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Baptist Health South Florida reports it’s making good progress in its efforts to subsidize doctors in its area to convert to electronic health records so that Baptist hospitals and the doctors can easily share data about patients.

Baptist spokeswoman Roymi Membiela said the system is contributing 85 percent of the doctors’ costs -- the maximum allowed for electronic records under an exception to the Stark Law, the federal anti-kickback statute intended to stop hospitals from paying doctors to get patients to its facilities. That exception expires Dec. 31, 2013, Membiela said.

Membiela said five companies are providing the software for the electronic records, including IOS Health Systems, based in Kendall. The latest software company to contract with Baptist is CareCloud, also based in Miami.

CareCloud also recently announced it has contracted with Miami Children’s Hospital to provide billing and collections software to 200 doctors in the hospital’s network.

-- John Dorschner, The Miami Herald

Topic: Town meeting format including foreign and domestic policy

Sometimes a picture can be worth a thousand followers too.

Therapists have always had a duty to report suspected abuse, but since Florida has passed what has been called the "nation's toughest child abuse reporting law," now is a good time to review your policies and procedures regarding child abuse.

Speaker-designate Weatherford has announced his intention to appoint Representative Seth McKeel as the Appropriations Chairman during his term. Read a copy of the memo below:

MEMORANDUM
To: Members of the Florida House of Representatives
From: Will Weatherford, Speaker-designate
Date: October 9, 2012
Re: Appropriations Chairman

It is hard to believe that it has been more than six months since the gavel fell and we gathered in the rotunda to mark Sine Die. I am grateful to Speaker Cannon for the way he and his staff have allowed my team to conduct the transition process. I understand and support the concept of "one Speaker at a time;" therefore, the ability to prepare and plan during the interim is appreciated.

In order to keep you as informed as possible, I write today to announce my intention to appoint Representative Seth McKeel as the Appropriations Chairman during my term as the Speaker. Seth's expertise and background as a small business owner, a former Lakeland City Commissioner and the previous Chairman of the House State Affairs Committee will prove to be invaluable as we manage our state's future budget priorities. Representative McKeel has demonstrated a commitment to putting the priorities of our state over his own interests and will serve the House well as we develop an appropriations plan in the coming months.

We have a great task before us. The constitutional responsibility to pass a balanced budget and the public duty to fund the basic needs of our state will take every ounce of thoughtful, principled, and serious effort. Seth McKeel will be a great leader by example for the next two years.

I look forward to sharing further insight at the appropriate times in the weeks ahead.

According to an AP Press article, the pilot program in south Florida is continuing to receive a lot of interest from the Republican led Legislature as a way to privatize healthcare despite the fact that it's shown little or no savings. 

It appears the GOP has been busy during recess. The House Republican leaders suggested  that HHS should suspend incentive payments to providers in the electronic health-records program and delay penalties to those that do not integrate health IT until the federal department can define clear, interoperable standards.

The Department of Education has issued its annual report highlighting disability rights enforcement issues. At the top of the list was FAPE (fair, appropriate public education) with nearly 4,700 complaints of the 11,700 received relating to this issue. 

In preparation for the debate 10/3/12, it will help to familiarize yourself with each party's health care plan. Taken from the Commonwealth Fund website, here is a graph that compares the two regarding impact on the uninsured. For the complete article, click here.

BY JOHN DORSCHNER
JDORSCHNER@MIAMIHERALD.COM
Quietly, over the past six years, an experiment in providing healthcare for the poor has been playing out in Broward and four other counties around the state. Its basic goal is to relieve the financial pressures of Medicaid on Florida’s taxpayers by turning over poor and disabled patients to private companies, a move lawmakers believe will cut costs.

Conservatives love the Medicaid reform program, pointing to an in-depth University of Florida study indicating that the experiment has lowered costs while not raising consumer complaints. The Legislature has already approved a slightly modified model of the reform to go statewide. At least one national think tank believes it should be a model for the entire country.