Bye bye, BlackBerry It was a sad beginning to 2022 for tech nostalgia. Service on BlackBerry cellphones shut down for good on January 4, closing the door on a piece of technology that helped usher in a revolution in communications, CBS News reported. BlackBerry announced in September 2020 that it would stop updating operating systems and software for its devices on January … [Read more...]

COVID associated with higher blood pressure levels The COVID-19 pandemic hasn’t just been detrimental to respiratory health. According to new research published in the American Heart Association’s journal Circulation, COVID has also been associated with higher blood pressure levels among middle-aged adults across the U.S. Nearly half of American adults have high blood … [Read more...]

Draw inspiration from the best ads and commercials of 2021 Between a pandemic and the world struggling to get back to “normal,” ads and commercials in 2021 havetransformed through the year. While savvy marketers remained focused on the overall strategy and audience targeting, creatives needed to deliver a memorable ad experience with more prospective buyers consuming media … [Read more...]

The persistence of shipping bottlenecks and the emergence of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 have continued to be top of mind for our industry. Despite these challenges, HIDA’s commitment to advance the value of distribution in healthcare remains unchanged. HIDA has been working closely with the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR) within the U.S. … [Read more...]

Your customers are playing it. You should too. Hospitals and medical practices were introduced to risk-based contracting decades ago, with the advent of health insurance. In 1982, Medicare raised the bar for hospitals by introducing prospective payment in the form of DRGs, or diagnosis-related groups. Since then, the stakes have kept rising. Today, Medicare, Medicaid and … [Read more...]

Providers need safety and efficacy in medical products and equipment.Add usability, and you’re that much closer to a sale. Pharmaceutical labels and packaging that look so much like others, patients get the wrong medication. An insulin pump that’s difficult to program or calibrate. Blood pressure tubing that is erroneously connected to an IV catheter, resulting in a fatal … [Read more...]

Opening a new clinic or ambulatory surgery center on-time is always wrought with many challenges, including equipment lead times, construction delays, product loss/damage, and getting required biomedical checks completed. During the Covid-19 pandemic these challenges have become amplified. Demand is high, raw materials diminished, and logistics are bottlenecked all over the … [Read more...]

How will it affect procedures performed and products used in the physician office? By Mark Thill Telemedicine soared in 2020 due to the pandemic. Usage has plateaued since then, but it’s a safe bet it’s not going away. And with it comes questions. What role will it play in urgent care and chronic care management? Will it lead to fewer in-person visits, or more? Will it … [Read more...]

Pandemic proves that healthcare logistics demands a global perspective By Mark Thill A year ago, were you aware of the term “dwell time?” Did the word “container” connote anything other than Tupperware? Did you know how many weeks in a typical month an over-the-road trucker is away from home? Had you ever stopped at the Corwith Yards on the Southwest Side of Chicago to … [Read more...]

Nattie Leger, Vice President of Supply Chain Value and Clinical Performance, Ochsner Health, New Orleans, Louisiana Editor’s note: The following interview originally ran in the December 2021 issue of The Journal of Healthcare Contracting, a sister publication of Repertoire Magazine. The Journal of Healthcare Contracting (JHC): You’ve had extensive clinical and nursing … [Read more...]