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
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All sorts of stuff this week – dominated by the vaccine roll out (or not) and the fate for Telehealth.
A reasonable amount of company news as well!
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/govt-extends-temporary-telehealth-items-june
Govt extends temporary telehealth items to June
However, it is still working with doctor groups on its long-term plan
15th March 2021
The Federal Government has extended the temporary Medicare telehealth items while it considers options for funding a permanent system.
As part of a $1.1 billion package of measures announced yesterday, the government says it will continue to subsidise the MBS phone and video consultations until 30 June.
The temporary items, first introduced last March, were scheduled to expire at the end of this month.
Over the last year, more than 51 million telehealth services had been claimed by 13 million patients.
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https://medicalrepublic.com.au/telehealth-extended-again-but-future-still-murky/41835
15 March 2021
Telehealth extended again, but future still murky
ACRRM AMA COVID-19 RACGP Telehealth TheHill
The existing arrangements for bulk-billed telehealth are set to continue for a further three months while negotiations continue for the items to become permanent items on the Medicare Benefits Schedule, the prime minister says.
The decision marks the second extension of the temporary items since they were originally introduced a year ago, on 13 March 2020.
The announcement was made at the weekend by Prime Minister Scott Morrison as part of an additional $1.1 billion investment by government to extend the national COVID-19 response and suppression strategy.
As a part of the extended funding measures, telehealth services will be able to continue as temporary items on the MBS until 30 June. The additional funding has also secured the continuation of GP-led respiratory clinics.
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Tuesday, 16 March 2021 03:11
Telehealth to boom as pandemic results in ‘unprecedented’ global tech acceleration: Deloitte
While some technologies followed expected growth patterns, the reality of a global pandemic has resulted in unprecedented technology acceleration that has fundamentally changed how we live and work, according to a report from professional services firm Deloitte Austraia..
According to Deloitte Australia telco, media & entertainment leader Will Castles in the technology, media and telcommunications (TMT) landscape, telehealth, women’s sport and immersive tech are leading the charge in 2021 and beyond.
The report highlights how worldwide trends in TMT may affect businesses and consumers worldwide and how these trends are being driven by the global pandemic’s economic and societal impacts, resulting in intensifying growth in video, virtual, and cloud technologies.
“A range of enterprise and consumer technologies—from 5G to the cloud to virtual reality—will continue to offer opportunities to the worldwide business ecosystem,” Castles said.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/queensland-govt-tells-gps-do-less-telehealth
Queensland govt tells GPs to do less telehealth
Its chief health officer says doctors should 'get back' to seeing patients face-to-face
17th March 2021
By Kemal Atlay
Queensland's chief health officer has written to the state’s GPs telling them to reduce telehealth consults, saying it was now necessary to "get back" to seeing patients face-to-face, including those with respiratory symptoms.
While acknowledging telehealth fulfilled an “essential need”, Dr Jeannette Young said face-to-face consults would build community confidence in the road back from COVID-19 and "ease the pressure on our emergency departments".
Her letter included statistics stating that ED presentations rose by nearly 32,000 in January 2021 compared to the same month last year - an 18% increase.
One third of these presentations were “for conditions and ailments that could have been treated by a general practitioner”, she claimed (see the letter below).
The RACGP is not happy.
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https://medicalrepublic.com.au/patient-demand-to-determine-future-of-telehealth/42083
8 March 2021
Patient demand to determine future of telehealth
Clinical General Practice Telehealth
As pandemic restrictions ease across Australia, patients may not want to go back to in-person consults – and this reluctance could reshape primary healthcare models.
“The genie is well and truly out of the bottle – patients aren’t going to want to go backwards, and I think it’s them who are going to inform and influence policy,” Teladoc Health Medical Director Dr Benson Riddle told the ANDHealth Summer Summit webinar this week.
The online summit featured a panel on telehealth, moderated by Australian Digital Health Agency Clinical Reference Lead Dr Amandeep Hansra.
Joining Dr Hansra on the panel was Dr Riddle, Dr Silvia Pfeiffer, CEO of CoviuGlobal, and Dr Brad Younggren, Chief Medical Officer of Seattle-based firm 98point6.
