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Category: Matthew Holt

Matthew Holt is the founder and publisher of The Health Care Blog and still writes regularly for the site and hosts the #THCBGang and #HealthInTwoPoint00 video shows/podcasts. He was co-founder of the Health 2.0 Conference and now also does advisory work mostly for health tech startups at his consulting firm SMACK.health.

Aneesh Chopra talking Health IT and innovation, SF 12 noon today

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By Matthew HoltAneesh_Chopra

Today at 12 noon PST Aneesh Chopra, Federal CTO will be at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco talking about health care and health care IT. Indu and I saw him last night talking about technology before a big crowd at the Silicon Valley Computer History Museum.

In today’s talk he’s going to be focused exclusively on health care, which means he won’t have to dodge the question on Net Neutrality that he got last night. And even better, if you don’t have a ticket yet you can get one free thanks to the California Health Care Foundation,

I’ve seen Aneesh talk several times. Last night was particularly good in that he really responded well in the Q&A session. Plus he gave several shout-outs to the Health 2.0 Developer Challenge even if he made Indu embarrassed,

So if you care at all about health care and IT, you should come to the Commonwealth Club in downtown San Francisco today. And as an added bonus the entire health 2.0 team down to the Norwegian interns will be there – except for Lizzie who is up at the Health 2.0 NorthWest Chapter Kick off meeting.

Diversinet: a backbone for unplatforms?

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By Matthew HoltPicture 50

Unplatforms is the term I’ve been using to describe the multitude of devices that people are using to collect and receive information. And also to cover the different channels they are using often on the same device (e.g. text, voice and web on one smart phone). Application developers are having to come up with strategies for connecting with people and moving and integrating their data in a world of multiple unplatforms, Diversinet has been focusing on creating a turnkey system for moving health data securely to patients–here’s a demo you can play around with to see how it works. It might be one solution for health care organizations to deal with all those unplatforms over which they need to reach consumers.

The company has recently changed its business strategy–it was working with a subsidiary of a Penn Blues plan to distribute its services, but following a protracted legal dispute, it’s now going direct to health care plans and providers who want to move data between multiple devices, and has hired McKesson veteran Mark Trigsted to run its new health care group. First customer is Minnesota integrated systems HealthPartners, with a pilot for pregnant women underway already. I spoke with Diversinet’s SVP of sales Jay Couse to find out more about the technology and the business strategy.

Interview with Jay Couse, Diversinet

Ingenix buys Axolotl (with minor Update)

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By Matthew HoltPicture 49

Ingenix, the arms dealer that’s been supplying all sides in the health care information war for the past decade or so, built itself up by buying lots of little companies in the data analytics space. Now it’s repeating the effort in the Health Information tools space. First it bought Caretracker (actually the company may have had a different name when it bought it, but that’s the name now). It’s a Web-based EMR for smaller practices (a sector with lots of Federal dollars attached). Then it bought Picis, a company that offers software that runs ORs, EDs and other high acuity inpatient sites (another recipient of lots of Medicare dollars).

Today it bought Axolotl, one of the vendors that’s biggest in the emerging (and constantly confusing) Health Information Exchange marketplace. Yet another place that lots of Federal dollars via ONC are going.

You’re probably noticing a pattern by now…

Ingenix itself of course is owned by United Health Group, although its CEO Andy Slavitt will be at pains to tell you that United also just happens to own a health insurer or two, and that Ingenix is not the subsidiary of a health insurer. Of course, Congress doesn’t always agree…

Normally I’d do lots of in-depth analysis about this story, but I’m for now just rushing to for once beat HIStalk to the punch!

UPDATE: Inga at HISTalk won’t truck with my “I beat her” comment and notes that she posted the following tweet before me (even if I got my post up on THCB before her or MrHISTalk posted on HISTalk!)

ngaHIStalk1:09pm via Facebook

Rumor from two good sources: Ingenix/UnitedHealth Group will announce its acquisition of Axolotl after the market…http://fb.me/ECtaUXRc
boltyboy2:56pm via TweetDeck

Ingenix (UHG) getting even more expansive in HIT, buys HIE vendor Axolotl

Beating up on ONC, mostly unjustified

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By Matthew Holt

Earlier this week there was a curious little hearing at Pete Stark’s committee. Much of the Q & A—mind you post the announcement of the final meaningful use rules—was (apparently, as I can’t find the transcript) a beating up on the poor folks at ONC for reducing the barriers towards meaningful use. Here’s Jonathan Hare of upstart privacy/identity/network vendor Resilient explaining that things are not tough enough.

While Jonathan is having a bit of fun here (and, oh by the way, he does actually have a solution for the inadequacies of current HIEs which we’ll be showing you more about in the world of Health 2.0), some of this and the other stuff the ONC folks had to deal with was a little tough. They got a fair amount of abuse from the committee.

