Here are a few I have come across the last week or so.
Note: Each link is followed by a title and a few paragraphs. For the full article click on the link above title of the article. Note also that full access to some links may require site registration or subscription payment.
General Comment
An interesting week with Telstra seemingly wanting to buy up the eHealth farm! Interesting they are into Asia with Hospital Systems. That is a hard market segment to say the least!
Interesting the Qld Health Payroll debacle continues to cause news ages after it has been resolved - or has it?
Reporting season has also seen some e-Health companies announce results - most seem reasonable.
Enjoy the browse.
-----
Telstra Health contract wins expand Asian profile
- 24 August 2015
- By Peter Dinham
Telstra Health has secured four new contracts in the Asian region as the company looks to expand its presence in the region.
The company, which already has established offices in Hong Kong, Malaysia and India, has been awarded contracts which will see its Health CloudMed Arcus Hospital Information System deployed by hospitals in Malaysia and Thailand. The integrated patient care system that provides an end-to-end single medical record system for hospital networks spread over multiple locations is currently in use in more than 250 hospitals across Asia.
Under the new contracts, implementation of Arcus has commenced at Sunway Medical Centre group, Penang Adventist Hospital group and Tung Shin Hospital’s in Malaysia and Khon Kaen University Hospital in Thailand.
-----
Telstra bets on e-health to become billion dollar business
Date August 24, 2015 - 12:15AM
David Ramli
Reporter
Exclusive
Telstra has launched its rapidly growing eHealth division into Asia, winning two key contracts worth tens of millions of dollars in Thailand and Malaysia.
Telstra Health is one of the company's key hopes for growing profits as the national broadband network erodes its earnings and rising mobile service competition from Optus and Vodafone Australia threaten to hurt revenue.
The latest deals signal a bold new push for the telco and forms a new plank of its strategy to extract billions of dollars from Asia's increasingly affluent middle class.
"Health is just such an extraordinary opportunity especially when you consider the rate of digitisation," Telstra group executive retail Gordon Ballantyne told Fairfax Media. "We first have to build it in Australia but we have been overwhelmed by the interest in other Asian countries to come and adopt some of the things we're doing here."
-----
Telstra Health Expands Presence in Asia with Hospital Contract Wins
Business | August 24, 2015
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Aug. 24, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Telstra Health, a division of Australia’s largest telecommunication and technology company, today announced several key contract wins and implementations of hospital electronic medical record systems in Malaysia and Thailand, adding to its existing customer base in Asia and its established offices in Hong Kong, Malaysia and India.
Telstra Health creates solutions for key challenges in the healthcare sector by integrating leading eHealth solutions, such as the CloudMed Arcus Hospital Information System (Arcus), which is an integrated patient care system that provides hospital networks spreading over multiple locations with a single medical record.
Implementation of Arcus has commenced at Sunway Medical Centre group, Penang Adventist Hospital group and Tung Shin Hospital’s Western Medicine and Traditional Chinese Medicine wings in Malaysia. In addition, through a distributor, Convergence Systems, Arcus is being delivered to Khon Kaen University Hospital in Thailand.
-----
Telstra Health scores hospital contracts in Malaysia, Thailand
Telstra's health division will roll out its Arcus media records system at four hospitals
Telstra Health has won four new contracts with hospitals in Malaysia and Thailand.
Telstra's eHealth business already had a presence in Malaysia, as well as Hong Kong and India.
The new contracts involve Telstra Health’s CloudMed Arcus Hospital Information System (Arcus). Arcus provides a single medical record system for hospitals across multiple locations.
"Our Arcus product is designed to make it easier for doctors, nurses and pharmacists to treat patients, reducing the amount of time spent on paperwork and freeing up time to spend on what they do best — caring for patients," said group executive of Telstra Retail Gordon Ballantyne,
"The system is highly flexible and can support multiple languages including English, Thai and Mandarin across multiple sites while it will also be able to record both western medicine and traditional Chinese medicine data in the future."
-----
Who’s who of Aussie (global) ICT
August 24, 2015
PRO MEDICUS (ASX:PME) is a leading provider of radiology information systems (RIS) Picture Archiving and Communication Systems (PACS) and advanced visualisation solutions across the globe with over 30 years experience helping clients deliver first-rate patient care by enhancing and streamlining medical practice management. The company’s expertise is in the client visualisation technology and the management of the supporting information. Pro Medicus does this by providing products and services that combine speed, scalability and smarts to help eliminate administrative tasks and workarounds, optimise the efficiency of clinical and administrative staff and maximise profits. The company provides a full range of radiology IT software and services to hospitals, imaging centres and health care groups worldwide. The company has global offices in Melbourne, Berlin and San Diego. www.promed.com.au
-----
- Updated Aug 24 2015 at 5:04 AM
IBM 'negligent and misleading', Queensland alleges
The Queensland government has accused IBM of misrepresenting its credentials for the health payroll contract. Bloomberg
by Mark Ludlow
The Queensland government has accused technology giant IBM of misrepresenting its credentials in delivering a $6 million payroll system that cost $1.2 billion to fix.