Dr Riddle, a general practitioner by training, said one of the more significant findings from the past year was that not as many opportunistic telehealth start-ups moved into the space as expected.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/no-apology-hunt-covid19-vaccine-booking-chaos
No apology from Hunt for COVID-19 vaccine booking chaos
The Minister for Health says there was 'always going to be' a deluge of calls on day one
18th March 2021
Minister for Health Greg Hunt is not apologising after GP practices were bombarded with thousands of angry calls from patients following the botched rollout of the Federal Government’s COVID-19 vax booking system.
GPs say they had no clue that the online directory was going live yesterday listing the contact details of 1000 practices tasked with administering the AstraZeneca vaccine next week.
Some 190,000 people across Australia subsequently attempt to book a consult through the site.
However, most practices were listed as accepting bookings by telephone only, despite the practices being told the site would redirect patients to their own online booking systems.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/news/receptionists-hammered-booking-system-covid19-vaccinations-goes-live
Receptionists 'hammered' as booking system for COVID-19 vaccinations goes live
The government's online directory is apparently failing to redirect patients to their GP's normal appointment system
17th March 2021
The first 1000 GP practices offering COVID-19 vaccinations have started to line up appointments despite major glitches with the Federal Government's national booking system.
The online directory went live today and is meant to allow patients from anywhere in the country to search for clinics by postcode and book an appointment.
But for hundreds of practices, the website does not include direct links to their own online booking systems, with patients having to telephone them directly.
HotDoc, the country's biggest patient booking system, says it was told the directory would not be live until next Monday.
As a result it has yet to turn on its COVID-19 vaccination booking function for the practices using its system.
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Managing COVID-19 vaccine data in My Health Record: essential information for general practice
16 March 2021
The Australian Government has announced that it is mandatory under the Australian Immunisation Register Act 2015 to report all COVID-Vaccine encounters to the Australian Immunisation Register (AIR).
From July 2021, it will be mandatory for all immunisation encounters to be uploaded.
You can record information on the AIR:
- using your practice management software
- by direct upload using Health Professional Online Services (HPOS) on the AIR website. A Provider Digital Access (PRODA) account is required for this method
- using the Australian Digital Health Agency’s newly developed Clinician Vaccine Integrated Platform to support direct upload of an individual’s vaccination to the AIR at the site of administration.
More information on accessing the AIR and preparing your practice to administer COVID-19 vaccines is available on our website.
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https://medicalrepublic.com.au/govt-backflips-on-booking-priority-for-vaccine/42130
19 March 2021
Govt backflips on booking priority for vaccine
The Department of Health has softened its approach to practices just days before the GP COVID vaccine rollout, with officials saying primary care will be the master of its own bookings.
The advice comes as a noticeable change from instructions earlier this month, which directed practices to withdraw from phase 1b if they were unwilling to vaccinate people outside their patient cohort.
In the original announcement from the DoH, practices were told they wouldn’t be able to turn away other patients or withhold appointments to primarily vaccinate their existing patients.
But the narrative shifted in a webinar for GPs hosted this week by the department, with practices being complimented by senior department officials for knowing their patient cohorts “better than anyone else”.
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https://www.ausdoc.com.au/practice/why-online-booking-systems-covid19-vaccines-can-go-wrong
Why online booking systems for COVID-19 vaccines can go wrong
Some patients will try every trick in the book to jump the vaccine queues
17th February 2021
When the Federal Government announced patients could arrange their COVID-19 vaccinations through a computerised national booking system it was developing, many GPs rightly looked at its IT track record and started to sweat.
The government has since ‘clarified’ — or backtracked, depending on your level of suspicion — that this won’t be a booking system per se, but simply a list of GP practices and pharmacies where people can access vaccines.
The list will include weblinks and phone numbers for these providers, and patients will need to complete the actual booking themselves.
Given potential mishaps of government-run IT, it is probably a lucky escape for Australia.
However, as with countless other coronavirus-related endeavours, we can look to the UK and find examples of what not to do.
