Health Imaging & IT - December 2008 - (Page 6)

neWs UpdaTe Government Watch CMS relaxes in-office services regulations The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has released final rules on the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) and Hospital Outpatient Perspective Payment System (HOPPS) for 2009. Also, as part of the final MPFS rule, CMS is not requiring all imaging be subject to the Independent Diagnostic Testing Facility (IDTF) quality standards for 2009, and CMS is not requiring physicians and nurse practitioners to meet certain quality and performance standards when providing diagnostic testing services, except mammography services, within their medical practice. CMS also issued a final rule for the conversion factor for hospital outpatient payments, instituting a 3.6 percent increase from $63.69 for 2008 to $66.06 in 2009. The reduced conversion factor if hospitals do not meet the hospital quality reporting requirements is $64.78. bUsiness bUZZ Vital Images incurs losses in Q3; reduces work force Vital Images reported a net loss for the third quarter 2008, ending Sept. 30, of $243,000, compared to a net income of $927,000 for the same period a year ago. The company booked revenue of $17.7 million, compared to $17.1 million last year. Michael H. Carrel, president and CEO, said that reducing its work force by about 11 percent should result in a pretax charge of about $800,000 in the fourth quarter of 2008. Lawmakers urge CMS to cover CT colonography Several members of the U.S. House of Representatives have sent a letter to Kerry N. Weems, administrator of CMS, urging for Medicare to reimburse for screening CT colonography (CTC) under a national coverage determination. CMS and industry representatives met Nov. 19 to discuss a national coverage determination for CTC. The letter pointed to the cost benefits of CTC, noting that exams cost as little as onefourth as much as traditional colonoscopies. If more patients get screened, fewer will get sick and incur the cost of surgery, chemotherapy and doctors visit alone. McKesson, IBM to provide analytics solution for payors McKesson Health Solutions and IBM plan to combine McKesson’s clinical content and healthcare business solutions with IBM’s information management software and health plan data model for public and private health plans. Payors will have the ability to deploy health information to employers, consumers and providers, according to IBM and McKesson. The first set of solutions is scheduled for release in summer 2009. AMA, partners propose new ICD-10 timeline to hhS The costs, training and impact of HIPAA’s new electronic claim standard (5010) have been underestimated by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and must be readdressed prior to the ICD-10-CM code set conversion, according to the American Medical Association (AMA). In a letter to HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt, dated Oct. 21, the AMA and its partners said that many physicians and other healthcare professionals are still struggling with the transition to the National Provider Identifier (NPI) implementation, and have not received Medicare reimbursements since May 23. Siemens sees Q3 net income rise Siemens Healthcare reported healthcare profits of $415.36 million in the third quarter 2008, compared to $391 million in the third quarter a year earlier. Overall, Siemens reported that healthcare revenue rose 10 percent, to $3.4 billion, including new volume from Dade Behring in the diagnostics division. Its healthcare sector’s largest division, imaging and IT, posted a profit of $253.97 million in the third quarter of 2008, an 11 percent drop from the year-ago results. STAY CONNECTED: for daily news, log onto HealthImaging.com—and sign up for Health Imaging news. Patient-monitoring technologies could cut U.S. healthcare costs by $200B by 2033 Remotely monitoring patients with chronic diseases could cut nearly $200 billion from U.S. healthcare costs by 2033, according to a new study by economist Robert Litan at the Kauffman Foundation. The report analyzed the effects on patients with congestive heart failure, diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and chronic skin ulcers. Public policy changes would be necessary to achieve the full savings, but even without them, the technology could reduce healthcare costs by $153 billion, according to the report. The savings would come primarily by reducing emergency room visits, hospitalizations and hospital lengths of stay. 6 Health Imaging & IT | December 2008 HealthImaging.com http://www.HealthImaging.com

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Health Imaging & IT - December 2008 Table of Contents The Enterprise News Update Technology at Work: What You Need to Compete Why 1.5T MRI is Leading the Pack Workflow Strategies Aid Advanced Visualization Deployment Illuminating Reading Room Design for Better Reading Strategies Cardiac SPECT Sharpens its Focus OrthoPACS: The Information Backbone of the Orthopedic Clinic Imaging Tools Reader's Resource

Health Imaging & IT - December 2008

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