The State Department says it will lift a suspension on visa processing. The reversal will result in thousands of physicians and medical residents being able to provide care at a time when it is most needed.

State licensing boards are moving quickly to help retired physicians re-enter practice. According to the Federation of State Medical Boards, half of the states in the U.S. have taken action to expedite licensure renewals for inactive and retired physicians.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many employees were quickly forced to start working from home. Although the thought of staying in your pajamas and enjoying your own fresh coffee all day long sounds nice, it can be challenging for employees to set a structured workday while they are home. This article, although written under different circumstances, offers those of you who are now working from home as either a manager or an employee, some great advice on how to successfully transfer to a remote work model.

In the time it takes to make a phone call, you can gain temporary billing privileges during the COVID-19 emergency that will allow your providers to begin treating Medicare patients almost immediately.

As COVID-19 spreads throughout the U.S. MSPs face unique challenges to support their practitioners and keep patients safe. In response, we've launched an Acute Care Coronavirus response page that provides resources and solutions for hospitals and health systems as they navigate COVID-19. You can also visit our forum dedicated to COVID-19 discussions to ask your questions and share best practices with your colleagues.

With the news that many states are expediting licensures for retired practitioners, MSPs might start to see an influx of practitioners returning to their hospital to help battle the COVID-19 pandemic. Although it is critical to not put up too many barriers to let practitioners treat these patients, MSPs know there is still a level of vetting that needs to be done to protect patients. Take Hurricane Katrina, for example, where people pretended to be physicians and showed up at hospitals in white coats trying to provide care to patients.

At some point in your practice’s lifecycle, you may find the need to replace your current electronic health record (EHR) system. Your system could be outdated or ill suited for your practice, or you may be working with an unresponsive or unhelpful vendor. In any case, transitioning from one EHR to another is likely to be stressful, costly, and highly disruptive, and lead to physician and staff burnout during and after the process.

Plus, nurses and physicians voted most ethical professionals, physician defrauds insurers to finance political pursuits, and physician lets unlicensed colleague treat patients in his clinics. Find out what’s happening in the world of federal healthcare regulations by reviewing some recent headlines from across the country.

CRC members can peruse all the online articles from the March 2020 issues of CRCJ and MSB—as well as full-color, newly redesigned PDFs here:

• CRCJ
• MSB

To access the relevant full-issue PDF, select "DOWNLOAD FULL ISSUE" at the top of the page.