It said if IBM hadn't talked up its credentials to design, build and deliver the payroll system for Queensland Health before it signed a contract in 2007, it would have awarded the deal to its archrival Accenture, court documents reveal.
The state government is attempting to sue IBM for damages over the botched health payroll debacle, which partly contributed to the demise of the Bligh Labor government in 2012.
IBM has vowed to fight the claim and is blocking an attempt for the Queensland government to sue for damages in a four-day trial starting in the Supreme Court in Brisbane on Monday.
-----
- Aug 26 2015 at 12:53 PM
Qld claims payroll project too complex for IBM
IBM struggled to cope with the complexity of the Queensland Health payroll system. Craig Warga
by Mark Ludlow
A former senior Queensland bureaucrat said IBM had underestimated the complexity and the resources required to deliver the health payroll system before it went live in 2010.
Mal Grierson, who was director general of the Department of Public Works, told the Supreme Court in Brisbane on Wednesday there was a belief in the government the global technology company had struggled to get on top of the problems with the IT system after it signed up to the contract in 2007.
He said IBM's strategy to transfer the existing payroll system it had developed for the Department of Housing to Queensland Health and its 80,000 workers was flawed.
-----
Ian Maddocks: Record of care
Ian Maddocks
Monday, 24 August, 2015
INTEGRATION of care is a common theme in health, with expectations that information technology will play a major part to bridge gaps in offering patients continuous, seamless care.
In 2012, the federal government launched the e-health record system, where patients could register for a personally controlled electronic health record (PCEHR). More recently, the government has announced moves to introduce an “opt out” rather than “opt in” system and will rename the PCEHR myHealth Record.
The PCEHR aims to provide continuity of care by providing full details of the patient’s health care, medical contacts and interventions. But is that enough?
Access to my own record finds it is designed to advantage health care providers rather than those receiving care.
-----
App Review: Boost health, one spoonful at a time
26 August 2015
ONE of the challenges in effecting dietary change in the modern world is avoiding the hidden sugars and fats found in processed foods.
Following That Sugar Film, the That Sugar App aims to educate on the amount of hidden sugar in all of the foods we consume daily.
The app opens to a short video explaining the health benefits of limiting refined sugar.
Accessing the home page then allows the user to look up a wide range of different foods commonly available in Australia and determine their sugar content in teaspoons per serve or per 100g.
-----
http://www.australiandoctor.com.au/News/Latest-News/Leading-doctor-takes-aim-at-best-specialist-site
Leading doctor takes aim at 'best' specialist site
Tessa Hoffman | 21 August, 2015 |
A senior doctor has rubbished a new website that claims it can put GPs and patients in touch with the country's top specialists.
Launched this month, the Specialist Doctors website says it has a database of some 750 clinicians across 21 specialties.
The site is co-founded by former AMA president Associate Professor Kerryn Phelps (picture above, on the website's home page) and two specialists who oversee hospital departments.
The doctors claim to have used a peer-review process to find and share "their preferred list of specialists at the top of their fields”.
-----
Medical messaging: What would you change?
27 August 2015
The RACGP says hospitals and specialists lag behind general practices in their healthcare communications. Following an SA coroner's finding in July that "archaic snail mail" contributed to the warfarin-related death of Adelaide woman Marjorie Aston, MO is inviting suggestions on ways to improve communications between doctors, and between hospitals and doctors. Contributions will be passed on to the federal and state health departments. Enter your suggestions in the comment field below.
DR PETER BRADLEY
Springwood, QLD
THERE is no excuse for all medical parties and providers – hospitals included, certainly specialists and allied health providers (most GPs already are) – not being set up on one of the commonly available and affordable encrypted email systems for exchanging patient information… period.
Just make it happen. Faxes are not really secure, often poor quality and almost illegible. They also take up time and unnecessary memory space because of the need to scan them into electronic records, and, once scanned in, they are not able to be conveniently copied from or attached to subsequent communications.
-----
What is the state of CDA R3?
Posted on August 23, 2015 by Grahame Grieve
Question
We have seen references to new extension methodologies being proposed in CDA R3; however I can’t seem to find what the current state of CDA R3 is. Most searches return old results. The most recent document related to CDA R3 using FHIR instead of RIM. What is the current state of CDA R3 and where can I find more information. HL7 pages seem to be pretty old.
Answer
The Structured Documents work group at HL7 (the community that maintains the CDA standard), is currently focused on publishing a backwards compatible update to CDA R2 called CDA R2.1. CDA R3 work has been deferred to the future, both in order to allow the community to focus on R 2.1, and to allow FHIR time to mature.
-----
SNOMED CT Foundation E-Learning Course: Call for Applications
Created on Wednesday, 26 August 2015
The International Health Terminology Standards Development Organisation (IHTSDO) is calling for applications for their SNOMED CT Foundation course.
