Preventing disparities in colon cancer screening

How to prevent disparities in colon cancer screening – People living in poverty are less likely to be screened regularly for colorectal cancer — and more likely to develop the disease and die from it. How to end these disparities — and raise screening rates, lower disease rates, and prevent deaths?

Electronic health records improve patient care quality

Electronic health records shown to improve the quality of patient care — New Weill Cornell study provides compelling evidence that commercially available electronic health records are associated with better physician performance – A new study provides compelling evidence that electronic health records (EHRs) enhance the quality of patient care in a community-based setting with multiple payers, which is representative of how medicine is generally practiced across the United States.

Online access to doctors notes improves patient care

Study Finds Access To Doctors’ Notes Helps Patients Manage Their Health – Patients who have access to doctor’s notes in their medical records are more likely to understand their health issues, recall what the doctor told them and take their medications as prescribed, according to a study.

Obese youth face higher risk of gallstones

Kaiser Permanente study finds obese youth have significantly higher risk of gallstones — Girls and Hispanic youth at higher risk of disease usually seen in adults – Children who are overweight or obese face an increased risk for gallstones, revealed by Kaiser Permanente researchers. Children and adolescents who were overweight were twice as likely to have gallstone disease, compared to children and adolescents who had a normal body mass index.

Evaluating impact of EHR on childhood obesity

First large study to evaluate impact of EHR on childhood obesity evaluation — Computer-assisted tools alert pediatricians to obese patients – Electronic health records and embedded tools can alert and direct pediatricians so they can better manage the weight of children and teenagers. Researchers analyzed visits for nearly 740,000 children and adolescents ages 2 to 17 to evaluate the impact of computer-assisted decision tools.

MMRV vaccine linked to double risk of seizures

Combination MMRV vaccine linked with 2-fold risk of seizures — Electronic health records study of 459,000 children sparked new CDC recommendations – The combination vaccine for measles, mumps, rubella and chickenpox (MMRV) is associated with double the risk of febrile seizures for 1- to 2-year-old children compared with same-day administration of the separate vaccine for MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) and the varicella (V) vaccine for chicken pox.

Extreme obesity affecting more children at 10 – 12 years of age

Extreme obesity affecting more children at younger ages — Electronic health records used to study 711,000 children – Extreme obesity is affecting more children at younger ages, with 12 percent of black teenage girls, 11.2 percent of Hispanic teenage boys, 7.3 percent of boys and 5.5 percent of girls now classified as extremely obese.

Microsoft’s HealthVault for AMA physicians in US

New AMA and Microsoft Collaboration to Enhance Patient-Physician Communication — Microsoft?s HealthVault available to physicians through AMA?s new Web-based portal – The American Medical Association (AMA) announced that it is working with Microsoft to better connect patients with their physicians. Patients and their physicians will be able to exchange vital health care information by connecting through Microsoft’s HealthVault.

Patients want computer consultations, electronic health record

Patients reveal willingness to trade hands-on medical care for computer consultations — Study also finds that Internet-savvy consumers will trade some privacy in order to gain transparency, full access to medical records. – As President Barack Obama calls for streamlining heath care by fully converting to electronic medical records and as Congress prepares to debate issues of patient privacy, one question has largely gone unasked: What do patients want?

Health Newstrack