Review of the December 1, 2020 ONC Conference titled “Accelerating APIs in Healthcare”

On December 1, 2020, the Office of the National Coordinator  (ONC) Health IT sponsored a conference titled “Accelerating APIs in Healthcare:  A Year in Review and Momentum for 2021”.    The ONC develops the HealthIT policy and road map for the future of the United States.   When developing the HealthIT road map, the leaders…

Vaccine Management

Preparing Pediatric Practices to be Ready for the COVID-19 Vaccines

Early Monday morning, November 9th, Pfizer announced some positive results regarding their COVID-19 Vaccine they are developing with BioNTech.  This vaccine candidate is a two-dose series.    The phase III clinical trials involved over 40,000 patients.    There is some data in the press release that based on exposing patients who received the vaccine to…

Managing Payor Denials related to Supplemental CPT Codes associated with Well Visits at Pediatric Practices

The use of scoring tools in Pediatrics helps the Pediatrician or Pediatric provider in making a more informed assessment of the child.    While using a scoring tool is extra work for the pediatric provider, in many cases, the payer will reimburse for the associated scoring tools CPT codes when utilized for appropriate pediatric patient…

21st Century Cures Act: Interoperability, Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and Information Blocking

On March 9th, 2020, the Health and Human Services (HHS) released a press bulletin related to the 21st Century Cures Act for interoperability between Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems as well as Application Programming Interfaces (APIs).   This work by the ONC is a step forward to further enhance patient ability to have their data…

Some Advantages of Leveraging a Cloud-Based Vs. Server-Based Pediatric E.H.R. for Independent Pediatric Groups

Cyber criminals target small businesses with inadequate or “dated” security.   Most independent Pediatric Practices are small businesses with less than ten Pediatricians plus support staff.  When choosing an E.H.R. for a Pediatric Practice, the leaders/owners should evaluate cloud-based E.H.R.s vs. an E.H.R. on a Server.   This article is to compare the security, management…

2020 Annual ONC Technology Forum: Interoperability and APIs

The annual Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) Technology Forum is a two-day conference that includes participants from academics, IT managers/leaders and team members of Health Systems, payers and E.H.R. Companies like PhysicianXpress, Inc.     Physician Xpres, Inc. participated in the 2020 ONC Technology Forum this year on August 10th – August 11th.  The…

Update on Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Total Visits to Pediatric Practices

The COVID-19 Pandemic continues to impact operations of a pediatric office.  From the business perspective of total visits to the office, the average practice continues to see less well and sick patients when compared to the pre-COVID-19 Pandemic.   While the United States economy moves forward since the original lock-down, the COVID-19 disease has spread…