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General Comment
The most amusing news this week came from the Senate Estimates hearing last week where your humble blogger was described by the Secretary of the Department of Health as ‘infamous David More’ and by a Senator as a ‘serial blogger’ - whatever that means!What I see as good about all this - and we can do without the name calling - it that clearly the blog and the comments made are being read by the ‘powers that be’ - so if you have a serious point to make it is possible to make it pretty directly. For serious points probably using your real name might be a good idea!
Reports of the details from Senate Estimates will hopefully be provided later this week.
The other big news is that this is the week when Window 8 is to drop on us all. See last item. It seems the new has more than a few a little nervous. I for one think I might wait for version 8.1 before updating!
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Patient sign-up to PCEHR steady
19 October, 2012 Kate newton
Uptake
of Australia’s new e-health system is gradually increasing, with more
than 12,500 people signed up for a personally controlled electronic
health record by mid-October.
However, the number is still a long way short of the 500,000 target the Federal Government has set for 1 July 2013.
There
are also 68 individual health practitioners and 86 health organisations
— including hospitals and practices — signed up to access the e-health
system, which was launched this year on 1 July.
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E-health ramp-up awaits GP software
Summary:
The Australian government is banking on the roll-out of software for
GPs to boost uptake of e-health records from 13,000 today to 500,000 at
the end of June 2013.
The
Department of Health and Ageing has said it is pleased that 13,000
Australian residents have signed up for e-health records since July 1,
and has downplayed the original forecast that 500,000 will be signed up
by the end of June 2013.
Since the federal government's AU$466.7 million personally controlled e-health record (PCEHR) system launched on July 1, take-up has been slow. But the government has stated that a slow take-up was the aim.
In
the 109 days since the launch (to October 17), there has been a total
of 13,340 sign-ups for the records either online, on the phone, or in
writing — an average of 122 people per day. On this average, just over
44,500 people will have signed up for the service by the end of June
next year. A total of 791,764 documents have been uploaded to those
records.
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PCEHR targets depend on new medical software
Half a million users registered by June still feasible, Health officials claim.
The most important factor in getting more consumers to use the Government’s Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record (PCEHR)
will be medical provider-friendly software that will be released by the
end of October, a Senate Estimates Committee has been told.
Heath
& Ageing secretary Jane Halton told the Committee yesterday that
she was "delighted" with the early numbers of consumers registering for
the $628.3 million initiative since it launched on July 1.
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US cyber crime sparks concern for PCEHR
17th Oct 2012
WARNINGS
from a leading internet fraud investigator that e-health crime is the
fastest growing crime in the US and is spreading have sparked renewed
criticism of the security of the government’s personally controlled
e-health record system (PCEHR).
Detective Superintendent Brian Hay from Queensland’s Fraud and Corporate Crime Group has told MO that doctors in Australia are unprepared for cyber attacks on their business computer files.
His
comments follow a series of attacks on Australian medical centre
business file servers in recent weeks in which hackers blocked access to
patients’ data and demanded $1000 ransoms.
“Over
21 million medical files have allegedly been stolen since 2009 in
America. It’s been reported that a medical file can sell for $50. It’s
already a US$10.5 billion dollar industry.
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Mandatory privacy breach paper should become law: Pilgrim
Privacy
Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim supports federal government's discussion
paper, says data breach incidents that may go unreported are concerning.
- Hamish Barwick (Computerworld)
- 18 October, 2012 11:37
The federal Attorney General’s discussion paper, Australian Privacy Breach Notification should be considered by all Australian organisations and passed into law, according to Privacy Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim.
The paper
covers a number of discussion questions including the possible
introduction of mandatory data breach notification laws, the kind of
breaches that should trigger notification requirements and how a data
breach notification requirement should be enforced.
“Privacy
breach notification is an important issue that needs community debate,
and I’m sure there will be a wide range of views expressed on whether
this notification should be mandatory.” Pilgrim said in a statement.
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Consumers irked by pharmacist access to medical records
15 October, 2012 Nick O'Donoghue
Most
health consumers do not feel comfortable with the idea of pharmacists
or practice nurses having access to their medical records, a study
reveals.
Australian
research into pharmacists’, GPs’ and consumers’ views on integrating
pharmacists into general practice found there was overall support for
the move.
However,
the majority of patients (63 per cent) did not want pharmacists to have
access to their medical files, despite 73 per cent of consumers saying
that pharmacists should have a role within general practice.
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National E-health Transition Authority (NEHTA) and the Personally Controlled Health Record (PCEHR)
Posted on October 18, 2012by
The
National E-Health Transition Authority (NEHTA), in association with Cor
Mentes Health Consulting, has recently delivered a series of 23
interactive information sessions in hospitals around Australia to help
Doctors in Training understand the Personally Controlled Health Record
(PCEHR), the National eHealth Records System (NEHRS) that supports this,
and how Doctors in Training – so often on the patient front line in
hospitals – will be able to interact with them.
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AARNet helps students and staff cut the cable in Qld hospitals
AARNet providing wireless access to online resources from multiple healthcare facilities across the state
- Byron Connolly (CIO)
- 16 October, 2012 15:52
Australia’s Academic Research Network
(AARNet) has expanded its “eduroam” high speed wireless network in
several hospitals across Queensland.
The
wireless service enables staff and students at the University of
Queensland to gain access to the institution’s online resources from
multiple healthcare facilities across the state.
