communication (NFC) mobile payment pilot project in Amsterdam. Following initial trials in September, the pilot service is now being rolled out to a broader group of JCB’s customers. The project marks Europe’s first contactless international credit payment scheme using a mobile phone with an NFC chip.

This project is being carried out with close collaboration among these regional and global enterprises addressing the whole ecosystem for mobile payment applications. Selected JCB cardholders are provided with a mobile phone by Nokia, which is equipped with an NFC chip, developed by NXP and loaded with the JCB payment application specified by JCB and developed by Gemalto. At selected PaySquare merchants, cardholders can securely purchase items by just holding their mobile phone close to ViVOtech’s contactless NFC reader/writer, which is attached to the payment terminal of CCV. KPN is taking the role of installing the application and personalizing the mobile phones, and CCV is processing the transactions. JCB designed the scheme and coordinated the project based on its successful experience in contactless technology in Japan.

The first transaction of the pilot was conducted at Sushi Time, the Japanese sushi restaurant in the World Trade Center in Amsterdam. The manager of Sushi Time enthusiastically told JCB that the customers who pay by Mobile J/Speedy are very happy with the speed and ease of this payment solution. Approximately 100 selected JCB cardholders are now enjoying fast, easy, and convenient payments with Mobile J/Speedy at selected merchants, where they used to pay by cash. Pilot merchants have received many questions from customers who are not part of the pilot but inquired about the contactless mobile payment when they saw it being used at the cash register. Although it has only been one month since the trial was launched, the increasing number of repeat usage indicates a strong acceptance of the technology and a very successful pilot.

“Feedback from the first users of Mobile J/Speedy has been very encouraging and we are pleased to now be able to involve a wider group of customers”, said Hajime Matsuura, branch manager of JCB International’s Amsterdam branch, who is taking a leading role in the pilot project. “Customers mentioned how quick and easy it was to pay for a cup of coffee on a busy day. Since there is a lot of business offices located in and around the World Trade Center, Mobile J/Speedy is being especially well-received by busy business people. They do not need to fumble in their pocket or purse to find small change. And merchants benefit from the fact that lines proceed faster at the cashier.”

Mr. Matsuura continued, “Along with a wallet, the mobile phone is becoming a must-have item when going out. Uniting mobile and secure contactless payment increases the level of convenience. Mobile J/Speedy is the product that answers the needs of today’s fast rhythm. JCB has already been successful with a contactless payment solution in Japan. With this additional success in Amsterdam, I am even more confident that mobile credit payment will start taking off in the payment market.”

A National Summit: Moving Toward Interoperability - Technologies for Accessible, Affordable Healthcare October 18-19, 2006 [ Updated ]

Presentations available online here.

NIST Administration Building, Gaithersburg, MD

Keynote Address:

Michael O. Leavitt (confirmed)
Secretary, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

Carlos M. Gutierrez (invited)
Secretary, U.S. Department of Commerce

Craig R. Barrett (confirmed)
Chairman of the Board, Intel Corporation

Just Announced...

Keynote Address (Day Two):
Mike Magee, MD, Director, Pfizer Medical Humanities Initiative and Vice President, Science and Medical Advocacy, Pfizer Inc. (confirmed)

This is a unique opportunity where government and industry will come together to chart a path toward a far-reaching vision for connected, home-based health technologies through public-private partnerships.

Five session topics will cover today's interoperability issues, such as:

• Market Drivers and Societal Issues
• Technology Gaps and Barriers Networked, Interoperable Solutions
• Device Standardization and Interoperability of Equipment
• EHR and PHR Standards as a Foundation for Future Digital Healthcare Systems

Register Today!
Register online now. The registration fee is $195 and includes meals, summit materials, and transportation to and from the NIST facilities to the Gaithersburg Holiday Inn.

Hotel and Travel
Reserve a hotel room at the Gaithersburg Holiday Inn. A limited number of rooms are available for the rate of $104 per night. Book online or call (301) 948-8900 to make your reservation . Please refer to the "NIST/Moving Toward Interoperability Workshop" room block. The group booking code is MTI.

Posters and Case Studies
Interact with researchers at universities, companies and government on technologies to support our aging population during our poster networking session.

Questions?
Contact Rebecca Scritchfield
E-mail: rscritchfield@agingtech.org
Tel: (202) 508-9416
Official Event Web site: http://www.itl.nist.gov/Healthcare%20Summit/intro.htm

Who Should Attend
Technology Researchers and Developers
Healthcare and Aging Services Providers
Government Agency Representatives
Healthcare Product Vendors
Company Executives
Standards Development Organizations
Associations
Consumer Organizations

Companies, government, and consumers are developing partnerships to address the challenges of the coming "age wave". Through the application of consumer-directed technologies, opportunities exist to empower individuals to take charge of their own health care and maintain independence.

To achieve this vision, our country must advance the development of new technologies and ensure the interoperability of these devices. To help explore the best way to enable the vision of connected home-based health delivery, Center for Aging Services Technologies, the Department of Commerce's Technology Administration and National Institute of Standards and Technology have come together as partners to host a National Summit to identify issues around the needs and challenges to make interoperability a reality. Recommendations from the Summit will drive needed public and private sector action.

Co-Sponsored by:
Center for Aging Services Technologies (CAST)
U.S. Department of Commerce's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
U.S. Department of Commerce's Technology Administration (TA)

For more information about this Summit, visit the official website at http://www.itl.nist.gov/Healthcare%20Summit/intro.htm

Financial benchmarking helped by CPM, XBRL

Nov. 6, 2006 By Hannah Smalltree, News Writer, SearchDataManagement.com 

Competitive context is critical for financial data.

A company's revenues and costs have new meaning when stacked up against its competitors' numbers. So for years, organizations have benchmarked performance by manually comparing financial results with those of competitors to get a sense of where they stand in their industry. At Conshohocken, Penn.-based medical technology maker Viasys Healthcare Inc., the finance department does this by reviewing competitors' public statements for key metrics and building spreadsheets, explained Mathew Gualtieri, assistant controller.

"It's offline. You pick your hot spots and key indicators, you plop those into a spreadsheet and you do a competitive analysis," Gualtieri said. "It can't be incorporated into every [financial] close; you just pick your key points to track quarter to quarter."

That's set to change. Ultimately, Viasys plans to automate the benchmarking process by upgrading its corporate performance management (CPM) system from Norwalk, Conn.-based Cartesis Inc. The Cartesis 10 CPM suite, released in April, includes integration with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)'s Electronic Data Gathering Analysis and Retrieval (EDGAR) Online database of public companies' disclosure documents. That enables companies such as Viasys to pull competitors' financial information directly into a Cartesis CPM system for automated competitive analysis. The prospect is enticing because it will save time and enable regular, detailed, competitive comparisons, Gualtieri said. Rather than looking at a few key areas, the finance department will use the CPM system to compare more granular metrics -- such as debt-to-equity ratio -- across the organization, he said. That will help the company benchmark performance against that of competitors and could affect business decisions.

Consumer Health World Healthcare Venture Forum

Join your healthcare colleagues at the Venture Forum at Consumer Health World where investors, thought leaders, CEOs, CTOs and entrepreneurs will meet, discuss new leading ideas and business plans as well as do deals. Co-located with 6 other leading healthcare conferences at Consumer Health World, this is the Healthcare Venture Forum you must attend.

The Forum is Chaired by Brad Burkett, Managing Director of Navigant Capital Advisors, and attendees will join entrepreneurs Jonathan Bush, Founder & CEO of athenahealth and Lonny Reisman, Founder & CEO of ActiveHealth Management, now a division of Aetna, investors and advisors Buddy Gumina of APAX, Chris McFadden of Goldman Sachs, and thought leaders from Fortune 100 Companies Darren Jones of Intel and Nate McLemore of Microsoft. In addition, learn first hand what it takes to raise money in today's environment from Elliot Cooperstone of Prodigy Health Group and Deborah Gage of GTESS, Mary Furlong and Alan Schabes of Benesch Friedlander. All of these accomplished pros will be on-hand to discuss about the current state of healthcare investing.

Come meet and hear CEOs from 15 - 20 of the leading, early and mid-stage healthcare companies and learn more about the future of healthcare investing.

SPECIAL OPPORTUNITY: All attendees will enjoy the opportunity to network with the expected 1000 plus Consumer Health World Conference attendees at the Grand Opening Cocktail Reception, Monday, December 11th, 4:30 - 7:30pm, as well as have full access to the Exhibit Hall to meet over 50 exhibitors.

A Call for Applications: Improving Outcomes for Children Involved in Child Welfare

Physical and behavioral health problems are critical issues in the child welfare population. As many as two-thirds of children entering foster care have behavioral or emotional problems. Access to physical and behavioral health services for children in foster care varies drastically across the country, with some youth receiving too much and disjointed care and others receiving too little care. Furthermore, Medicaid's costs for physical and behavioral health services for these high-needs children are disproportionately large relative to the population's share of Medicaid enrollment.