- All details including how to apply are located here
- Further information is available on the IHTSDO website
-----
- Aug 27 2015 at 4:31 PM
Sleeper stock Compumedics delivers healthy profit
by Trevor Hoey
Shares in Compumedics performed strongly on the back of an impressive 2014-15 result which featured profit growth of more than 100 per cent.
Over the last two years, the company has distinguished itself as one of the few small cap healthcare stocks generating a profit while maintaining a healthy balance sheet.
Providing investors with further confidence was the management's guidance, which pointed to net profit in a range between $2.8 million and $3.2 million in 2015-16. The company had minimal debt as at June 30, 2015, and was in a net cash position.
Compumedics develops and manufactures medical devices largely used in diagnosing sleep and brain activity as well as measuring blood flow. The group is highly diversified, owning US-based Neuroscan and DWL Elektronische Gmbh in Germany.
This provides access to markets in the Americas, Europe and the Middle East, complementing an established position in Australia and the Asia-Pacific region.
-----
NICTA merges with CSIRO to create new entity Data61
- The Australian
- August 28, 2015
David Swan
Australia’s chief IT research facility NICTA is no more, with the government announcing a new organisation, Data61, that will see NICTA merge with CSIRO’s Digital Productivity flagship.
The decision comes after a long period of uncertainty for NICTA, which had been pushing ahead with research and innovation despite the federal government cutting its funding altogether from June next year.
Minister for industry and science Ian Macfarlane said the new entity, to be part of CSIRO’s digital productivity group, would be one of the largest digital innovation teams in the world.
“Both CSIRO and NICTA have an impressive track record in digital innovation and have demonstrated their ability to take homegrown technologies to market,” he said.
-----
Nanomedicine potential
Charlotte Mitchell
Monday, 24 August, 2015
THE world has just started to see the exciting potential of nanomedicine in the treatment of cancer, according to Australian experts, but several issues need to be addressed before the technology becomes more widely available.
Professor David Goldstein, senior staff specialist in the department of medical oncology at Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney, told MJA InSight that Australia was actively involved in the global research effort into cancer nanomedicine, which “will ensure that we can get the right drugs into the patient, in the right place, at the right time, and with less side effects”.
As with any new medical treatment, determining which patients should get nanomedicine will be about weighing up the potential risks and benefits.
“This ratio has to be large. However, when patients have a malignancy, there usually is a relatively favourable benefit–risk ratio”, he said.
-----
The Search For 'Dark Matter' And 'Dark Energy' Just Got Interesting
by The Conversation, The Conversation
-- this post authored by Ryan Wilkinson, Durham University
Only about 5% of the universe consists of ordinary matter such as protons and electrons, with the rest being filled with mysterious substances known as dark matter and dark energy. So far, scientists have failed to detect these elusive materials, despite spending decades searching for them. But now, two new studies may be able to turn things around as they have narrowed down the search significantly.
Dark matter was first proposed more than 70 years ago to explain why the force of gravity in galaxy clusters is so much stronger than expected. If the clusters contained only the stars and gas we observe, their gravity should be much weaker, leading scientists to assume there is some sort of matter hidden there that we can't see. Such dark matter would provide additional mass to these large structures, increasing their gravitational pull. The main contender for the substance is a type of hypothetical particle known as a "weakly interacting massive particle" (WIMP).
To probe the nature of dark matter, physicists look for evidence of its interactions beyond gravity. If the WIMP hypothesis is correct, dark matter particles could be detected through their scattering off atomic nuclei or electrons on Earth. In such "direct" detection experiments, a WIMP collision would cause these charged particles to recoil, producing light that we can observe.
-----
NBN Co says 9 million homes by 2018: believable?
- 24 August 2015
- By Alex Zaharov-Reutt
After previously promising 8 million homes by 2020, NBN Co now says at least a million more homes will be connected two years sooner - do we believe it?
nbn, the company building the NBN network, which has already built itself a new logo, says in a media release today that 9.1 million homes and businesses will be ‘ready for service by 2018.’
The news comes as part of its ‘comprehensive corporate plan’, which iTWire colleague Graeme Philipson also wrote about this morning in terms of nbn, the company, unsurprisingly hitting its ‘revised’ targets.
The company explains that ‘the introduction of additional technologies, a projected boost to the size of the construction workforce and newly-signed agreements with the construction industry are anticipated to see the total number of premises that are able to connect double over each of the next three years to 9.1 million.’
-----
Windows 95 – 20 years old today
- 24 August 2015
- By Ray Shaw
Windows 95 released on 24 August 1995, was a big change from Windows 1.x, 2.x and 3.x – it was the end of Windows running over MS-DOS and the beginning of a complete operating system.
I still remember the excitement of this new 32-bit operating system based on NT 4.0 and installing it from 13, 3.5” floppy disks. That was relatively painless – Microsoft Office at that time had something like 20 separate floppies and often fell over during install.
It was the defining moment for Windows and its look and feel – design cues – carried right through to Windows 7 released in July 2009. These included the task bar, Start menu, and general use of multiple Windows for different tasks.
W95 was in another way a defining moment for marketing. Microsoft spent over US$300 million to launch it.
-----
Enjoy!
David.
