The formation of a new health information exchange was recently announced in California that would make the medical records of nine million patients, representing more than a quarter of the state’s population, available to network physicians and hospitals.

The records of an estimated 4.5 million patients of Community Health Systems (CHS) potentially have been compromised by computer hackers. Community Health Systems, which operates 206 hospitals across the U.S. announced earlier this week that its data security was compromised when hackers broke in and stole patient data. 

The Obama Administration is still actively engaged in redefining healthcare in the U.S.  During this period of change, radiologists are seeking out a more prominent seat at the table as contributors in defining and directing patient care and ultimately, in improving patient health outcomes while reducing overall healthcare costs.

The U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) recently announced that healthcare spending costs rose 9.9 percent in the first quarter of 2014, which was the largest quarterly increase in more than 30 years. The continued rise in healthcare spending costs has a direct effect on the entire United States population, but most directly effects consumers via overall higher healthcare costs including higher insurance premiums. 

In an environment where radiologists are consistently being asked to do more with less, a simple increase in production is no longer a viable remedy to a problem. Practice managers and physician owners need to work smarter, instead of just harder. Using business intelligence data for predictive analytics, they are beginning to run their practices more efficiently, but also more effectively, challenging the status quo and using data to affect change. 

According to the results of a survey published today by global analytics company Towers Watson, more U.S. companies plan to increase the use of telemedicine to lower healthcare spending costs in 2015. Telemedicine has the potential to deliver more than $6 billion in healthcare savings per year to U.S. companies, according to the report.

The fall season is commonly known as the time that people get "back on track". Healthcare is no exception. With the official ICD-10 transition deadline finally announced, radiology practices can get back to the business of preparing physicians and staff for the new coding implementation.

In an NPR story, some professional societies and associations expressed concern over a new report from the Insitute of Medicine that calls for more accountability in the distribution of funding for medical graduate education.