From mHealth to EHRs, and telemedicine to data security, technology has overtaken how we approach health care. That topic has garnered the attention of many healthcare industry participants, a number of whom cover it routinely on blogs.
Industry View, a blog about health care technology sponsored by CDW Healthcare, recently compiled a list of the 50 top Health IT blogs. In the interest of your time, we whittled it down to 10 that we considered the cream of the crop based on our subjective opinion.
1. 33 Charts
Authored by Bryan Vartabedian, MD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine, 33 Charts covers the intersection of medicine, social media, and technology.
Started in 2006, it’s one of the older entrants into the health blogosphere and has been a vital conduit for information about the social health revolution and its influence on doctors and patients.
2. American EHR
How could we not include the “official blog of America’s clinician-powered health IT community?” A number of health IT professionals comprise its list of contributors, and the site includes topics such as EHR implementation and optimization, interoperability, meaningful use, and new care models.
From the site: The AmericanEHR Blog features original commentary, opinion pieces, and news stories about Electronic Health Records (EHRs) and the meaningful use of health information technology. Discussion is strongly encouraged to enhance the current EHR knowledge base, facilitating the successful adoption and optimum use of EHRs and related health IT products and services.
3. Becker’s Hospital Review
A healthcare industry staple, Becker’s Hospital Review might be considered less of a blog than a news and information site. Even still, it did make CDW’s list as one of the top 50 blogs. Due to the amount and quality of information provided, we felt it deserved a place in ours, as well.
From the site: Becker’s Hospital Review features up-to-date business and legal news and analysis relating to hospitals and health systems. Content is geared toward high-level hospital leaders (CEOs, CFOs, COOs, CMOs, CIOs, etc.), and we work to provide valuable content, including hospital and health system news, best practices and legal guidance specifically for these decision-makers.
4. Cloudview Blog
From Athenahealth comes the Cloudview Blog, which offers ideas, insight, and analysis to help physicians, medical groups, and health systems stay informed and profitable in today’s challenging healthcare environment.
Authored by multiple contributors, we like the blog due to its practical approach toward health care practice management. Topics include EHR, meaningful use, medical billing, and mHealth.
5. Getting Paid
We all like to get paid, right? That’s the focus of this blog, which offers ideas, news, and opinions on medical billing and practice management. Getting Paid is a publication of Kareo, a medical office software and services company.
Topics include accountable care, EHR/EMR, medical coding, patient-centered medical homes, and practice profitability.
6. Healthblog
This blog represents the thoughts, comments, and reflections about healthcare IT from Microsoft’s worldwide health senior director Bill Crounse, MD. It focuses on how information technology can improve healthcare delivery and services around the world.
7. The Health Care Blog
You have to love a blog that describes itself as “everything you always wanted to know about the Health Care system but were afraid to ask.”
Founded by Matthew Holt, co-chairman of Health 2.0, a conference that showcases innovative healthcare technologies, The Health Care Blog focuses on the intersection of healthcare, technology, and business.
Note: The site has numerous contributors. In case you would like to become one, it is always looking for more.
8. HealthWorks Collective
This site, part of the Social Media Today network, brings together leading thinkers on health care, especially as it relates to the use of technology. Due to the fact it has so many contributors and that it is updated multiple times per day, you could consider it more of a content aggregator or curation site than a blog, at least in the technical sense.
Topics covered include health IT, mHeath, healthcare social media, patient engagement, and the business of medicine. If you want a site that provides a wealth of information from a variety of perspectives, then add HealthWorks Collective to the list.
9. KevinMD
If there is a rock star in the healthcare blog and social media-sphere, it’s probably board-certified internal medicine physician. Kevin Pho, MD. (The guy even has a Wikipedia page!)
Founded in 2004, KevinMD is one blog that could (and should) be present on just about any healthcare-related top ten blog list, including one that deals with technology.
More than 1,000 authors contribute to KevinMD.com including front-line primary care doctors, surgeons, specialist physicians, nurses, medical students, and policy experts.
The blog is regularly cited by publications such as the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, USA Today, and CNN. Forbe’s even called it a “must read blog,” so who are we to disagree?
10. mHealth Watch
This site, which at one time was part of Mobile Marketing Watch, grew in such popularity that the publisher, Jason Reitzin, decided to break it out on its own.
As the name implies, the site is dedicated to mHealth and is one of the first to cover this topic exclusively, based on the increasingly important role it plays in the healthcare ecosystem.
Missed any of your favorite healthcare IT blogs you’d like to see on this list? Let us know in the comments!
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