The Ohio State Medical Association, representing 20,000 Ohio physicians, residents, medical students and practice managers, says its Standards of Excellence Program has helped save time and money in adopting electronic medical records.

Edward Hospital & Health Services, a regional healthcare provider in Naperville, Ill., is developing a hospital-based community model that will connect its physicians electronically.

With continued focus on how the Obama administration might affect healthcare IT, this week's news that the Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology will likely stay in place is a welcome relief, say healthcare leaders.

Fourteen rural hospitals in South Dakota will receive $194,766 in grants to boost healthcare information technology initiatives.

An estimated 300 new vacation homes being built on 1,000 acres in the Upper Yellowstone region of Montana will be supplied with emergency medical services.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Indian Health Service, the federal health program for American Indians and Alaska Natives, has signed a five-year agreement for open source software to provide support, maintenance and development for the agency's Resource Patient Management System (RPMS) and electronic health record solution.

To be successful, the adoption of health IT by physicians, nurses, and staff must extend communication and health data exchange beyond the narrow confines inside the four walls of their practice.

Express Scripts, a St. Louis-based provider of pharmacy benefit management services, has notified the FBI of an apparent extortion attempt possibly involving millions of patient records.

It's no secret that Nordic countries are decades ahead of some of their European peers in healthcare IT infrastructure and development. Visitors to this year's World of Health IT show in Copenhagen were offered a look at Denmark's system, which relies on the Sundhed eHealth Portal to connect patients and providers.

Springfield Clinic is already reaping the benefits of an electronic health record program used in combination with mobile computing devices.

Continuum Health Partners, which bills itself as the largest nonprofit health system in New York City, plans to automate medical records and clinical workflow for its approximately 3,300 employed and volunteer providers.

The McKesson Corporation has renamed its specialty pharmaceutical business unit McKesson Specialty Care Solutions. Read about this and other business news, contracts and new products in this week's Vendor Notebook.

A $100,000 Defense Department grant has been awarded to the Birmingham, Ala.-based Teksouth Corporation as the first phase in a program to aid military and civilian doctors and other providers in analyzing electronic medical records.

The Zix Corporation has signed a three-year contract with Aetna that covers e-prescribing services for northern New Jersey. Read about this and other business news, contracts and new products in this week's Vendor Notebook.

Aetna and the Microsoft Corporation have announced a collaboration to provide Aetna members access to their personal health information through Microsoft's HealthVault online platform.

The Bronx RHIO continues to expand its data-sharing reach since going live last July with 16 participating organizations.

CareView Communications, Inc. of Plano, Texas has signed a contract with Hillcrest Medical Center in Tulsa, Okla. to install the CareView System in patient rooms and other areas of the hospital. Read about this and other business news, contracts and new products in this week's Vendor Notebook.

The Sharp Community Medical Group, the largest IPA in the San Diego area, will roll out an electronic health record and practice management system to automate and connect clinical and administrative processes for 700 physician members and affiliates.

Physicians and patients using the SwiftMD Web-based portal will be able to securely share medical information through a custom electronic medical records solution.

Symantec has announced that AMN Healthcare, billed as the largest provider of medical staffing solutions in the country, has implemented Symantec Endpoint Protection and Symantec Mail Security to secure their endpoints, including desktops, laptops and other mobile devices.