A new study from healthcare IT research and advisory firm CapSite indicates that 54% of hospitals plan to purchase Medical Device Integration solutions.  The MDI study from the Burlington, VT-based CapSite represents insight from over 300 hospitals on the market opportunity and vendor market share across the United States.

The research study includes MDI vendors like Cerner,

A wearable biometric bracelet is being developed to communicate with the wearer’s medical devices and potentially push data out to the patient’s record.  By uniquely identifying the wearer, the device could prevent data from being imported into the wrong records.

Dartmouth College computer scientist Cory Cornelius and other researchers are developing technology to match a person’s bioimpedance (the physiological response of the body to electric current passing through tissues) to a unique individual.  

Cerner Corp., a leading supplier of Electronic Health Records software, experienced a major computer outage on July 23rd which affected an unspecified number of hospitals.  The five-hour outage was blamed on “human error.”

While affected hospitals and healthcare providers were not immediately aware of any patients being harmed as a result of the disruption,

Arlington, VA-based Surescripts announced the ten states with the highest rate of electronic prescribing activity for the year 2011 this week.  The U.S.’ largest network for ePrescribing ranked Minnesota, which hadn’t been in top 10 in previous years, at the head of the list, with 61% of its prescriptions being ordered electronically.

The seventh annual Safe-Rx Awards are based on an analysis of Surescripts data regarding ePrescribing activity by healthcare providers,

To succeed, mobile medical apps will have to integrate with healthcare platforms and Electronic Medical Records software as well as engage consumers’ sense of fun.  Last week’s mHealth World Congress, held in Boston, had several sessions in which the future of mobile apps was discussed.

Such apps must be able to integrate with other devices,

Six laptop and tablet computers were stolen from the hospice offices of Chicago’s Northwestern Memorial Hospital during a burglary in June.  The hospital is conducting an internal investigation to determine whether or not any Protected Health Information (PHI) was compromised, although it does not believe that such information was targeted in the thefts.

A patient data exchange system that sometimes sends incomplete cardiology reports is being recalled by Philips Healthcare because it could lead to misdiagnosis.  A healthcare facility reported to the Federal Drug Administration earlier this year that the Xcelera Connect product was transmitting partial reports into patients’ records, prompting the Philips recall.  No patients have been known to have suffered harm as a result of the issue,

New York University Langone Medical Center has announced it is making changes to its emergency care guidelines following the sudden death by strep infection of a boy.  Twelve-year old Rory Staunton cut his arm while playing basketball at school in March, and subsequently fell ill and was taken by his parents to his pediatrician.