EHR Vendors Put Up Roadblocks to Direct Messaging
Ken Terry for iHealthBeat
“The issue of EHR vendors being tough to work with are old hat. But this is a good read examining the specific issue of Direct secure messaging between a hospital and physicians running on different systems. Despite technological progress, interoperability between an HIE, a HISP, two EHR vendors, and different facilities in the same community still doesn’t work.” – Naveen
“Article clearly shows that despite all the talk about interoperability among policy wonks, out on the front-lines it is can be an extremely difficult and frustrating challenge, even for something as simple as Direct secure messaging.” – John

Health IT Early Mover Advantage Examined
Alison Diana in InformationWeek
“InformationWeek article provides simple summary, but get the actual report as it provides some excellent insights. Healthcare is undergoing rapid transformation and IT will play a pivotal role in the success and/or failure of many HCOs.” – John

Exclusive: Two Apple medical trials shed light on how HealthKit will work
Christina Farr for Reuters
“At last, a little bit of light is shed on some of the much-ballyhooed Healthkit pilots. As expected, test use cases are being run in academic settings at Stanford and Duke, and will focus on measurement to support chronic care. While the Apple Watch announcement last week seemed to be a disappointment to most, this article probably serves as a better indication of Apple’s ecosystem/partner approach to healthcare.” – Naveen

Toward Increased Adoption of Complex Care Management (PDF link)
Hong, Clemens, S., et al, NEJM
“This article in the New England Journal of Medicine summarizes some of the findings from a group here in Boston at MGH. Unsurprisingly, physicians look at care management tools differently than IT does. This article looks, exhaustively, at the barriers to more widespread adoption of care management at the practice level.” – Brian

MeHI Provider and Consumer Health IT Research Study (PDF link)
Massachusetts eHealth Institute
“This comprehensive survey of HIT adoption exposes some of the benefits and challenges that providers face in the use of HIT. While regrettably, report does not delve into challenges of EHR usage, it does give a fair assessment on challenges of HIE adoption and use.” – John

Apple HealthKit apps are on hold due to last-minute problems (updated with Apple comment)
Mark Sullivan in Venture Beat
“A minor stumble for Apple’s healthcare efforts right out of the gate. Not a big deal in technical or business sense, but not the best omen either. Integrity of data management will be central to health kit’s success – hopefully these glitches don’t become a recurring theme in Apple’s efforts.” – Naveen

Software patents are crumbling, thanks to the Supreme Court
Timothy B. Lee for Vox
“Software patents in healthcare get no attention but they are always lurking. Since the Supreme Court last spoke in June about whether software should be patentable, lower courts have been killing off software patents. While it is still far from clear, the entire rationale for software-based patents may be in question. However, it is clear that users and buyers of healthcare applications and devices have a little less to fear from patent trolls, who now are on the defensive.” – Brian