We had some alarming news during the week:
World Health Organization announces new Department of Digital Health
Thursday, 7 March 2019 (0 Comments)
WHO has announced the most wide-ranging reforms in the organisation’s history to modernise and strengthen the institution to play its role more effectively and efficiently as the world’s leading authority on public health.
One of the key changes is “harnessing the power of digital health and innovation by supporting countries to assess, integrate, regulate and maximise the opportunities of digital technologies and artificial intelligence, supported by a new Department of Digital Health”.
The changes are designed to support countries in achieving the ambitious “triple billion” targets that are at the heart of WHO’s strategic plan for the next five years: one billion more people benefitting from universal health coverage (UHC), one billion more people better protected from health emergencies, and one billion more people enjoying better health and well-being.
Source: World Health Organization media release, 6 March 2019
Here is the link:
There is also coverage here:
WHO unveils plans to create a Department of Digital Health
The new suite of reforms announced also include the development of a new role of chief scientist and a Data, Analytics and Delivery division.
March 08, 2019 11:26 AM
WHO has revealed this week plans to create a Department of Digital Health overseen by the division of the chief scientist, a new role, along with a raft of reforms that it says are the “most wide-ranging in the organization’s history”.
The Department of Digital Health will, according to WHO, harness “the power of digital health and innovation by supporting countries to assess, integrate, regulate and maximize the opportunities of digital technologies and artificial intelligence”.
The announcement follows a recent event organised in February this year by the WHO regional office for Europe, which brought together a suite of stakeholders to create a network that would advance the digitisation of healthcare systems in the region.
Former WHO regional director for Europe Zsuzsanna Jakab warned at the time at European countries should “move beyond an understanding of the promise of digital health” and speed up implementation. It was announced earlier this week that Jakab had been appointed as WHO deputy director general in the new changes.
Other reforms include the development of a new Data, Analytics and Delivery division to “significantly enhance the collection, storage, analysis and usage of data to drive policy change in countries”.
WHO said the measures were drafted by its Global Policy Group after an “extensive period of consultation” with staff.
More here:
And also here:
March 7, 2019 / 4:16 AM /
WHO chief unveils reforms, with more science, apps and an academy
GENEVA (Reuters) - The World Health Organization unveiled a landmark reform on Wednesday that targets billions of people around the globe and puts a stress on primary care for all rather than “moonshot” projects like eradicating diseases.
The reform firmly reshapes the Geneva-based U.N. health agency with the manifesto of its Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, an Ethiopian who is the first African in the job. He was elected in 2017 promising to focus on “universal health coverage” (UHC).
His back-to-basics approach won fervent support among health ministers, partly reflecting the WHO’s failure in 2014 to seize on what became the world’s worst Ebola outbreak, and the fact that many of the 11,300 deaths in that outbreak would have been prevented by better primary healthcare in West Africa.
Announcing the reforms, Tedros told WHO staff that UHC is the “WHO’s top priority, and is central to everything we do”.
The WHO has a five-year “triple billion” target, with one billion more people benefiting from UHC, one billion more people better protected from health emergencies, and one billion more people enjoying better health and well-being.
Alongside this ambition to cast a huge global net, there will be a new chief scientist role, reflecting the WHO’s determination to be ahead of the curve on frontier technologies such as gene editing, and to ensure its member countries are first to benefit from research and innovation.
A new chief of antimicrobial resistance will tackle what Tedros told staff was “one of the most urgent health threats of our time”.
The agency will also focus more on “digital health”, using text messages to spread messages about vaccination and smartphone applications to help people manage and monitor their health.
More here:
Now if this type of announcement was being made in the financial sector many would suggest that we had hit a market peak and that it was time to take profits.
When you see the global World Health Organisation moving into digital health it is hard not to think that we will see action at the speed of the usual Global Organisation (slow) and that we may have seen the best of the innovation and invention.
Somehow it always seems that these grandiose plans fall short – often by a huge amount.
Do these announcements signify “Peak Digital Health” or can we still expect steady progress as we see apparently reflected here and mentioned last week?
India hosts a Global Digital Health Partnership Summit
Global Digital Health Partnership Summit saw international healthcare providers discuss digital health opportunities and challenges.
India’s Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) inaugurated the 4th Global Digital Health Partnership Summit, earlier this week.
The summit is a global intergovernmental meeting on digital health and is hosted by MoHFW in collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP).
According to its website, the GDHP’s objective is to support governments and health system reformers to improve the health and well-being of citizens through the best use of evidence-based digital technologies.
Participants at the summit discussed the uses of technological innovations to advance Indian healthcare. The country’s current healthcare system being delivered and accessed is poised to change for the better and digital health interventions are driving this change.
Technology could make Universal Health Coverage (UHC) a reality, something India has been pushing for.
During the event, representatives talked about the implications of digital health interventions to health services accessibility, quality, and affordability. They explored ways to leverage digital health technologies to strengthen healthcare delivery systems globally.
