AHIA Offers Consumers Online Information on Public, Private Insurance
The Association of Health Insurance Advisors recently added an online consumer outreach program designed to educate consumers about the need for public and private health insurance and how to obtain coverage. Consumers can access information on the benefits of health insurance, what to look for when comparing policies, an index of key insurance and health terms, how to contact insurance agents and information on the State Children's Health Insurance Program. The program is available on AHIA's Web site at www.ahia.net/consumer/index.html (AHIA release, 2/7).
ComTrust LLC recently announced the availability of its new ComTrust QuickStart product, a "managed public key infrastructure solution," offering increased security for information processed by health care organizations. The product aims to address HIPAA requirements regarding authentication, authorization, access control, policy, data integrity and audit (ComTrust release, 2/6).
The Center for Healthcare Information Management recently unveiled its joint Patient Safety Initiative, which seeks to identify the role of information technology in helping to reduce medical errors. The Initiative, developed in conjunction with 3M Health Information Systems, Eclipsys Corporation, ePhysician and Per-Se Technologies Inc., will provide health care organizations with "impartial" data on which technologies best help to reduce errors. CHIM will collect and review data from various technology vendors and institutions, and the data also will be reviewed by an independent advisory board of technology experts selected by CHIM to assess which technologies best improve quality of care. For more information, visit CHIM's Web site at www.chim.org (CHIM release, 2/6).
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