The American journal of managed care
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There are over 12 million ambulatory care visits for acute pharyngitis annually in the United States. Current guidelines recommend diagnosis through culture or rapid antigen detection test (RADT) and relatively straightforward treatment. Community pharmacists may provide cost-effective care for disease states such as group A streptococcus (GAS) pharyngitis. ⋯ This model suggests that pharmacists may be able to provide a cost-effective alternative for the treatment of pharyngitis caused by GAS in adult patients.
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The identification of patients most likely to benefit from care management programs-case finding-is a crucial determinant of their effectiveness regarding improved health outcomes and reduced costs. Until now, research has mainly focused on claims data-based case finding. This study aimed to explore how primary care physicians (PCPs) select patients for practice based care management and how risk prediction may complement their case finding. ⋯ Case finding for care management programs in primary care may benefit from a structured approach combining clinical judgment by PCPs and claims data-based risk modeling. However, further research is needed to identify the optimal case-finding strategy for practice based care management.
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To examine patient and physician factors affecting utilization of diagnostic imaging in primary care. ⋯ Both patient and physician factors have a substantial effect on primary care outpatient diagnostic imaging utilization. Several of these significantly influence both the probability that any images will be ordered and the intensity (number) of imaging.
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The emergence of information technology in healthcare holds the promise to transform the industry through the creation of highly reliable information exchange. These same technologies have a central role in the patient safety movement. Organizations that wish to deliver safe and high-quality healthcare will only be successful if they plan, develop, and use health information systems with the principles of high-performing organizations in mind. We discuss the current state of health information technology in the patient safety movement, how this technology can contribute to high organizational performance, and some caveats.