Health Law

HealthCamp Boston / SocialPharmer Boston Twitterstream via Cover It Live

Posted on April 21, 2009
HealthCamp Boston and SocialPharmer Boston are taking place today. For those of you on site, please live tweet using hashtags #hcbos or #socpharm. For those of you following along at home, please follow those hashtags in your reader of choice,...

Blawg Review goes green

Posted on April 20, 2009
Today's edition of Blawg Review at Green Patent Blog celebrates Earth Day by examining the EPA's stance on greenhouse gases, the carbon footprint of spam, a lawsuit involving the appropriation of Woody Allen's image (dressed as a hasid in Annie...

HealthCamp Boston April 21 - Come join in the fun, or follow along at home

Posted on April 20, 2009
HealthCamp Boston and SocialPharmer Boston are happening tomorrow, April 21. If you can't make it in person and would like to follow the events of the day, check back here at HealthBlawg for CoverItLive windows: one will be set to...

MGH pediatric heart surgery: Volume, volume, volume, or, How low can you go?

Posted on April 17, 2009
Today's Boston Globe reports that Massachusetts General Hospital has voluntarily suspended operation of its pediatric cardiac surgery program, following two significant negative outcomes. MGH is conducting an internal investigation, much as UMass Memorial suspended its heart surgery program while investigating...

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Draft guidance on rendering PHI unusable or indecipherable posted; comment period runs through May 21

Posted on April 17, 2009
The federales posted today, for a brief comment period, proposed guidance on how to render PHI unusable, unreadable or indecipherable to unauthorized individuals. (This keys into the FTC's proposed interim breach notification rule, released yesterday, as well...

Health Wonk Review is up

Posted on April 16, 2009
The collective self-delusion edition of Health Wonk Review is up at Glenn Laffel's Pizaazz. Read all about "progress" in health care and get ready to pitch in and change it all. For those of you in the Boston area, come...

All the blawgs that fit, we print

Posted on April 13, 2009
A tribute to journalism not being dead yet, the current edition of Blawg Review is up at Jordan Furlong's Law21. Amazingly, this edition marks the end of the first four years of Blawg Review. The HealthBlawger will be hosting in...

Blog Rally to Help the Boston Globe

Posted on April 06, 2009
We have all read recently about the threat of possible closure faced by the Boston Globe. A number of Boston-based bloggers who care about the continued existence of the Globe have banded together in conducting a blog rally. We are...

CVS and Google Health: adding lots of prescription data to PHRs

Posted on April 06, 2009
Users of Google Health can now import their CVS prescription data into their PHRs. Not the first pharmacy to hook up with Google Health, but perhaps the largest. The more info there is in a PHR, the better; incomplete records...

Library of Congress blawg collection is up and includes HealthBlawg

Posted on April 05, 2009
The Library of Congress "harvested" snapshots of about a hundred blawgs over the past couple of years and has now posted them to the Library of Congress Blawg Web Archive. The HealthBlawger is honored to have HealthBlawg included in the...

The Leapfrog Group's hospital safe practices scores don't correlate with inpatient mortality figures

Posted on March 31, 2009
A study published in the current issue of JAMA concludes that self-reported Leapfrog hospital safe practices scores just don't correlate with risk-adjusted inpatient hospital mortality rates. Better Leapfrog scores don't mean lower risk-adjusted mortality rates...

Health insurance mandates: Geez, good thing Obama isn't pushing them, 'cause he'd get tied up in litigation for forever

Posted on March 31, 2009
San Francisco's municipal health insurance mandate is in the news again this week. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the mandate in September (after sturm und drang and litigation over the San Francisco health insurance mandate going back almost...

David Harlow quoted on OIG Advisory Opinions in Part B Insider

Posted on March 30, 2009
I spoke last week with Torrey Kim, editor of Eli's Part B Insider, to offer some practical advice about seeking an OIG advisory opinion. See the story on page 3 of the current issue. The lead story in this issue...