Continue reading…

Knee Trauma, again

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By Matthew HoltMatthewholt

One of my favorite topics is back in the news. Apparently ACL repairs may be unnecessary. Here’s the WSJ Health Blog write up about the NEJM study. Two groups of active young people with torn ACLs were split. Half got immediate ACL repair, half got rehab and later repair if they needed it. Of the second group around 39% needed surgery but when the two groups (surg vs surg when rehab wasn’t enough) were assessed there was no difference.

Mostly this is a big duh! A simple ACL tear doesn’t need fixing unless you are going to go skiing, play soccer, volleyball or some other sport that needs it. I had a left knee simple ACL tear in my early 30s, had it fixed after 6 months wait & rehab and went back to all those sports. (Although I never seriously tested it in a twisting sport before repair).

Then several years later I had both a right knee ACL tear and a few weeks later multiple trauma to my left knee—3 ligament tears and other damage. (Advice to you all; snowboard around the tree not into it). My left knee has never recovered (nor will it) to take part in those twisting sports so I never had the right one fixed (I did get a new ACL & PCL in left knee as I need to be able to walk again!). But the right knee with no ACL is fine for walking, running, biking and even controlled pivoting for snowboarding—where the leg is locked in place vis a vis the other one.

But if I try to twist in a gentle soccer kickabout on my right knee I fall on my ass. So for my earlier ACL repair I suspect that I would have been in the group that needed surgery anyway (the 39%). So if you don’t want to or don’t need to play those sports OR if you do the rehab and are fine, you don’t need a repair, But if you do need to play those sports and rehab alone doesn’t work, then you do.

The question is how many people are getting the ACL repair but never gave rehab a try? Probably quite a few, and for them rehab with the option of surgery is a good idea.

But the real question is how many people are getting ACL repairs when they’re not participants in those sports? Anyone know?

So I’m on TV, unfortunately in piece of crappy reporting

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By Matthew Holt

So last month the nice people from KTVU (the local Fox affiliate in SF) came by to interview me and last night it aired. They’d been over at web-based EMR vendor Practice Fusion and had found out about EMRs. Then they came to interview me. I should probably have got the hint when reporter John Fowler kept on asking me about privacy concerns. I spent 20 minutes giving a balanced nuanced view about the advantages and problems of adopting medical records which is not exactly represented by the 6 second soundbite I get.

Unfortunately—despite the producer’s stated desire to use Bay Area people—Texan nut job Deborah Peel gets almost half the piece including almost all the interview content. (Apparently Deven McGraw couldn’t be tracked down? Maybe DC is too far away) And what does Deb Peel say? Well you know what she says…

Continue reading…

Fantastic job: HHS ONC subject matter expert on consumer e-health

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By Matthew Holt

Josh Seidman has written from ONC telling us about a fantastic job opportunity. You get to work with the brilliant folks at ONC on fun stuff regarding consumer e-Health. What does that mean? From the posting.

  • Forge alliances with consumer organizations, technology and care delivery innovators and consumer advocates to further the consumer e-health agenda.
  • Develop consumer oriented strategies across the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC).
  • Serve as Project Officer providing project management oversight for contracts, including designing, developing and coordinating project management plans for policy initiatives in conjunction with the Division Director and the Office of Policy and Planning Director.

We’ve been very impressed by everything we’ve seen about ONC’s commitment to patient communication—not least the “sneaking-in” to the meaningful use requirements in Phase 1 of patient education materials (what Don Kemper calls Christmas in July). I can’t think of a more fascinating job for anyone who cares about online health.

So if you’re interested here’s the link to apply. 

Meaningful use, and cats & dogs

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By Matthew Holt

More than a year or so of squabbling is (sort of) over and today HHS announced its criteria for the first phase of meaningful use. Essentially the 25 criteria for qualifying for “meaningful use” (in other words who qualifies for the money) have been changed to 15 with a further 5 from a menu of 10. The details are here, and it looks like most of the percentages needed to qualify have been relaxed but not eliminated. The Dogs have clearly had a minor victory in that there are patient communication requirements in both the mandatory and optional criteria.

The most impressive part of the announcement (you can see it here) which included HHS Sec Sebelius, CMS head Berwick (not wearing his Che Guevara T Shirt) & ONC Director Blumenthal, was the two Reginas. First, Surgeon General Regina Benjamin explained how thrice her clinic was destroyed by nature, and how the second time she realized that while she had thought she couldn’t afford electronic records for her patients, she then realized that she couldn’t afford not to have them.

The other Regina was our friend Regina Holiday who made (to me) a surprise appearance and told the 73 Cents story in a heartfelt and powerful way. She’s really become the poster child for why access to health data matters to ordinary people, and we need to get her from the world of webinars, Health 2.0 Conferences and HHS announcements onto Oprah and the 6 O’Clock News right now.

And I’ll be suggesting that when I interview David Blumenthal in a little under 30 minutes.

And here's the 3mins audio of Regina Holiday at MU announcement