News in brief - Feb. 28, 2011

Medical inflation starts to soften

Inflation in health care was lower in December 2010 and January than for the economy as a whole, reversing a 2010 trend, according to a monthly report on the consumer price index issued Feb. 17 by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The consumer price index grew 0.4% in December 2010 and January. Inflation for the past year was 1.6%. Growth in the cost of medical care was higher for the past year but low for the previous two months. Medical care inflation was 0.1% in January and 0.2% in December 2010. The annual inflation rate for medical care was 2.9%.

The inflation rate for professional services, a category that includes physicians, did not grow in January but increased 0.1% in December 2010. Inflation in the category was 2.3% in 2010.

Annual inflation for the cost of hospital and related services was higher than the general rate in 2010, but it declined in January. The inflation rate for this category increased 6.3% during the past year but decreased 0.1% in January.

The latest consumer price index report is online: (www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm).

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Informatics research center opens

Intermountain Healthcare in Salt Lake City announced that it has opened a research center to support its work in clinical informatics.

The Homer Warner Center for Informatics Research was named after medical informatics pioneer Homer Warner, MD, PhD, chair emeritus of the University of Utah's medical informatics department. Dr. Warner started using computers in the 1950s for decision support in cardiology. In the 1970s, he and his colleagues developed one of the nation's first versions of an electronic medical record. His work set the stage for what would become the medical informatics field.

The new center, which opened Feb. 16 in Salt Lake City, will employ 60 full-time informatics specialists. It expects to employ more than 100 employees in the next 10 years.

This content was published online only.

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