Chris Mazzolini is the editorial director of Medical Economics

Chris Mazzolini

Health care is a stressed out industry. And sometimes, stress and burnout can lead to frustration and incivility between colleagues or even with patients.

Practices that are experiencing incivility issues can fix things. It’s not easy, but there are steps to take. This was a topic during the HIMSS22 Global Health Conference at the sessions, “Promote Effective Interpersonal Communication” hosted by Edward Klatt, a professor at Mercer University School of Medicine.

Klatt’s presentation outlined 12 steps to restore civility at your organization. Check out the slideshow.

Restoring civility at your practice

Slideshows

A 12-step program for removing negative communication habits at your practice.

Refusing to share records and data with patients in a timely manner can result in an accusation of 

, which could someday soon lead to a fine.

Federal health care agencies have been trying to halt information blocking, and have been warning provider and other organizations that enforcement action is coming soon for organizations with data blocking complaints lodged against them.

 Global Health Conference in Orlando, health and human services Secretary Xavier Becerra 

 HHS has received regarding organizations barring access to patient data. More than 75% of the complaints about information being blocked have involved health care providers, Becerra said.

One patient wrote about awaiting to hear about a biopsy and being told the results are available, but the patient couldn’t get the results yet, because the doctor was out of town, Becerra recounted.

“Closing this enforcement gap is an HHS priority,” Becerra said.

Becerra didn’t specify what penalties may be coming for information blockers. But he said HHS will have more to share on enforcement measures later this year. When it comes to providers blocking information, the health secretary makes the decisions on penalties, he said.

Information blocking is action by someone (a medical practice, hospital, vendor, etc.) to interfere with access, exchange or use of health data, according to Arthur W. Harvey III, senior vice president and chief information officer for Boston Medical Health System, during a HIMSS22 presentation

Essentially: If a patient wants access to their health data, you have to give it to them. There are exceptions (eight of them, including preventing harm, privacy, infeasibility) and the records don’t have to be provided for free.

Organizations have many reasons for blocking information. Deven McGraw, chief regulatory officer for Ciitizen, explains that many are 

 to privacy concerns, and because they view data as a business asset.

The 21st Century Cures Act standardized the process for the public to report claims of possible 

, which is a practice by a health IT developer that is likely to interfere with the access, exchange, or use of electronic health information.

 has created a standardized process for the public to report claims of possible information blocking via a portal, which launched April 5, 2021. Since that time, 274 cases of possible information blocking have been reported.

Of these claims, 174 were filed by patients, 42 by attorneys on behalf of patients, and 32 by health providers, with the rest coming from IT developers or third parties. Of those suspected of information blocking, 211 are health care providers and 42 are IT developers. Provider is defined by ONC as a hospital, health facility, or physician, among others.

 has provided examples of practices that may constitute information block:

Fees are imposed that make exchanging electronic health information cost prohibitive.

An organization’s policies or contractual arrangements prevent sharing or limit how information is shared with patients or their healthcare providers.

The HIPAA Privacy Rule is inappropriately cited as a reason not to share information.

Healthcare providers or IT vendors limit or discourage sharing information with other providers or with users of other IT systems.

Technology is designed or implemented in non-standard ways that lessen the ability to exchange and use information with other IT systems, services, or applications that follow nationally recognized standards.

Patients or healthcare providers become “locked in” to a particular technology or healthcare network because their electronic health information is not portable.

Articles

Why blocking patient access to their records can cost your practice

It’s harder than ever to hire and retain staff at medical practices. The so-called “Great Resignation” in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic has created a vexing staffing environment for businesses of all kinds, but especially medical practices and other health care providers.

Furthermore, the challenge for practices is that staff members won’t put up with difficult internal cultures anymore, and a turbulent staff environment has a direct impact on the quality of the patient care you provide, said Heather Towery, MD, the vice president of clinical strategy for Eden Heath.

“Making sure your employees are in engaged is key to your success as a company,” Towery said.

Towery spoke during the HIMSS22 Global Health Conference in Orlando as part of a session called, “Better Patient Care Starts with Engaging Internal Culture.”

The data shared by Towery and her co-presenter, Krystle Castillo MSN, APN, FNP-C, was stark. One in 4 employees have voluntarily left their employment during the pandemic, according to Towery. That has a staggering cost for practices: It can cost 33% of an employee’s annual salary to replace them.

Employees have been quitting for a variety of reasons, said Towery, but the leading ones according to 2021 data from the Achievers’ Workforce Institute are:

To find an employer that better recognizes them (16%)

To find an employer with better internal culture (8%)

Furthermore, nearly half (44%) of health care workers are interested in changing jobs, even if they have not seriously tried yet, Towery said.

The benefits of creating an employee engagement campaign to improve your culture can be transformative to your business by increasing profitability and productivity with corresponding decreases in turnover.

So what can practices do about this? There are four steps, Towery said.

Roll out the red carpet. “You want your employees to feel loved,” Towery said.

Multidisciplinary, regional team breakdown.

Design meaningful meeting structures. “Meet every day,” Towery said. “Huddling is important to get everybody together and get to know each other and what people do.”

Align incentives and give meaningful recognition.

Give employees opportunities to provide significant input.

It’s harder than ever to hire and retain staff at medical practices. Here’s what you can do about it.

Patient care won’t improve until your internal culture does

The HIMSS22 Global Health Conference kicked off its general programming Tuesday in Orlando with a modest goal: To motivate thousands of physicians, tech CEOs, cybersecurity experts and others to “realize the full health potential of every human, everywhere.”

Those were the words of HIMSS president and CEO Hal Wolf, delivered at a challenging time for the global healthcare system. There’s a pandemic, of course. There’s increasing awareness of how inequal health outcomes are across the globe. There’s tension between an inefficient encounter-based health system on one side, and a digital health ecosystem that sometimes is too impersonal.

The problems, Wolf said, remain well known.

“Too many patients, not enough resources, not enough information, still” Wolf said. “The medical model is at a breaking point. You know, because you are living it every day.”

Wolf said the great challenge facing health care leaders today is to merge the two models, the in-person physician visit with population health, predictive modeling, and artificial intelligence and machine learning.

“There will always be the need for what we do every day in our clinics, our hospitals, our facilities,” Wolf said. “But it’s not enough. Our fundamental challenge is to weave these models together and realize the best of both worlds.”

The bottom line is that patients are approaching their health care as consumers, and they want digital care. They want their health app data to be part of their care plan, they want telehealth.

“We must embrace disrupters, because patients will,” Wolf said.

We will have ongoing HIMSS22 coverage this week on Physicians Practice. Check out our HIMSS conference page for more.

The HIMSS22 Global Health Conference kicked off with a motivational challenge for the health care industry.

HIMSS22 keynote: We must embrace tech disrupters

EHRs are increasingly leading to malpractice lawsuits. While EHR-related lawsuits still make up only a small number of lawsuits, user error is the cause of 64 percent of EHR-related malpractice claims, according to the Doctors Company. Practices need to focus on eliminating several common problems, mostly tied to user actions, which have led to the majority of EHR-related suits.

Here are six EHR landmines physicians should avoid.

EHRs are increasingly leading to malpractice lawsuits. Here are six issues to avoid.