HIT Leaders and News

EHR Modernization at Lakes Regional Healthcare

Jason Free — Tue, 19 May 2026 10:50:02 +0000

Lakes Regional Healthcare’s transition to Epic is more than a local technology upgrade. For a community hospital serving northwest Iowa and southwest Minnesota, a new electronic health record platform changes how clinical information moves, how staff coordinate care, how patients access records, and how the organization positions itself inside a more connected healthcare market.

The post EHR Modernization at Lakes Regional Healthcare appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Voice AI Tests Healthcare’s Privacy Discipline

Jason Free — Tue, 19 May 2026 09:55:37 +0000

Voice AI has entered healthcare through one of the industry’s most sensitive workflow gaps: conversations that shape care but often disappear once they end. Staff meetings, case reviews, shift handoffs, care coordination calls, safety huddles, and operational briefings can contain clinically important context that never makes it into the medical record or formal documentation.

The post Voice AI Tests Healthcare’s Privacy Discipline appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

AI-Powered Aquablation Therapy at UVA Health

Jason Free — Mon, 18 May 2026 12:35:29 +0000

The arrival of AI-powered Aquablation therapy at UVA Health Prince William Medical Center is a local urology development with broader strategic implications. It reflects how advanced procedural technology is moving beyond academic flagships and into regional hospitals, where access, patient selection, operational readiness, and financial sustainability determine whether innovation becomes durable clinical value.

The post AI-Powered Aquablation Therapy at UVA Health appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Prior Authorization Enters Its Test Phase

Jason Free — Mon, 18 May 2026 10:44:44 +0000

The next phase of prior authorization reform will not be decided by whether healthcare organizations support electronic exchange in principle. That consensus already exists. The real test is whether payers, providers, EHR developers, networks, and digital health companies can make electronic prior authorization work inside the messy conditions of actual care delivery.

The post Prior Authorization Enters Its Test Phase appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Healthcare Fraud Has Become a Platform Risk

Jason Free — Mon, 18 May 2026 10:39:56 +0000

The conviction of a healthcare software company owner in a billion-dollar Medicare fraud conspiracy should not be treated as an isolated criminal case. It is a warning about what happens when healthcare technology platforms become infrastructure for transactions without sufficient clinical, compliance, and program integrity controls.

The post Healthcare Fraud Has Become a Platform Risk appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Browser Security Is Becoming Clinical Infrastructure

Jason Free — Tue, 12 May 2026 11:08:02 +0000

The browser has become one of healthcare’s most important clinical access points. That shift is easy to underestimate because browsers still look familiar, ordinary, and low risk. In modern care environments, however, the browser is no longer just a window to the internet. It is increasingly the place where clinicians reach EHRs, virtual desktops, cloud applications, payer portals, analytics tools, collaboration platforms, and patient-facing systems.

The post Browser Security Is Becoming Clinical Infrastructure appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Regional Providers Are Carrying National Cyber Risk

Jason Free — Tue, 12 May 2026 11:02:21 +0000

The latest cluster of healthcare data breach disclosures is not remarkable because the affected organizations are household names. It is notable because they are not.

The post Regional Providers Are Carrying National Cyber Risk appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Prior Authorization Reform Becomes an Execution Test

Jason Free — Mon, 11 May 2026 11:35:05 +0000

Prior authorization reform has moved from a policy debate to an operational stress test. The central issue is no longer whether fax-driven approval workflows are inefficient. That case has been made repeatedly by physicians, patients, regulators, and payers themselves.

The post Prior Authorization Reform Becomes an Execution Test appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

Wearables Are Becoming Health Infrastructure

Jason Free — Mon, 11 May 2026 10:56:00 +0000

Google’s launch of Fitbit Air is another signal that the boundary between personal wellness technology and healthcare infrastructure is becoming harder to defend.

The post Wearables Are Becoming Health Infrastructure appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.

The Average Patient Is No Longer Good Enough

Jason Free — Mon, 04 May 2026 11:04:41 +0000

A new brain science finding from Stanford Medicine carries a warning for healthcare technology leaders far beyond neuroscience. The study found that analyzing children’s brain activity through group averages can obscure, and in some cases misrepresent, how individual brains regulate behavior.

The post The Average Patient Is No Longer Good Enough appeared first on HIT Leaders and News.