It's widely understood that passwords for access to digital resources are both insecure and annoying for the users. Sandeep Kumbhat, Field Chief Technology Officer at Okta, points out that digital cards, widely used in health care systems, also have their difficulties: they must be securely distributed, and a constant stream of outside visitors has to be accommodated.

The desire for healthcare data has never been greater.  This is true for healthcare organizations that want legitimate access to data.  Hackers that want to breach healthcare data.  Startups that want appropriate access to data and some who want to push the envelope of what data should be shared.  Patients who want access to their health data.  And everything in between.  Plus, there's a complex maze of national and state laws which govern when and how healthcare data can and should be shared.

It's no surprise that one of the hottest topics of discussion at the HLTH 2024 conference was AI.  We love AI and see its potential to transform so many parts of healthcare.  However, we were particularly interested in learning where AI is not just a discussion point but is actually making an impact on healthcare.  Plus, we think it's important to talk about how AI can be used in healthcare responsibly.

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be the doctor to the president?  Did you know that a doctor has to be within 2 minutes of the President of the US at all times?  While we can't all have a doctor following us around, what can we learn from the care the President gets?  I had these questions and many more come to mind when I discovered a new book called Transforming Presidential Healthcare: Ensuring Comprehensive Care for the Commander in Chief Amid 21st Century Threats, a Ballast Books title, by author Jeffrey Kuhlman, MD, MPH.

We talk a lot about the importance of data in healthcare.  Not just data, but clean data that can lead to insights that improve outcomes.  It turns out that high quality healthcare doesn't just magically happen.  It takes a thoughtful strategy and good partners to help you address your data and insight needs.

Having attended multiple eClinicalWorks user conferences, one of their big efforts was to move all of their users to the eClinicalWorks cloud.  eClinicalWorks had made a big investment in cloud and they wanted all of their users to benefit from the reliability, scalability, and benefits of being on the cloud.

Andy Gulbis, MD, Owner at Dr. G Medical Solutions, says that one of people’s top concerns is for the last week of their life “to be on my terms.” In this extended video conversation, Gulbis and Rishi Sarna, MD, Chief Clinical Officer at Backline, discuss the purpose and process of advance care planning (ACP).

North Country HealthCare is a highly rated clinical provider running three critical access hospitals in northern New Hampshire. In this video, their CIO Darrell Bodnar describes their on-going efforts to optimize and integrate a new EMR. They have a long-term relationship with tech consulting firm CereCore, represented in this video by Bob Gronberg, their AVP MEDITECH Professional Services.

One of the leaders in the AI medical assistant space is Nabla. We’ve had a front row seat to their growth over the last year led by Alex Lebrun, Co-founder and CEO at Nabla. While at the HLTH 2024 conference in Las Vegas, we had a chance to catch up with Lebrun to hear about their growth as a company and how their product has evolved, from a solution focused on ambient clinical voice documentation to becoming a comprehensive AI assistant for clinicians.

One of the big challenges that healthcare faces is that AI and other technology solutions have promised the world to healthcare leaders and then often fallen short.  Once this happens, it creates a really challenging uphill battle for the next technology.  This has been particularly true with revenue cycle leaders who often express skepticism about AI's role in healthcare due to past overpromises.  While there are still some companies out there over promising, AI technology has developed so rapidly that many of the past promises are now current reality.