It
is the result of a five-year initiative between AARNet, Queensland
Health and Queensland universities, under the Queensland Regional
Network Organisation.
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NeHTA Conformance
Wed, 10/10/2012 - 12:15pm
We
are pleased to announce that we have passed all four of the National
eHealth Transitional Authority (NeHTA)’s CDA (Clinical Document
Architecture) conformance tests.
The
CDA is a standard developed by HL7 that defines the format and
semantics of clinical documents (eg, progress notes and discharge
summaries) that are to be exchanged between health services. Now that we
are compliant, this means that Communicare can send, receive and unpack
any CDA message and display these within Communicare.
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Raising standards to save lives: Klaus Veil
Posted Thu, 18/10/2012 - 10:40 by Will Turner
It
can be difficult to imagine a clear connection between someone clinging
to life in an emergency room and the interoperability standards
governing the use of healthcare technology.
Yet
for Associate Professor Klaus Veil, one of the nation’s leading experts
on interoperability standards and long time ehealth educator, the link
is too important to overlook.
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Redefining medicine with apps and iPads
Date October 14, 2012
Katie Hafner
Dr
Alvin Rajkomar was doing rounds with his team at the University of
California, San Francisco Medical Center when he came upon a puzzling
case: a frail, elderly patient with a dangerously low sodium level.
As
a third-year resident in internal medicine, Rajkomar was the senior
member of the team, and the others looked to him for guidance. An
infusion of saline was the answer, but the tricky part lay in the
details. Concentration? Volume? Improper treatment could lead to brain
swelling, seizures or even death.
Rajkomar
had been on-call for 24 hours and was exhausted, but the clinical
uncertainty was "like a shot of adrenaline", he said. He reached into a
deep pocket of his white coat and produced not a well-thumbed handbook
but his iPhone.
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Using Your iPhone To Detect Ear Infections Also Keeps The Doctor Away
Andrew Liszewski 13 October, 2012 1:30 AM
Forget
that daily apple. Researchers at Georgia Tech and Emory University have
developed the Remotoscope, an accessory that turns the iPhone into an
ear-inspecting otoscope so doctors can diagnose and treat kids remotely
in the event of an ear infection.
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Bench test : putting medical apps through their paces
- From: The Australian
- October 15, 2012
NAME: iQuit ItPUBLISHER: FlexibleCodeCOST: Free (previously $1.99)PLATFORM: iPhone
PURPOSE:
It claims to assist in weaning people off various addictions by
recording the date when quit attempts will begin and allowing users to
register when they have been tempted or relapsed.
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Media Release
Senator the Hon Stephen Conroy
Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy
Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister on Digital Productivity
Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy
Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister on Digital Productivity
Construction begins on $12.5 million rural medical training facility in Armidale
The
Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator
Stephen Conroy, today officially started construction on a new medical
training facility at the University of New England.
The
Tablelands Clinical School, which is part of UNE’s School of Rural
Medicine, will provide medical training, deliver rural health care, and
promote medical research for regional and rural Australia.
“The
Gillard Government is proud to be contributing $10.5 million dollars to
build this wonderful new facility, which will be at the forefront of
training medical professionals here in regional Australia,” Senator
Conroy said.
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Tasmanian health agency gives external contractors the flick
Tasmania’s
Department of Health and Human Services uses technology to upgrade its
core services in-house and plans to create shared services for use by
all agencies across the state
- Byron Connolly (CIO)
- 15 October, 2012 11:41
Tasmania’s Department of Health and Human
Services (DHHS) has saved hundreds of thousands of dollars by using
technology to upgrade its enterprise software in-house rather than spend
vital funds engaging costly external IT consultants.
In
the 2011/2012 financial year DHHS – Tasmania’s largest government
agency which delivers services through 300 health-related facilities
–needed to achieve $100 million in savings within a $1.8 billion budget.
It
also needed to decentralise its operations by establishing three
regional statutory authorities called Tasmanian Health Organisations as
part of the National Health Reform agreement.
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Only 6400 NBN fibre connections so far
Just over 25,000 premises now connected to NBN
- Stephanie McDonald (Computerworld)
- 17 October, 2012 11:51
NBN Co has hooked up just shy of 6400
fibre broadband connections to the National Broadband Network. Of the
25,495 NBN-connected premises, “just under 6400 are fibre, just under
600 are fixed wireless and just over 17,000 are for satellite,” Jim
Hassell, head of product development and sales at NBN Co, told a Senate
Estimates committee yesterday.
Of those 17,000 satellite connections, around 8000 were new customers and 9000 were customers who were previously on the Australian Broadband Guarantee (ABG) for more than three years, the committee heard.
The
ABG ended in June last year and was designed to help residential and
small business premises access broadband services regardless of where
they were located.
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Early look at Windows 8 baffles consumers
- By Peter Svensson
- AAP
- October 20, 2012
THE release of Microsoft's Windows 8 operating system is a week away, and consumers are in for a shock.
Windows,
used in one form or another for a generation, is getting a completely
different look that will force users to learn new ways to do things.
Microsoft
is making a radical break with the past to stay relevant in a world
where smartphones and tablets have eroded the three-decade dominance of
the personal computer.
Windows 8
is supposed to tie together Microsoft's PC, tablet and phone software
with one look. But judging by the reactions of some people who have
tried the PC version, it's a move that risks confusing and alienating
customers.
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Enjoy!
David.
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