The Center for Health Care Strategies (CHCS), with support from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, is seeking to improve the delivery of physical and mental health care for children in child welfare through a Best Clinical and Administrative Practices workgroup for Improving Outcomes for Children Involved in Child Welfare. This 24-month national collaborative invites up to 15 managed care organizations to develop and pilot promising approaches to meet the health and behavioral care needs of children and youth in the child welfare system.

Participating organizations will receive:

• Expert technical assistance provided by CHCS staff and consultants
• Access to a peer-learning network through the workgroup process
• A travel stipend covering transportation, accommodations, and meals for two team members.

Participation in this initiative is open to managed care entities (MCO, HMO, ASO, BHO) providing general medical and/or behavioral health services to the child welfare population under a Medicaid-funded managed care program.

Purchasing Institute Pay-for-Performance Faculty Presentations

The first Pay-for-Performance Purchasing Institute was held in October 2006. The goal of the Purchasing Institute was to assist seven states in developing provider-level incentive programs.

During this 18-month initiative states will learn how to design and implement financial or non-financial incentives; identify performance measures applicable to their program; and structure a process for engaging providers. States interested in learning more about physician-level pay-for-performance programs can download the meeting presentations.

Three Massachusetts Communities Chosen To Be Test Cases For Digital Health Records

March 29, 2005 By Marianne Kolbasuk McGee, InformationWeek

Backed by $50 million from a health insurer, the multiyear project will test whether digital health records can cut errors and costs in the real world.

Three Massachusetts communities have been chosen as pilot sites for an electronic-health-record project that could serve as the model for statewide adoption of digitized medical-record systems.

... Within each community, health-care providers--including acute-care hospitals or group hospitals, physician practices, long-term care facilities, nursing and home health-care agencies, and community health centers--will implement interoperable E-health records systems.

EuroRec 2006 Annual Conference Presentations on Electronic Health Record systems and Certification

here.

This year’s conference focused on the Quality Labelling and Certification of the EHR, the importance of which is recognised by the European Commission in funding the Q-REC project to be managed by the Eurorec Institute. Not only in Europe has this been seen as key to the future but elsewhere in the world. An example of this is in the USA where their Government have funded Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology (CCHIT) and Eurorec is liaising with them to make this a global initiative.

The EUROREC Institute (EuroRec) is an independent not-for-profit organisation, promoting in Europe the use of high quality Electronic Health Record systems (EHRs). One of its main missions is to support, as the European authorised certification body, EHRs certification development, testing and assessment by defining functional and other criteria.  EuroRec is organised as a permanent network of National ProRec centres and will provide service to industry (the developers and vendors), healthcare providers (the buyers), policy makers and patients.

Barry Smith, Werner Ceusters, and Rita Temmerman on Interoperable Electronic Health Records Ontology Best Practices

The last two decades have seen considerable efforts directed towards making electronic health records interoperable through improvements in medical ontologies, terminologies and coding systems. Unfortunately, these efforts have been hampered by a number of influential ideas inherited from the work of Eugen Wüster, the father of terminology standardization and the founder of ISO TC 37. We here survey Wüster’s ideas – which see terminology work as being focused on the classification of concepts in people’s minds – and we argue that they serve still as the basis for a series of influential confusions. We argue further that an ontology based unambiguously, not on concepts, but on the classification of entities in reality can, by removing these confusions, make a vital contribution to ensuring the interoperability of coding systems and healthcare records in the future.

AIAG Conferences Tackle Multi-Billion Dollar Interoperability and High Healthcare Costs

DETROIT – The Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG) is hosting its first-ever Enterprise Interoperability Showcase conference on Nov. 15, 2006, at the Rock Financial Showplace in Novi, Mich., to tackle the multi-billion dollar challenge created by proprietary IT investments over time that no longer support today’s business process needs— ranging from the shop floor and across the global enterprise, to trading partners and from dealer to supplier.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) estimates that the automotive industry wastes $5 billion annually due to the lack of interoperability, and has provided similar data for other industries. The lack of end-to-end visibility of data when needed impacts decision-making and creates waste at all levels.

