QA and Testing Pros Focus on Skills, Innovation at StarWest

Earlier this month, I participated in the StarWest Conference for software testers and quality assurance professionals at Anaheim, California. Many of the best and brightest in our industry attended, and it was clear to me that we are entering a period of rapid innovation and growth in the QA and testing arena. New technology and […]

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7 Questions to Benchmark Your Quality Assurance and Testing Practices

The frequency of enterprise software releases and adoption of cloud and mobile technologies are just some of the factors driving increased spend and focus on quality assurance and testing. But QAT practices can vary greatly from one IT organization to the next. So how do you stack up against others? This short assessment should help […]

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Ebola, EHR and Teaching Moments

An Ebola patient is seen in the ED and discharged. The hospital points to its EHR software as the culprit. Alas, if it were only that simple. In fact, as we all are now aware, the EHR has been exonerated (in an unusual and carefully worded clarification). The patient has died. And we as physicians […]

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6 Resources to Learn about ICD-10 Testing

With the ICD-10 countdown clock again ticking toward the October 1, 2015, compliance deadline, I’m reminded of the rush to complete Y2K projects in 1999. There is a lot of work to do and less than year left to do it. The deadline represents thousands of hours of testing work for QA professionals and applications […]

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Health IT First Movers May Enjoy Competitive Edge, Faster Growth

Most healthcare organizations are conservative when it comes to investing in new technologies, but a new report suggests early adoption of social, mobile, analytic, cloud and machine-to-machine technologies are hallmarks of higher growth rates and market leadership. The findings come from a new study, The Digital Dividend: First Mover Advantage, conducted for Verizon by the Harvard […]

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Is Healthcare IT Meaningful Work?

Most would agree that doctors and nurses, i.e., those on the front lines of delivering patient care, have meaningful jobs. But what about those behind the scenes, such as the healthcare IT workforce that installs the electronic medical records systems (EMRs), maintains billing and coding software and manages the overall IT infrastructure of hospitals and health […]

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The Most Epic Tweets from Epic UGM 2014

Wearing coveralls, a red flannel shirt, work boots and a John Deere hat, Epic Systems' CEO and founder Judy Faulkner made it clear during a keynote speech Tuesday during the annual Epic Users' Group Meeting (UGM) that the company was sticking to what it knows - developing its Epic Systems software and improving interoperability with other EHR vendors. […]

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From Abacus Rings to Phone-Charging Pants: The History of Wearables

Long before FitBit, Google Glass and Bluetooth headsets, wearables entered the world in a non-social media world. No one wrote an online review about the abacus ring, the first known wearable, but chances are that everyone did laugh when the first person tried to put an Apple II computer into a cut-out backpack. So at least […]

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Interoperability, the 21st Century’s Golden Fleece

Jason, mythic hero prior to the Greek Dark Ages, was tasked to find the Golden Fleece before he could claim his throne. For this quest, Jason recruited other Greek heroes, Hercules, Orpheus, Castor and Pollux, to name a few of the Argonauts. Today, a new Jason summons new heroes to join in the quest for […]

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5 Reasons Why Healthcare IT Workers Switch Jobs

Nearly half of IT employees at a hospital would like to work for their current employer until retirement, according to a 2013 Towers-Watson survey. But the reality of today's HIT job market is one of greater volatility, with most HIT workers open to new opportunities under certain circumstances. In our own survey of HIT full-time […]

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How to Find Skilled HIT Candidates That Many Employers Overlook

When it comes to IT recruitment, hospital hiring managers may feel like they are looking for a needle in a haystack. But our survey of the healthcare IT workforce points to two rich veins of HIT candidates that should be tapped more often by recruiters. Our report — and our own day-to-day outreach — points […]

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