Read the latest article from iHealthBeat, "ACOs Tackle Security Challenges," featuring DocbookMD and learn how DocbookMD is helping connect physicians in the MHMD Memorial Hermann Physician Network, an ACO in Houston.

Sharing is typically a good thing, but in the IT world it also introduces the risk of data loss. So it shouldn't be surprising that accountable care organizations - groups founded on the premise that exchanging data among providers will improve patient care - are viewed as potentially vulnerable.

A study conducted by Ponemon Institute, a privacy and data protection research center, found that two-thirds of the health care organizations that are part of an ACO said the risks to patient privacy and security have increased "due to the exchange of patient health information among participants."

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The most recent specialty guide to be released is the Accountable Care Guide for Emergency Medicine Physicians. It can be found on the TAC website under resources; or accessed more directly here.

The next guide to be released will be on bundled payments. 

Thomas R. Hill, MD, has joined AllCare Clinical Associates, PA. He attended undergraduate/graduate programs at Pennsylvania State University in University Park, Pennsylvania and Hahnemann Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Dr. Hill received his medical degree from Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and completed his anesthesiology residency training through Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts. Prior to joining AllCare Clinical Associates, Dr. Hill was employed as an anesthesiologist with Western Piedmont Anesthesia in Conover, North Carolina.

Dr. Hill is certified by the American Board of Anesthesiology and the National Board of Echocardiography. He is a member of the American Society of Anesthesiologists, North Carolina Society of Anesthesiologists, North Carolina Medical Society and the American Heart Association.

AllCare Clinical Associates, www.allcareclinical.com, is one of the largest private physician-owned anesthesia practices serving North Carolina and provides anesthesia and pain services for over 70,000 procedures annually. The practice employs over 200 Anesthesiologists, Anesthetists and business and management professionals. AllCare Clinical Associates provides anesthesia, perioperative care and pain clinic management services for hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers of all sizes. 

WCMS is a thriving 700-plus member professional association of the physicians of western North Carolina and a chartered component medical society of the NC Medical Society and the AMA. The WCMS is an organization run by physicians for physicians.