This makes the United States different from most other countries. In 11 countries that this Health Affairs article looked at, hospitals usually put about 12 percent of their budget toward administrative activities. But in the United States, hospitals spend a full quarter of their funds on filing the necessary paperwork to make sure that surgeries happen and patients get scheduled

Kaiser Permanente CIO Philip Fasano wrote an excellent book on Healthcare IT - a must read to learn more about both IT in the health care space and Kaiser. Mr. Fasano's move to the largest health insurer is a significant tell for our business, notably the increased reliance on big data as well as the alignment of insurance companies and care providers.

This article proves that while you can debate if the reform we got was the reform we needed you can't argue the need for reform. Hospital leadership continues to posture, obfuscate and down right mislead consumers of their services. What is going to get this to change?

More evidence private practice is going away - unless you can afford it.

The contradiction of selling tobacco was becoming a growing obstacle to playing a bigger role in health care delivery," Merlo says.

Now with five acute-care hospital campuses, dozens of outpatient centers throughout San Diego County, and more than 13,500 employees and 2,600 affiliated physicians, Scripps is ranked as one of the top 15 integrated health systems in the country by Truven Health Analytics. The system has made Fortune's "100 Best Hospitals to Work For" list for six consecutive years. Scripps CEO Chris Now Van Gorder is sharing the story of building this IDN in a riveting new book, "The Front-Line Leader: Building a High-Performance Organization From the Ground Up."

Another sign private practice might become a thing of the past? You judge.

CVS Caremark and Walgreens have significantly increased their clinical affiliation activity in recent years, in attempts to grow market share as retail-based healthcare providers. CVS has entered into a total of 41 partnerships, doubling the number of affiliations of their rival, Walgreens, which has 20.

While managing the health of a population is a noble cause and logically should fall under the purview of a health system (at least according to the federal government), there is little, if any, evidence that the current obsession with taking global risk for the management of the health of a population will end any better than it did in the 90s. Here are 10 reasons why capitated risk is still not likely to take hold anytime soon:

The Service Employees International Union-Healthcare Workers West is stepping up its campaign to block the sale of Daughters of Charity Health System to Prime Healthcare Services, which is accusing the union of racketeering and extortion.

Glendale Adventist's settlement is the third Los Angeles has filed so far this year. In January, 102-bed Beverly Hospital in Montebello, Calif., paid $200,000 in a patient-dumping case. Pacifica Hospital of the Valley, a 231-bed facility in Sun Valley, Calif., agreed to a $500,000 settlement. The city has been working with the Hospital Association of Southern California to help hospitals communicate with all patients and carry out proper discharges for them.

Clinical efficacy is a critical component for medical device manufacturers to consider. It is no longer enough just to innovate or have a new shinny widget to boost sales. Insures, payers and care providers are increasingly looking to the medical results for the equipment they allow. This is a good trend - one that will have serious results if you are not prepared. Case studies, ROI and peer reviewed data on your devices are going to be required if your products will be accepted and purchased going forward.

We've been traditionally worried about big iron players, such as GE, Philips or Pharma as our largest competitive threats. Meanwhile non-traditional competitors have been entering the market unnoticed, such as Apple, Dell Computers, Google, CVS, Walgreens and others. Some of these companies may be customers for medical device suppliers. Others intend to dominate not only the device and software space but providing care as well. Time to watch these companies and develop competitive strategies before they put you out of business.

Ron Batory, Konica Minolta’s product marketing manager for CR and conventional imaging products, says CR still is recognized as the system of choice for late digital imaging adopters, thanks to rapid technological developments and decreasing CR prices over the past few years.

You simply can't sell boxes any more. The days of slinging iron with the pitch "get your ROI here - do more, get paid more" is over. That way of selling died when ACA was signed. Today you have to create value and be part of the cost/clinical value solution - not simply a vender. Toshiba's initiative is a stellar example of how those of us in the Medical Device Industry can partner with care providers. "Toshiba recognizes the ability of big data to monitor individual health, and in the future, to support day-to-day clinical decision making," said Rich Mather, PhD, director of clinical programs of Toshiba Medical Research Institute USA. "With our collaboration at Johns Hopkins, we hope to create a new paradigm in medicine that transforms healthcare into a more efficient, cost-effective and data-driven enterprise that will help to improve patient outcomes."

In 2013, hospitals purchased more than $49 billion in products and services through Novation contracts. Wednesday’s Innovative Technology Expo at the Irving Convention Center was the third the company has hosted. About 120 suppliers got face-time with the hospital representatives who could potentially contract to buy their products.

If concerns about funding, FDA, and reimbursement did not cause you sleepless nights, what dream medical device would you design? The editors of MD+DI invite you to participate in the 2014 Dare-to-Dream Medtech Design Contest.

Pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies should prepare themselves to meet the risk sharing demands from the increasing number of ACOs in the coming years, according to new research from HRA – Healthcare Research & Analytics. In the company’s most recent study, Accountable Care Organizations: Partnering for the Future, ACOs are increasingly looking for risk sharing to become part of standard contracting agreements with manufacturers in the near future.

According to input from 100 accountable care organizations, 8% of Medicare ACOs and 4% of Commercial ACOs already have active risk-sharing programs with manufacturers. The risk-sharing models vary across ACOs, but the message is clear that the organizations expect manufacturers to have a stake in patient outcomes.

“We need you to come to the table and say – ‘we want to partner with you and the providers to share risk’,” says Edward D. Shanshala, CEO at Ammonoosuc Community Health Services, a key opinion leader (KOL) interviewed as part of the study.

Gallup reports that one in four healthcare dollars spent in healthcare can be attributed to defensive medicine – about $650 billion annually. These costs are passed along to everyone, significantly driving up health insurance premiums, taxes to cover public health insurance programs, co-pays and out of pocket costs.

The problem is likely to get worse under the Affordable Care Act. There will be fewer physicians in the workforce and 30 million more patients with healthcare coverage. The practice of defensive medicine will escalate as more patients are cared for by people who are overworked, and increasingly they are seen in settings such as emergency rooms by people unfamiliar with the patient.

This is where IT sales and dollars will be found. The survey of 70 College of Healthcare Information Management Executives members by data solutions vendor Health Catalyst found 54 percent rate data analytics as their highest IT priority. Other top priorities included population health initiatives, ICD-10, accountable care initiatives and consolidation-related IT investments.

The architects of the Affordable Care Act have as a stated goal the end of employer provided healthcare insurance. So how has insurance provided by employers fared so far?

Have you thought through these issues?

CT accounts for around 10% of all imaging examinations but contributes up to 70% of the collective radiation dose to patients