HealthCamp Boston - April 21

Posted on March 27, 2009
Together with Mark Scrimshire, Shwen Gwee, and Joe Cerro, I am working on planning an upcoming un-conference: HealthCampBoston, to be held April 21, 8:30-4:30 in Cambridge, MA (the day before Health 2.0 - Boston). Contact me or any of the...

David Harlow reprises Social Media for Lawyers presentation at Boston University

Posted on March 23, 2009
I'm proud to be a part of the Massachusetts Bar Association Law Practice Management section which, under the leadership of co-chairs Alan Klevan and Rodney Dowell, has set a high bar for programs and publications. I've been involved in a...

Health Wonk Review: Spring has just about sprung

Posted on March 19, 2009
Welcome to Health Wonk Review, where everyone is above average. We enjoy above-average health care costs per capita, above-average uninsured rates, and above-average obsession with health care reform. That's what it's like today in America. Our president has said, Change...

Massachusetts Code of Conduct finalized for Pharma, device manufacturers, health care providers

Posted on March 13, 2009
The code of conduct adopted in Massachusetts is the most restrictive set of rules in the nation, crows the Department of Public Health, and mutters the industry. The final MA pharma and medical device conflict of interest rule is posted...

Steven Lash, CEO of Satori World Medical, speaks with David Harlow about medical tourism

Posted on March 11, 2009
Steven Lash, President and CEO of Satori World Medical, spoke with HealthBlawg last week about Satori's take on medical tourism, including its method of sharing cost savings with consumers who use Satori's services through employer-sponsored health plans...

David Harlow quoted in FierceHealthcare on physician-hospital collaboration

Posted on March 08, 2009
I spoke with Anne Zieger at FierceHealthcare last week about a variety of strategies for hospitals to engage with their affiliated physicians in order to hunker down and improve short-term finances and also prepare for future growth. The strategies can...

The broken health care system; the White House summit; prospects for the future

Posted on March 08, 2009
We all have war stories about negotiating the health care (non) system. Today's installment is courtesy of Jeff Krasner, health care reporter for the Boston Globe. Jeff, like the readers of this blog (I would hazard to guess), is better-equipped...

David Harlow quoted in Medicare Compliance Alert on pre-employment background checks

Posted on March 06, 2009
Take some advice from the HealthBlawger in screening new employees. Check out some specifics in the current edition of DecisionHealth's Medicare Compliance Alert, offered in point-counterpoint format with tips from my friend Bill Mandell.David HarlowThe Harlow Group LLCHealth Care Law...

Health Wonk Review: Watchmen edition, up at MedicaidFrontPage

Posted on March 05, 2009

Dan Greden, head of eHealth Product Management at Aetna, speaks with David Harlow about PHRs and patient engagement

Posted on March 04, 2009

Bad idea: proposed nullification of pre-dispute arbitration agreements affecting nursing facility residents

Posted on March 04, 2009

Grand Rounds is up at Health Business Blog

Posted on March 03, 2009

Slouching towards HITECH Act implementation

Posted on March 01, 2009

Grand Rounds is up at The Blog That Ate Manhattan . . .

Posted on February 24, 2009
. . . and the HealthBlawger's post is served up at TBTAM's Grand Rounds as part of the main course. The Blog That Ate Manhattan . . . sounds like a monster movie from my home town. But it's not:...

200: Blawg Review's Milestone

Posted on February 23, 2009
The HealthBlawger always enjoys a good jazz funeral, and appreciates the tip of the hat from the anonymous editor of Blawg Review in today's Blawg Review #200. This isn't the end of the line, Ed.; come join the second line...

Nurse union merger: Will mandated nurse-to-patient ratios make it to Massachusetts?

Posted on February 19, 2009
The Massachusetts Nurses Association, United American Nurses and California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee announced yesterday their merger, creating a 150,000-member-strong force to be reckoned with. While improved terms of employment for nurses should be welcome, it will be important...

Meta-analysis of stimulus package news coverage

Posted on February 16, 2009
In the past week, CNN's Elizabeth Cohen quoted a right-of-center source who badmouthed the evidence-based medicine piece of the health care piece of the stimulus legislation, claiming that it would lead to the federales' restricting treatment options...

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