More here:
I have to say I am always a little sceptical of the outcome of these transnational meetings?
What do readers think?
David.
Looking a bit closer to home, the Victorian Healthcare Week 2019 is on 23 - 24 July 2019
ReplyDeleteThe agenda is here:
https://plsadaptive.s3.amazonaws.com/eco/files/event_content/vichealth-brochure-2019-webi_vbz6uZZHK9o9ft5LEu5Jj5ouBAQgAyhf882VDJ2w.pdf
Out of 100+ speakers the only reference to My Health Record is an anonymous speaker from ADHA:
"Day 2 Plenary Session
KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: What Does the Future Hold for Digitally Enabled Health?
Australian Digital Health Agency will paint the vision for digital health in Australia. He will provide a progress update on how implementation of Australia’s National Digital Health Strategy is improving patient health outcomes through
integration of digital health services. Key pillars in the strategy include the national expansion of My Health Record, and the development of secure messaging and an interoperable health system.
Representative TBD
Australian Digital Health Agency"
My reading of this conference is that a) everyone else is ignoring My Health Record and b) nobody at ADHA is committing to anything so far in the future.
I wonder why?
The WHO has been about as useful in eHealth as a chocolate teapot.
ReplyDeleteSee here for their track record:
https://www.who.int/ehealth/about/en/
And their current strategy
https://www.who.int/ehealth/en/
This is Australia's contribution (from 2017)
https://iris.wpro.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665.1/13681/WPRO-2017-DPM-028-eng.pdf
with the usual vacuous claims:
"Digital information is the bedrock of high-quality health care. The benefits for patients are significant and compelling: digital health can help save and improve lives. Australia has developed an electronic health record called My Health Record, which will streamline care, resulting in avoided hospital admissions, fewer adverse drug events, reduced duplication in diagnostic tests, better coordination of care for people seeing multiple health-care providers, and better informed treatment decisions."
To answer David's question "I have to say I am always a little sceptical of the outcome of these transnational meetings?" I agree.
If you look at the GDHP, it has very little to do with health outcomes.
If you look at national/government initiatives, most have been less than spectacular. Those national initiatives that have made progress are closely involved in delivering healthcare services - their work is embedded in reality, they are not driven by promises o wild ideas.
Those like our Federal Government that do not deliver services, but develop policies are notable by their ineffectiveness.
The WHO is so far from delivering healthcare services it's not surprising they are ineffective.
Most of the progress in other industries comes from private industry working in a free market. The problem is that healthcare is far from a free market, it is highly regulated - by governments.
Governments are in a catch 22 situation. They cannot easily reduce regulation - people might die or suffer. However regulation (along with payment/funding models) is an important component of healthcare.
It is not an easy problem to solve and I don't claim to have all the answers. What I do know is that this government's track record for getting in the way of innovation in healthcare (as opposed to medical science) is second to none.
Sceptical is a gross understatement.
ReplyDeleteA couple of points of Bernard’s posting of Vic
ReplyDelete“He will provide a progress update on how implementation of Australia’s National Digital Health Strategy” HE? What they exclude woman now? Or is Tim vision to put the HE back in HEalth?
“ and will include the national expansion of the My Health Record? Did the not just disband the my Health Record expansion program board in recognition of that programs closure?
As for the Who I guess it is another example of expanding beyound your core requirement and that just eroded the value. I am interested in just what they are planning with all this research data, that is an area that needs close inspection, they are quite sloppy when it comes to data provenance I hear.
Research? What research? ADHA doesn't do research> It looks for any indication that My Health Record has some sort of benefit, however small. That's what all those test beds are for. Not do do research, not to look at provable benefits and costs but any sort of argument that they can hang their marketing hat on.
ReplyDeleteLet’s hope the ADHA speaker is a woman to lift the female speakers above the current 14% in the digital health sessions.
ReplyDelete"Let’s hope the ADHA speaker is a woman to lift the female speakers above the current 14% in the digital health sessions."
ReplyDeleteI would have thought that domain knowledge trumps nature of genitals but maybe not in 2019? Treating eHealth as a PR exercise is a huge part of the problem. Its hard and requires a lot of technical knowledge and the lack of that has wasted $2B and counting...
Talking about research ......
ReplyDeleteDid you know that ADHA thinks you are a patient of your pharmacist? I wonder who pays for all these trained community pharmacists? I wonder what GPs think of this?
"ADHA CEO Tim Kelsey said the service was part of a $8.5 million program that trials innovative and new approaches to post-hospital support, palliative care and the management of chronic health conditions using digital technology.
'Pharmacists involved in the Box Hill project will be able to access their patients' hospital discharge summaries quickly and easily using My Health Record,' he said.
'The ultimate aim is to ensure patients with complicated medication regimens don’t end up back in hospital after taking a bad combination of medicines.'"