AIAG’s conference will present perspectives from industry leaders on successfully integrating the global extended enterprise, as well as feature presentations and demonstrations covering specific industry scenarios in the areas of engineering, quality, material replenishment, warranty and manufacturing. Fred Killeen, chief systems and technology officer, General Motors Corp., will deliver the event’s keynote address and other key speakers include:

• Karla Norsworthy, vice president software standards, IBM Corp. – What Interoperability Means to Users • Dr. Steve Ray, division chief, integrated manufacturing systems, NIST – Virtual Supply Chain • Mark Schenecker, board member, European Enterprise Interoperability Centre, Brussels; director, industry standards, SAP – Enterprise Interoperability Centre (EIC) • Dr. Christine Legner, Universitat St. Gallen, Switzerland – Interoperable Data Exchange – Interoperable B2B Collaboration (BMW-Magna Steyr) • Pat Snack, AIAG executive loan from GM – AIAG Community Approach to Interoperability Standards

An exhibit area will showcase solution providers who have or are developing applications to support interoperability and a networking reception will conclude the event.

Individuals may register for AIAG’s Enterprise Interoperability Showcase by visiting www.aiag.org or calling AIAG customer service at (248) 358-3003. Details on the agenda and speakers are available at http://mows.aiag.org/staticcontent/EIAttendee.pdf.

On Dec. 1, 2006, at Rock Financial Showplace in Novi, Mich., AIAG’s Health Focus Group will host a distinguished medical faculty including Ronald M. Davis, president-elect, American Medical Association (AMA), as well as leaders from automotive companies and other health care provider organization’s who have developed best practice solutions at the second annual health event—AIAG AutoMed 2006: Bringing Quality and Value to Health. Presentations focus on actionable and powerful steps attendees can take to improve quality and value in their own workplaces and practices.

The dynamic agenda delves into what is currently being done on health related projects and how AIAG is working to build up and maintain eective, user-friendly channels of communication within the industry and develop real solutions to the true issues that continue to drive health care costs upward. Presentations and discussions focus on achieving real value and sustainable quality in health. Sessions will explore:

• Quality in Health Care – Programs that have a proven ROI
• Getting in Right in Corporate Health – Case studies of successful endeavors that
can be implemented in any organization
• New Horizons in Health – Upcoming initiatives for improving quality and value
in health

By improving the health wellness and the overall health status, related health costs can signicantly be reduced and quality improved. Stakeholder collaboration is critical to achieving this change. Get involved with AIAG, health organizations, physicians, pharmaceuticals, employers and employees as we continue to work together to reduce waste in the system, improve health wellness and ultimately make health care more aordable and accountable.

Tentative Conference Agenda

7:00 a.m. – 7:45 a.m.
7:45 a.m. – 8:00 a.m.
Registration and Continental Breakfast
Welcome
Speaker: J. Scot Sharland, executive director, AIAG
Setting the Stage

8:00 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. AIAG Health Focus Group Update: What We Have Done for You Lately
Speakers: Dr. Joe Fortuna, Delphi Corp.
Jim Patterson, ArvinMeritor, Inc.

8:30 a.m. – 9:00 a.m. e MSMS Future of Medicine Initiative: A Progress Report
Speaker: Dr. Alan Mindlin, Michigan State Medical Society (MSMS)

9:00 a.m. – 9:45 a.m. Keynote
Physicians and Employers: Partnering for Success
Speaker: Dr. Ronald M. Davis, American Medical Association President-Elect

9:45 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. Break
Quality in Health Care

10:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. e New IWA Health QMS Primer: Son of IWA-1
Speaker: Mickey Christensen, TQM Systems

10:30 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. e ROI of ISO 9001 at the Detroit Medical Center: It Works
Speaker: Dr. Tammy Lundstrom, Detroit Medical Center

11:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. Integrated Health Care at Toyota
Speaker: Dr. Ford Brewer, Toyota Motor Manufacturing N.A., Inc.

11:30 a.m. – Noon Q & A
Noon – 1:00 p.m. Luncheon Presentation
Speaker: TBA

Getting it Right in Corporate Health

1:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. e Value-Based Initiative in Health: Pitney Bowes – Designing for Success
Speaker: David Hom, Pitney Bowes

1:30 – 2:00 p.m. Aligning the Corporate Incentives for Health – PPG: A Successful Case Study
Speakers: Tom Welsh, PPG Industries, Inc.
Dr. Alberto Columbi, PPG Industries, Inc.

2:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. Diabetes in the Salaried Population of DaimlerChrysler AG: Wellness Pays
Speaker: Cyndy Parker, DaimlerChrysler AG

2:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Q & A
3:00 p.m. - 3:15 p.m. Break
New Horizons in Health

3:15 p.m. – 3:45 p.m. e EHR: Where Are We Now, Where Are We Going and When Will We Get ere?
Speaker: Dr. Steve Grant, United Physicians

3:45 p.m. – 4:15 p.m. Health Savings Accounts: Here Come the Banks!
Speaker: Paula Fryland, PNC Bank

4:15 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. Q & A
Speakers: Dr. Joe Fortuna, Delphi Corp.
Jim Patterson, ArvinMeritor, Inc.

4:30 PM - 4:45 PM Closing Remarks
Speakers: Dr. Joe Fortuna, Delphi Corp.
Jim Patterson, ArvinMeritor, Inc.

Committee on Operating Rules for Information Exchange (“CORE”) of the Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare (CAQH) [ Update: Portal Available ]

Promoting Interoperability: Online Eligibility and Benefits Inquiry

The benefits of an interoperable healthcare system are well understood. The availability of information in real-time at the point of care can reduce medical errors, allow physicians and their patients to make informed decisions about treatment options, and reduce administrative burdens. The challenges are equally well understood. Technology adoption rates, data security, and inconsistency associated with transactions and interactions between stakeholders are limiting the ability to realize a complete solution.

Through CORE, CAQH is working to make it easier for physicians and hospitals to access eligibility and benefits information for their patients at the point of care. CORE operating rules will allow providers to submit a request, using the electronic system of their choice, to obtain a variety of coverage information for any patient and from any participating health plan. Providers will receive more consistent and predictable data, regardless of health plan.

Portal news here.

Medical Banking Infrastructure Investment

<ed.note>In "A secure investment: Banks, hospitals buy into high-tech defense" Robin Roger, Herald Staff Writer makes some points which run parallel to the article "The Identity Management Arms Race - The Next eHealth Hurdle", by John Casillas, in the September/October 2006, The Medical Banking Report, Vol. 3, No. 5. Normally folks only get access to John's cutting edge insights and summary of current medical banking thought if they are MBP members but since the mission of the MBP is to try to communicate the hybrid domain/worldview which is medical banking I want to make this article available more widely ( with his permission ) at the "more" link.</ed.note>   

New ebBP editor is now available on Source Forge

Per Monica Martin ( of SUN and OASIS ebXML Business Process TC Co-Chair ) :

With many thanks to Dr. Asuman Dogac and her METU team ( the RIDE Project ) for this valuable work, the new ebBP editor is now available on Source Forge. More details on the user guide and other pertinent information is posted on our web site.

Using ebBP v2.0.x, the editor integrates additional error handling and compositional functionality. Our ( OASIS ) public web site also shows screen shots from our August 2006 demonstration. It is anticipated and work is ongoing to link this work with other public domain tools to support eHealth through the Integrated Health Enterprise (IHE). I encourage interested parties to go out to see the tool, visit also the METU site and provide comments and suggestions to this worthwhile effort. Thank you.

A Roadmap for Interoperability of eHealth Systems

RIDE is a roadmap project for interoperability of eHealth systems leading to recommendations for actions and to preparatory actions at the European level. This roadmap will prepare the ground for future actions as envisioned in the action plan of the eHealth Communication COM 356 by coordinating various efforts on eHealth interoperability in member states and the associated states. Since it is not realistic to expect to have a single universally accepted clinical data model that will be adhered to all over the Europe and that the clinical practice, terminology systems and EHR systems are all a long way from such a complete harmonization; the RIDE project will address the interoperability of eHealth systems with special emphasis on semantic interoperability.

In order to create RIDE Roadmap, first the European best practices in providing semantic interoperability for eHealth domain will be assessed and the quantified requirements to create a valid roadmap will be identified. Based on these requirements, the goals, and the economical, legal, financial and technological challenges of the industry for the 21st century for achieving interoperability in eHealth solutions will be elaborated. RIDE will also focus on the limitations of the policies and strategies currently used in deploying interoperable eHealth solutions.

A research portal for sharing resources addressing semantic interoperability in eHealth domain will be created and maintained; the key actors and stakeholders will be coordinated around RIDE special interest groups to create a wide consensus at the European level. Through eight RIDE workshops a shared vision for building a Europe-wide semantically interoperable eHealth infrastructure will be created. After assessing the gaps between the 'as-is' situation and the 'to-be' eHealth vision, the emerging trends and opportunities to achieve the vision statement, the required advances in the state of the art research, technology and standards will be identified.

More here