Tuesday, September 10, 2002

Effects Of Current And Future Information Technologies On The Health Care Workforce
Article in the September/October Health Affairs - "Information technologies have the potential to affect the types and distribution of jobs in the health care workforce. Against a background of an explosively growing body of knowledge in the health sciences, current models of clinical decision making by autonomous practitioners, relying upon their memory and personal experience, will be inadequate for effective twenty-first-century health care delivery. The growth of consumerism and the proliferation of Internet-accessible sources of health-related information will modify the traditional roles of provider and patient and will provide opportunities for new kinds of employment in health-related professions."  
  

US Steps Up Scrutiny of Health Insurers
Reuters story on comments by a Justice Department official that U.S. antitrust regulators "are stepping up scrutiny of health insurers, concerned that competition in the industry may have been crimped by a recent wave of mergers," and that health insurance companies have become an "area of primary concern" to the department's antitrust division.  
  

Moving Consumers to the Head of the Class
Managed Care article - "Creating a customer base that's aware of the link between cost and services has become the next big challenge in managed care. It's a daunting task.... The idea has gotten more play lately for several reasons: reports that health benefit premiums may rise 20 percent in 2003, a turn away from capitation, and a recent ruling by the IRS that makes it financially more advantageous for employees to enroll in defined-contribution systems."  
  

Urgent care for mental health takes pressure off hospital (Minnesota)
Minnesota Star Tribune story on the Diagnostic Evaluation Center, an urgent care program designed by Behavioral Healthcare Providers that provides an immediate psychological evaluation at the Fairview-University Medical Center ER in Minneapolis and also helps those who need outpatient care "navigate a disjointed mental health system."