PQRS Measures: Why Bother?
Downstream Consequences of Aging is a bi-monthly series written by guest columnist Barbara Weinstein, PhD. The Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS) is a program through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) designed to improve the quality of care to Medicare Part B beneficiaries by tracking practice patterns of health care practitioners. …
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Does ACO Spell Audiology?
Tom J. Northey is this week’s guest contributor. In July, Hearing Economics did a multi-part series going back in time to 2000, when Mr. Northey wrote a seminal article forecasting our profession’s future choices and coining that popular phrase “Audiology Economics.” Lucky for Hearing Economics, the series caught Mr. Northey’s attention. Though he left the field of…
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Audiology Landscaping Under Way by the Affordable Care Act
George Lyons (ASHA VP for Audiology) recently anticipated a “changing landscape” for Audiologists as components of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) are implemented. His well written post was well received and frequently read. It was also rare — few articles in the public domain are written specifically about Audiology and the ACA;…
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Influenza and Audiologists: Mitigating Harm to Life and Wallet
Today wraps up a 3-part series on flu vaccination by looking at private versus public sector efforts to vaccinate and protect, being mindful that we need to protect not only ourselves and our patients, but our professional livelihoods as well. It’s a perfect blend of Economics and Ethics and, I’d like to point out, Marketing. If it were…
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Influenza and Audiologists: In Harm’s Way
Last week’s post ended in high dudgeon at the prospect of hearing professionals violating the Harm Principle by foregoing flu shots. In the meantime, the flu marches on: For the second week in a row, flu deaths exceeded the epidemic threshold; 49.6% of hospital flu admissions were in those 65 and over, 48 states reported the…
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