In the News
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October 19, 2015 - WRKO Radio
Dr. Heather Forkey, chief of the UMass Memorial’s Children's Medical Center's child protection program, discusses the concern surrounding the children affected by the opioid crisis.
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October 4, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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Super lice? The story came out of a presentation at the American Chemical Society meeting in Boston in August, spreading the specter of mutant insects relentlessly crawling forward in their quest to infest the scalps of schoolchildren across North America.
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September 30, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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Things were difficult for Christine Croteau. Then they got worse, much worse.
Throughout her teens, the Millbury native suffered from anxiety and severe depression. She persevered, graduating from St. Mary’s High School in Worcester, then earning degrees at the College of the Holy Cross and Assumption College.
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September 23, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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The chairman of a key legislative committee toured UMass Memorial Medical Center's emergency department Tuesday, saying the hospital's efforts to control costs by focusing on certain patients could be a model for other Massachusetts medical centers.
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September 23, 2015 - Worcester Business Journal
An article bylined by William Corbett, MD, focusing on UMass Memorial’s introduction of Virtual Visits is in the Health Innovation and Technology column which is bylined each month by medical professionals in the WBJ service area. Dr. Corbett discusses the e-Visit tool and how it will benefit patients.
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September 21, 2015 - Worcester Business Journal
UMass Memorial Health Care President and CEO Eric Dickson, MD, was recently interviewed by Emily Micucci of the Worcester Business Journal. The topic was on the Epic EMR system.
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September 20, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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Bart Metzger exudes precision. The office he occupies as chief human resources officer for UMass Memorial Health Care Inc. is tidy, his desk surface nearly clear of papers. When he answers questions, he speaks deliberately. When he’s done, he stops speaking.
It’s a practice that could serve him well as the face of UMass Memorial in its sometimes-contentious relations with unionized employees.
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September 16, 2015 - Worcester Business Journal
Standard and Poor's Rating Services has upgraded UMass Memorial Medical Center's outlook from negative to stable, citing improved financial performance and affirmed the Worcester hospital's BBB+ bond rating on Tuesday.
"The outlook revision to stable reflects material improvement in financial performance with profitable audited 2014 results and continued positive, although thin, earnings in fiscal 2015 to date," said Standard & Poor's credit analyst Cynthia Keller.
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September 15, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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Instead of using it to rid their hands of germs, some children are drinking ethanol hand sanitizer to get a buzz. Through Aug. 31 of this year there have been 227 calls in Massachusetts – 34 in Central Massachusetts - to the Regional Center for Poison Control and Prevention regarding ingestion of ethanol-based hand sanitizer by people under the age of 20. Some hand sanitizers contain an ammonium compound instead of ethanol.
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September 2, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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Americans are getting older and heavier - and both trends are trouble for the country's knees.
The rate of total knee replacements almost doubled from 2000 to 2010 for Americans over 45, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control, while the average age of patients decreased by more than two years, to 66.2.
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August 21, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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Even before Wanda Boone was handed the brochure that described the minimally invasive procedure that would circumvent the bulge — an aneurysm — in her thoracic and abdominal aorta as well as the risks involved, she knew she would go ahead with it. The 55-year-old Springfield resident already knew that the odds strongly favored her dying if that aneurysm should burst.
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July 27, 2015 - The Boston Globe
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UMass Memorial Health Care will spend $700 million over the next decade to upgrade its patient records and information technology systems, its chief executive, Dr. Eric W. Dickson, said Monday.
Central Massachusetts’ largest health network has agreed to buy clinical and billing software programs from Epic Systems Corp. of Verona, Wis., the country’s biggest vendor of electronic health record systems, Dickson told the Globe.
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July 25, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
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WORCESTER - Dr. Roula N. Choueiri, chief of the Division of Behavioral and Developmental Pediatrics at UMass Memorial Children's Medical Center, doesn't want toddlers to wait. Getting a diagnosis of autism confirmed and starting intervention as soon as possible can significantly reduce the severity of the disorder and improve a child's chances for healthy development.
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July 22, 2015 - Health Affairs Blog
Mary (not her real name) is an elementary school student with moderate to severe asthma. She struggles to manage her condition and uses her rescue inhaler frequently. Mary’s mother is concerned about several problems in their apartment, including an unresolved pest infestation and bedbugs. As Mary’s pediatrician learned during a recent appointment, the family faces eviction for non-payment of rent.
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July 20, 2015 - Worcester Business Journal
UMass Memorial Health Care is entering the growing field of virtual doctors' visits, agreeing to a deal with a Minneapolis-based company to provide online diagnosis and treatment, the company, Zipnosis, said Monday.
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July 20, 2015 - Everyday Innovators Blog
Today I signed one of the most important contracts I have signed since becoming CEO two-and-a-half years ago — I signed the contract to install Epic as our enterprise-wide electronic health record and billing system! Why Epic? It basically came down to one thing: hundreds of our caregivers tested the options available to us and they resoundingly selected Epic as the best system.
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July 7, 2015 - Everyday Health
Call it the sound of your life force — that “lup dub lup dub” beat your healthy heart makes, resounding like rhythmic, repetitive pounding on a drum. When those notes stray off beat or tone, a trained ear can tell that something’s amiss with your health.
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June 24, 2015 - Telegram & Gazette
A healthy baby is born in Memphis, Tennessee, and the placenta that allowed it to prosper in its mother’s womb is not disposed of as medical waste, but instead recovered in the delivery room and later used to prevent a 54-year-old Ashburnham man from losing his left foot or worse yet, his whole left leg.
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June 10, 2015 - Boston Business Journal
UMass Memorial Health Care is doubling its annual investment in virtual medicine with a program to increase access to virtual visits to outpatient visits, various inpatient consultations and genetic counseling.
The plan, which would increase the annual investment in virtual medicine to $15 million from approximately $8 million, is part of a broader initiative by the health system to better manage the care of its patients in a budgeted way, rather than receiving reimbursements for each service rendered.
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June 4, 2015 - Worcester Business Journal
The first two UMass Memorial-affiliated CareWell Urgent Care centers, located at 500 Lincoln St. and 348 Greenwood St. in Worcester, will open on July 15. A third site, planned for Northborough, is slated to open in October.