Paul Govern

Beginning in May, Vanderbilt University Medical Center patients who are owed refunds of $200 or less will receive prepaid debit cards by mail instead of paper checks. The switch to debit cards will give patients easier access to their refunds and an escape from check-cashing fees that banks may impose. Read More

Vanderbilt University Hospital recently earned a Spring 2014 patient safety grade of “A” from the Leapfrog Group, a coalition of public and private purchasers of employee health coverage that works to encourage health care safety, quality and affordability. Leapfrog’s Hospital Safety Score uses 28 measures of publicly available hospital data… Read More

In May, Vanderbilt University Medical Center will launch a survey of clinical staff and faculty to assess attitudes and perceptions regarding patient safety at the Medical Center. Read More

For years, Vanderbilt Medical Group has used robocalls to remind patients of upcoming appointments. The reminders are triggered four days out, and VMG is able to refill approximately 60 percent of all cancellations that occur at this four-day mark. Cancellations account for approximately 7 percent of all patient responses to these appointment reminders. Read More

RxStar, a prescribing application developed at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, has earned a 2013 Surescripts White Coat of Quality. Read More

The Physician Council for Clinical Service Excellence helps ensure that clinical faculty have a clear voice in shaping major initiatives affecting patients, clinicians and clinical staff at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Read More

Implementation science is a new and growing field concerned with the transfer of research findings and medical evidence into routine health care. Read More

Support for Medical Center operations is now named Health Informatics Technologies and Services or HITS. The group’s tagline is “Powering Care, Discovery and Learning.” Read More

The most recent Credo Award and Five Pillar Leader Award winners were announced Wednesday at the Clinical Enterprise Leadership Assembly at Langford Auditorium. Read More

For the 14th time Vanderbilt University Medical Center has been recognized by Truven Health Analytics as one of the nation’s “100 Top Hospitals.” Read More

By Oct. 1, U.S. health care payers and providers will adopt a modified and greatly expanded version of the code set used for diagnoses and inpatient procedures. The ICD-10 code set (International Classification of Disease and Related Health Problems, Tenth Revision) will replace ICD-9, which has been in use in the United States since 1979. Read More

Health care service and access are at the crux of new Vanderbilt University Medical Center leadership appointments. Read More

A program launched by Schnelle in January 2013 aims to reduce readmissions for Medicare patients transferred from Vanderbilt University Hospital to any of 23 area skilled nursing facilities, or SNFs. The specific goal is 17 percent reduction, by 2015, in 30-day hospital readmissions directly from these SNFs. Read More

Healthcare Informatics Magazine has awarded Vanderbilt University Medical Center third place in its 2014 Innovator Awards. Read More

Research conducted at Vanderbilt University Medical Center shows that routine administration of the Brief Health Literacy Screen (BHLS) by nurses provides a valid measure for large-scale studies of the influence of health literacy on clinical outcomes. Read More

Recent sweeping changes to undergraduate medical education at Vanderbilt are intended to produce physicians who are better attuned to teamwork and more accustomed to leading teams to improve clinical outcomes, quality and patient safety. Read More

Blackford Middleton, M.D., MPH, M.Sc., chief informatics officer for Vanderbilt University Health System, has begun a two-year term as chair of the board of directors of the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA). Read More

In preliminary testing, Vanderbilt Home Care Services (VHCS) has found that Internet-based remote patient monitoring reduces hospital readmissions for patients with congestive heart failure (CHF) who are receiving home nursing visits. Read More

Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s 55 patient transporters average approximately 550 transports per weekday and 425 per day over the weekend. The dispatch system that coordinates transport is fully automated. Read More

Faculty members Josh Denny, M.D., M.S., associate professor of Biomedical Informatics and Medicine, and Paul Harris, Ph.D., associate professor of Biomedical Informatics and research associate professor of Biomedical Engineering, are among six fellows elected this year to the American College of Medical Informatics. Read More