Archive for April, 2007
Wikinomics
April 14, 2007
I am about half way through this book and came across the website as well which includes an active blog. With the provocative subtitle, “how mass collaboration changes everything”, you know you are in for some wild claims. But in many cases, the claims are backup up by observations of how companies are inviting consumers and others to contribute to innovation within their businesses. No examples from health care yet, but one can see how consumer suggestions on how to improve care or especially patient safety might provide important contributions.
More thoughts to come.
Cigna: Free eVisits for Seniors
April 13, 2007
In an article from the Phoenix Business Journal, Cigna Medical Group is offering “online health care services, including e-visits at a nominal charge, to its non-Medicare patients. Now all CMG patients can use RelayHealth to schedule or cancel appointments, refill prescriptions, request lab results, send a note to their doctor’s office, request a referral, and manage their personal health records online.”
This is a significant expansion of a service that is rarely offered but needs to be expanded by insurors as an incentive to physicians and patients. In the long run, it will reduce physician work time and costs.
Share this:Investor’s Daily on eHealth
April 13, 2007
It’s not often an investor’s publication covers EMRs and PHRs. In today’s issue, the authors say that futurists “see the day when emergency room staff can get online to quickly learn that an accident victim is a diabetic or has a pacemaker, or to find what drug allergies his family doctor has listed.” The Stark Law as a barrier is cited as it was discussed at the National Governors’ Association in March.
Share this:Best Presentation on Privacy and Security for PHRs
April 12, 2007
Just posted by HIMSS Weekly Insider is a powerpoint by Lisa A. Gallagher, BSEE, CISM, HIMSS director of Privacy and Security, titled Privacy and Security Issues for PHRs. She presented this to a HIMSS task force I serve on and I consider it one of the most thorough treatments of this important issue I have seen. An important point is that HIPAA only applies to PHRs for “covered entities” like providers and health plans. It does not cover PHRs which are developed by employers or private health care websites. She outlines patient concerns including transmission of data through data exchanges, data mining, correcting errors, etc. What is the issue? “It is about who accesses, who owns, and who controls the information stored in a PHR, and how that information might be used.”
Definitely read this powerpoint. I hope it will become a white paper or journal article soon so it can be cited appropriately.
Share this:The Bank as Health ‘Infomediary’
April 11, 2007
An interesting article on iHealthbeat discusses how banks are getting into health IT. This is potentially good news because banks know security and how to process payments efficiently. But can banks handle personal health information? Do you want your bank handling your health information? “From the eHealth Lockbox, a bank can progress to offer a specialized portal for provider health plan businesses that are clients of a bank. On the other side of the connection, there’s an opportunity to create an increasingly specialized online banking portal for the consumer.” It could also support provider-patient secure messaging.
Read more at the Medical Banking Project.
Share this:eHealth Wiki Launched
April 10, 2007
I came across this new wiki sponsored by the Journal of Medical Interenet Research and the Centre for Global eHealth Research. The wiki proposes to be a location for collaborative writing of journal articles and research proposals and grant applications. A very collaborative venture if the research community gets on board. There are also events which will list conferences (only one listed so far). Unfortunately, it looks like they have had some pornographic spamming already in the ehealth dictionary section. Wikis take a fair amount of monitoring or control in terms of who can be a contributor.
Share this:Upcoming Presentation at Research Day at Case Western Reserve University
April 6, 2007
I will be copresenting a poster titled, “Web-based Collaboration for Clinical Care, Research and Education at an Academic Hospitalist Group” at the Research ShowCase. Coauthors are all physicians – Ves Dimov (Clinical Cases and Images blog), Ashish Atreja, a medical informaticist, Neil Mehta of the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine and others. Collaboration on the web has new meaning in the Web 2.0 age. One could debate whether Windows Sharepoint Services is really Web 2.0 since it runs on a proprietary system but once up and running it is low cost, easy to establish a personal or team site and ready for user-contributed content.
Check out some of the other presentations which are innovative and a colorful variety of work. The authors of AskDrWiki will be there and Ves Dimov is also presenting on his blog.
Share this:Doctor–patient relationship as motivation and outcome
April 5, 2007
This article from the University of Wisconsin Madison was recently published in the International Journal of Medical Informatics and featured in the Washington Post. This paper by Brent Shaw and others from the Center of Excellence in Cancer Communications Research, concludes that, “use of the Information services was associated with having a more positive appraisal of the doctor–patient relationship at post-test”. He further states that, “high-quality information on the Internet can serve to improve patients’ satisfaction with their doctor.”
Some additional findings:
- patients with a more negative appraisal about the doctor–patient relationship used the Ask an Expert service more frequently
- a more positive appraisal of the doctor–patient relationship predicting higher use of the Discussion Group service
Two PHR Stories today
April 4, 2007
At the Fourth Information Technology Summit, the Interim National Coordinator of Health Information Technology Robert Kolodner stated that we are close to a tipping point in Health IT which will be helped along by consumer demand for PHRs. His main caution was that the public must be able to trust online medical records.
The second story has to do with the National Governor’s Association State Alliance for eHealth met on March 30 to discuss progress on ehealth including PHRs and RHIOs. An archive of the webcast is available including testimony by Holly Miller, MD. Liability issues in ehealth are addressed and recommendations for limiting liability were presented.
Share this:AskDrWiki.com in the News and Blogs
April 2, 2007
This wiki which I referred to previously, is now receiving much attention both in the press since a story in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and in health care blogs. The best summary of all of this press in on Clincal Case and Images blog which points to the best blog responses to this innovative wiki and views this as a future disruptive competitor for major, subscription-based online reference tools.
Share this: