The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute awarded $6.9 million to Louisiana Public Health Institute, Pennington Biomedical Research Center and Tulane University to develop the Louisiana Clinical Data Research Network.

Telestroke—or utilizing telemedicine to deliver stroke care—is an effective means to delivering quality emergency stroke care to remote hospitals and improving patient outcomes, according to a Mayo Clinic study appearing in the American Journal of Managed Care. Telestroke also appears cost-effective for society, the research found.

If this week is any indication, health IT safety is going to be a primary focus in 2014.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the Office for the National Coordinator for Health IT announced that McKesson and Meditech are the first two official “test EHRs,” selected from among certified EHRs.

Clinical decision support reference products still are not integrated enough to deliver the strategic direction providers are looking for, according to a new report from KLAS Research, Clinical Decision Support 2013: Sizing Up Point-of-Care Reference Tools.   

Almost three-quarters (74 percent) of Americans are extremely concerned or very concerned about healthcare, just slightly behind the 79 percent concerned about the economy and ahead of the 67 percent about joblessness, according to a survey.

The concept of patient-centered care has led to a proposed vision from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT with the goals of increasing self-management and prevention; seamless interaction with the healthcare system; and shared management of healthcare.

Thanks to a $7 million grant from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, Kaiser Permanente is working to build a data network aimed at improving outcomes for patients with colorectal cancer, heart disease and obesity, according to the Calif.-based health system.