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Volume 13 • Issue 7 • $5.00 January 2017
THE REGION’S MONTHLY NEWSPAPER FOR HEALTHCARE PROFESSIONALS & PHYSICIANS
ONCOLOGY EDUCATION
Nationally Renowned Photo credit: FIU External Relations
Pediatric Surgeon Joins
Palm Beach Children’s Hospital
BY VANESSA ORR
Five months ago, Anne C. Fischer, M.D.,
Ph.D., transitioned from her role as the sur-
geon-in-chief at Beaumont Children’s Hospital
Dr. Ralph Zagha and the chief of pediatric surgery at William
A Message from Beaumont Hospital in Michigan to take on her
the President new role as Tenet Florida’s regional medical Christina Cascante
of the Broward director of pediatric surgery. FIU’s Master’s
County Medical “My goal is to help build a multi-tier pro- Program
Association gram with depth with advanced mid-level in Health
EHR, CPOE, PQRI, ICD10, ACO, providers and pediatric specialists,†she Informatics
MIPS (merit based incentive payment
system), MACRA (Medicare access and explained. “Through this program, we will pro- Expands
CHIP reauthorization act), MOC, bun-
dled payments, pay for performance, vide minimally invasive surgery for newborns, Opportunities
meaningful use. If you don't recognize
those terms, consider yourself lucky. All as well as standard and more advanced thora- Dr. Anne C. Fischer for Students
different programs with the same conno- coscopic approaches to children.â€
tation to the practitioner: more work, less As healthcare systems continue to
pay, and, more importantly, no patient Dr. Fischer, who is board-certified by the move forward with technological
benefit. Physicians are skeptical of gov- advances focused on improving care,
ernment initiatives rolled out under the American Board of Pediatric Surgery and the American Board of Surgery, specializes value and patient engagement, the oppor-
guise of improved patient care. Did the tunities for individuals trained in health
ICD 10 "upgrade" lead us toward the in oncologic surgery for childhood malignancies; complex neonatal surgery with pre- informatics are rapidly expanding. From
CMS goal of improving patient care, electronic health records, to patient por-
access, and health while lowering costs? natal counseling and intervention; advanced minimally invasive laparoscopy (MIS); tals to mobile apps aimed at assisting
Likewise, does PQRI help provide better patients in controlling their health, new
patient care? Do electronic health records video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) and NUSS surgery, a minimally invasive sources of healthcare data are coming
allow for seamless access of patient together. Turning this data into valuable
records among different offices or hospi- Continued on page 21 information for healthcare organizations,
tals? providers and patients is the challenge
COMMENTARY presented to Health Informatics profes-
The mission of the Broward County sionals.
Medical Association (BCMA), since Puzzlement as the Game Changes
1926, is to promote and preserve the Providing students with the analytical
highest standards of medical care and fos- BY STEVEN G. ULLMANN, PHD skills and tools to meet this challenge is
ter the ethical principles of the medical the goal of Florida International
profession. It will be my goal as president Given what I do for a living, I have been University‘s Master’s degree program in
to uphold these principles and strive to Health Informatics and Analytics.
improve health care for our patients, asked many times, “Are you for or against Launched in 2012 by the Department of
providers and the community. Information Systems and Business
Obamacare?†My answer has been consistent Analytics in FIU’s College of Business,
One thing we can likely all agree upon graduates of the program have been met
is that our current health care system … I firmly believe that one cannot be “for it†with career opportunities in diverse
needs improving. healthcare organizations.
and one cannot be “against it.†With a 2,000
Continued on page 12 Continued on page 9
plus page law and over 10,000 pages of rules,
there are many elements of the law that appear
to make a lot of sense, there are many aspects
of the law that are problematic, and there are
many aspects of the law which are in the gray
area, their impact still to be determined.
Indeed, those who have been major advocates
of the law have now been confronted with the Dr. Steven G. Ullmann
shortcomings, and those advocating for the
demise of the law are now indicating that they want to retain a number of significant
elements of the law. And so, both sides of the argument are realizing and ironically
coming to consensus that one cannot be “for it†and one cannot be “against it.â€
There is a game called “Jengaâ€, a game where players see a tower of wood blocks
and take turns removing a block at a time, attempting to safeguard the tower of blocks
from collapse.
Perhaps this is the perfect metaphor for the policies being examined relating to the
Affordable Care Act. Removing elements of the Affordable Care Act, or the entire set
Continued on page 25
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