Untitled Document

May 5, 2008

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1. UCSF: So Many Ways to Compromise Patient Privacy, So Little Time

Facts and Background

UCSF Medical Center in San Francisco, CA admitted Friday that it had inadvertently made the information of over 6,000 patients accessible via Internet searches for three months in 2007, but didn't notify those patients until nearly six months later. The information was intended to be used by a fundraising company the medical center hired to target potential donors from its patient population.

Opinion

Let's hope it was the marketing and foundation people who were clueless and not clinicians and administrators running patient care. Since the medical center can't really do anything to lessen its embarrassment at this point, firings will certainly ensue to try to place distance between UCSF and the problem it created.

Musings

Using limited patient data for fundraising is unfortunately OK by watered down HIPAA standards, but UCSF also included clinic information that's prohibited by its own privacy policies. It will look like the second gold rush Monday as greedy attorneys travel en masse to San Francisco to track down the 6,000 potential plaintiffs.
UCSF was quick to fire the firm using the data, despite the appearance that it was UCSF who screwed up. Target America was doing what it was hired to do from all accounts.
Even though hospitals can and do solicit donations from patients, that practice doesn't look so good when described in a newspaper article.
Target America's flagship offering, as described on its site: "Target America data base, culled from 75 data sources, contains more than 7 million records of the wealthiest and most generous people in the nation -- the top 5 percent in terms of income, assets, and philanthropic history. " And, they all need healthcare eventually.
A recent UCSF-hosted conference on marketing cancer centers lists Target America as one of its sponsors.
As is nearly always the case, UCSF found out it had a problem when someone idly Googling their own name found it in an exposed data file and called to complain.
Patients should ask UCSF for an accounting of disclosures to see if fundraising data extraction was included.

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2. Allscripts Proves Analysts Wrong with Unimpressive Profits

Facts and Background

Allscripts announced earnings Wednesday that fell short of analyst expectations. The company also announced expectations on the low end of forecast earnings growth for 2008, but said it would have problems meeting revenue growth targets.

Opinion

Allscript's track record at managing Wall Street is so bad that shares didn't even drop much in price after the news. Its sales numbers were good (up 50%) and it said again that it's got a handle on the TouchWorks software problems that have plagued it.

Musings

At least those who thought Misys was getting too good of a deal might be rethinking right about now.
Nobody knows that the stock price will do after the complicated one-time MDRX divided of $4.50 is paid after the Misys merger, which management says could happen during the summer.
Glen Tullman quoted KLAS reports that say that eClinicalWorks is a strong competitor on price, but struggling with implementation and support.
Actually, expectations aside, Allscripts did pretty well considering it had to deal with the customer impact of announcing a merger. That doesn't usually encourage prospects to close quickly.

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3. HTP Improves its Own Revenue Cycle with McKesson's Money

Facts and Background

McKesson's RelayHealth subsidiary has acquired Columbus, OH revenue cycle vendor HTP Inc., the company announced Friday.

Opinion

So far, RelayHealth is doing everything right to logically position its multiple business lines.

Musings

Companies are realizing that there's money to be made in helping hospitals collect patient payments upfront now that patients have more costs and higher deductibles shifted to them.
Care financing will attract the interest of companies not in the insurance business. HTP's products give RelayHealth a leg up on competitors that deal only with third-party reimbursement.

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