Box Hill Hospital trials medication management using EMRs
https://www.healthcareit.com.au/article/box-hill-hospital-trials-medication-management-using-emrs
For a system that was supposed to be a patient controlled summary system, (and designed that way) there's a lot of scope creep going on as they desperately search for some sort of use of the system.
@4:26, I was not thinking of ADOHA in the context of research - this snippet for the WHO articles
ReplyDeleteOther reforms include the development of a new Data, Analytics and Delivery division to “significantly enhance the collection, storage, analysis and usage of data to drive policy change in countries”.
WHO said the measures were drafted by its Global Policy Group after an “extensive period of consultation” with staff.
I am sure it is all very innocent and constrained at present, what worries me is when people like Tim Kelsey get their hooks in there that things will soon unravel. Love to know who his puppet masters are.
Andrew the Cockoo (ADHA) emptied that nest and threw vast amounts of knowledge out into the cold.
ReplyDeleteDelving into the research mentioned in this article:
ReplyDeleteBox Hill Hospital trials medication management using EMRs
https://www.healthcareit.com.au/article/box-hill-hospital-trials-medication-management-using-emrs
It is being done at Monash University and is led by Greg Duncan who has a Masters Degree in Public Health (his first degree is not mentioned in LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/greg-duncan-57118881/)
This is the project page:
DCMedsRec: Reducing Hospital Readmission by Enhanced My Health Record Use in Community Pharmacy
https://research.monash.edu/en/projects/dcmedsrec-reducing-hospital-readmission-by-enhanced-my-health-rec
Notice the title. It rather presumes the outcome. A genuine research project should probably say something like:
Investigating the Impact, Costs and Benefits of the use of My Health Record in Community Pharmacy with respect to Hospital Readmissions
But we all know that ADHA is only looking for benefits.
The only other projects Greg is listed as leading at Monash are:
Development of a Health Literacy Education Program for Community Pharmacists and Pharmacy Assistants in Australia
15/10/11 → 19/05/14
and
The incidence and prevalence study of people with chronic wounds in the community in Victoria
12/05/07 → 30/06/08
Hmmm, well spotted Bernard, can't say I have ever seen myself as a pharmacists patient before.
ReplyDeleteI go to a regular GP, but that is not the case for a pharmacy, as I will grab a prescription from the most convenient place, could be local, could be at the shopping mall, could be the all night one 2 suburbs away.
Perhaps Tim has seen MyDNA signs in the local Pharma while watching an add for MyDoc and put two bands and two beans together and came up with a very small casserole
Interesting couple of tweets today:
ReplyDeleteDigital Health AU
@AuDigitalHealth
#Pharmacists at Health Smart Pharmacy in Box Hill, Melbourne have helped launch a new trial program that will assist up to 5,000 local patients understand their medicines after being discharged from hospital. Learn more: bit.ly/2UCEcMc
https://twitter.com/AuDigitalHealth/status/1106012096595152896
and
Tim Kelsey
@tkelsey1
This is today, not the future: putting digital to work in Australian health. @easternhealthau launch brilliant program supported by @AuDigitalHealth to evaluate how #myhealthrecord can support medication management. Honour to support launch in Box Hill tdy #digitalhealth
https://twitter.com/tkelsey1/status/1106107763917115393
If you look at the project description on the Monash Uni site:
https://research.monash.edu/en/projects/dcmedsrec-reducing-hospital-readmission-by-enhanced-my-health-rec
It says the project effective start/end dates are 16/07/18 → 30/06/19
So they launched the project 9 months after it started and with 3 months left.
The media release from ADHA dated 13 March
https://www.digitalhealth.gov.au/news-and-events/news/joint-media-release-new-trial-to-improve-medicine-safety-for-those-leaving-hospital
says:
"The success of the service will be evaluated after 12 months."
Something doesn't add up.
Neither does this "trial" seem to fit in with ADHA's Framework for Action. I can't find any mention of it, although it could be hidden in the test bed projects.
https://conversation.digitalhealth.gov.au/framework-for-action
Considering the Uni project description says it started in June 2018 and the Framework document is dated July 2018, once again something doesn't add up.
Just clutching at shadows Bernard, the GovHR failed to build any interest or momentum. Now they are a bit lost. They do not seem to be headline guests anyway and even the infamous global partnership saw ADHA almost listed with the hired help.
ReplyDeleteI am sure Tim and co will trying a regain significance through secure messaging but that will fizzle out as they just are a empty shell of what was once a bright new opertunity.
March 14, 2019 3:58 PM My guess is you might find the answer in the HISA tweet March 5 - Patient control of information in regards to MyHR is cause for interesting discussion: how well did the opt-out period transpire? Our panel Hamish Rodda, Tania Mortensen, Philip Loya, Rupert Lee, Dr Jane Collins and Keith Donohoe discuss.
Sad the ADHA did not even retweet.