| R. Lewis Dark:
Integration of Clinical Care and the Lab Industry
DURING 2012, THE HEALTHCARE SYSTEM IN THE UNITED STATES will make measurable
progress toward the goal of integrated clinical care. In my view, this will be
a positive development for clinical laboratories, since it creates opportunities for
labs to step up and add value to physicians, patients, and payers.
There is a bubbling stew of ingredients that will contribute to more integration
of clinical care. Growing numbers of hospitals and office-based physicians
are adopting electronic health records (EHR). As they do, they want their laboratories
to interface the LIS to their EHR systems. This is a significant development.
Once all of a patient’s data can flow seamlessly across the care
continuum—accompanied by computer prompts and reminders to physicians
and the care team—the gaps in medical care begin to disappear.
Other ingredients include the advent of accountable care organizations
(ACO), the expanding number of health information (HIE) exchanges that
are becoming operational, and greater transparency on provider outcomes
and prices. All of these forces for change are in motion today. How quickly we
see today's predominately fee-for-service healthcare system transform into
something different is difficult to predict. It will be a multi-year process and is
likely to be more evolutionary than revolutionary.
Within every laboratory, there are administrators and pathologists who are
tasked to be the strategic thinkers for their organizations. My recommendation
to these individuals is that integration of clinical care should be a key element
in their labs’ strategic priorities.
In particular, the product that every laboratory creates is information. Thus,
integration of healthcare informatics—whether from the use of a common electronic medical record (EMR) system within an integrated healthcare system, or
provider support for the regional HIE—has the potential to disrupt the longstanding
relationship that a laboratory has traditionally enjoyed as a primary
source of lab testing to its client physicians.
But, this same disruptive force will open a door for those lab organizations
that understand how to deliver added value to each group of stakeholders: physicians,
patients, and payers. With the trend toward clinical care integration in its
earliest stages, there is an ample amount of time for innovative clinical labs and
pathology groups to develop the value-added services that will anchor long-lasting
and profitable relationships with physicians and their patients.
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2011's Top 10 Lab Stories
Point to a Busy 2012
Few "earthquake news events" during a year
when many were anticipating ObamaCare reforms
CEO SUMMARY: Given the specific news stories thatmake up
THE DARK REPORT'S list of the “Top Ten Lab Stories for 2011,” it
might be said that 2011 was a rather quiet year overshadowed by
anticipation of the coming reforms mandated by the Accountable
Care Act of 2010. For the clinical lab testing industry, 2011 was a
year where much of the news was about government and payer
proposals. The biggest lab acquisitions of the year were done by
major corporations buying their first lab companies.
Big Medi-Cal Settlement Sets Stage
For More Qui Tam Lab Test Price Suits
First Payers Poised to Reform/Change
Code Stacking for Molecular Claims
Several Corporate Giants Buy Their
First Stakes in Lab Test Marketplace
Medicare and Private Payers Ready
To Implement Value-Based Payment
First Wave of Lab Professionals Retires
As Oldest Baby Boomers Turn 65
Mobile Computing Poised to Find
Wide Acceptance Within Healthcare
Internet-Based Lab Test Companies
Grow by Serving Price-Shopping Patients
Welcome to ACOs and Medical Homes:
Goal Is to Integrate Clinical Care
Federal and State Budget Battles Are
a Sign of Unprecedented Fiscal Stress
First Year of EMR ‘Meaningful Use’
Ends for Hospitals and Physicians
‘Salary Power’ Helps Lab
Recruit and Train New MTs
MT and MLT distance training programs help
PeaceHealth Laboratories meet staffing needs
CEO SUMMARY: It was back in 2002 when THE DARK REPORT
highlighted the innovative use of MT and MLT long distance training
by PeaceHealth Laboratories (formerly Oregon Medical Labs).
Distance training is part of a comprehensive program to attract
individuals in the communitywith two-year and four-year degrees
and give them an "earn while they learn" career path toward certification
as medical laboratory technicians (MLT) and medical
technologists (MT). Here is an update on this business strategy.
9 Pennsylvania Hospitals
Tackle Lab Specimen Errors
Errors in patient blood specimen labeling
were reduced across the nine hospitals by 37%
CEO SUMMARY: In this unusual collaboration, the participating
Pennsylvania hospitals dramatically reduced blood specimen
labeling errors. This initiative to share best practices incorporated
techniques that were refined in other projects designed to
reduce medical errors and improve patient care. Another interesting
feature of this multi-hospital quality initiative is that the
participating institutions agreed to publish their rates of errors
involving mislabeled patient blood specimens.
Final Three Labs Settle
California Qui Tam Case
Individual agreements with seven defendant
lab companies lack guidance on future compliance
CEO SUMMARY: In recent months, the California Attorney
General (AG) entered into settlement agreements with the last
three defendant laboratory companies involved in the Medi-Cal
discount pricing whistleblower lawsuit. The AG did not make
this news public. In their respective settlement agreements, the
three laboratory companies stipulated that the agreement was
not an admission of liability. Overall, the California Attorney
General collected more than $300 million from the seven defendant
laboratory firms.
INTELLIGENCE: Late & Latent
CORRECTION FOR
DEC 19, 2011 ISSUE: Health
Network Laboratories, Inc.,
of Allentown, the name of the
Beckwith’s laboratory was
incorrectly listed as "Health
Line Clinical Laboratories."
TRANSITIONS: Effective on January 23, 2012,
Francisco (Frank) R. Velázquez,
M.D., will become
CEO of Pathology Associates
Medical Laboratories
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