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Elsevier launches COVID-19 Healthcare Hub to support healthcare workers
Tuesday, 09 March, 2021
Elsevier — a global provider of research publishing and information analytics — has launched complimentary resources and learning tools via its COVID-19 Healthcare Hub to support healthcare professionals on the frontline of the pandemic.
The ICU Nurses Refresher Toolkit and COVID-19 Vaccine Toolkit contain up-to-date medical information on COVID-19, approved treatments and guidelines, and other useful tools to help doctors, nurses and staff provide care.
Elsevier President of Global Health Markets Jan Herzhoff said, “As a trusted partner to healthcare providers globally, we believe that Elsevier has a responsibility to provide high-quality information and tools on COVID-19 and the newly approved vaccines. Our team of researchers, clinicians and data scientists work tirelessly to develop the latest tools and resources, such as the complimentary ICU nurse training, that will further support healthcare providers during this public health crisis.”
The ICU Nursing Refresher Toolkit features curated nursing skills from Elsevier as well as clinical eLearning and wellness resources from American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN). Utilising evidence-based practices and data on the novel coronavirus, the toolkit helps to enhance clinical reasoning skills for ICU nurses who are managing high volumes of patients with COVID-19, and for registered nurses being called from other units to assist with COVID-19 care in the ICU.
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Exoskeleton technology comes to Australia
Monday, 15 March, 2021
Royal Rehab — an Australian provider of rehabilitation and disability support services — has entered into an agreement with United States robotic company Ekso Bionics to bring advanced exoskeleton technology to Australia. The agreement propels Royal Rehab’s plans to become a centre of excellence in technology-driven rehabilitation through the acquisition of assistive technologies, to help patients move more freely, communicate, control objects and complete everyday tasks.
The EksoNR is set to revolutionise the Australian rehabilitation sector with its ability to help patients stand and walk following incomplete spinal cord injury, acquired brain injury, stroke and other neurological conditions including Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerosis.
Royal Rehab CEO Matt Mackay said breakthroughs in technology are driving better and faster outcomes for people living with life-changing conditions and injury; however, these have been unavailable in Australia, until now.
“Those treated for spinal cord injuries or a neurological condition overseas will often have access to assistive technology that can dramatically change a person’s quality of life,’’ he said.
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Tuesday, 16 March 2021 22:51
Australian Taxation Office using iProov identity face verification for digital identity program
Australians will soon be able to access digital government services online, including with the Australian Taxation Office, after proving their identity using face verification from biometric authentication company iProov.
Following an open tender process, the Australian Taxation Office is using face verification from iProov to extend its national digital identity program and to provide a liveness solution for myGovID.
Unlike face recognition, which matches a physical face seen in a crowd to a list of images on a database, face verification is done with the knowledge and collaboration of the user, and iProov says its Genuine Presence Assurance uses a facial biometric scan that is highly secure, “yet effortless to use on any personal device”.
· iProv says the Genuine Presence Assurance process delivers a multitude of benefits including:
· Simple and inclusive to use - a brief, passive face biometric scan requires no effort from the user. No need for movement, following instructions or other skills.
· Inclusive to access - works on any device and is not dependent upon any particular brand or model.
· Convenient - enables users to access more services securely online reducing the need for visits to shopfronts or phone calls.
· Secure – protects against identity theft by preventing impersonation or the use of copies of victims’ faces.
· Resilient – actively mitigates risks from emerging threats.
· Privacy is maximised and respected - user data is fully protected.
· Encourages growth of Australia’s digital economy by increasing uptake and use of online services.
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Coronavirus Australia: Online vaccine booking website’s day one fail
Australian Government COVID Vaccine Clinic Finder website. Picture: Ryan Pierse/Getty Images
The Federal government’s online booking website for COVID-19 vaccines is not functioning on the day of its launch, with frustrated patients unable to book online for a jab at GP clinics.
The COVID-19 national booking service lists GP clinics that will have vaccines available at the beginning of the 1B rollout, which begins on Monday.
However, most of the GP clinics that are listed on the national
booking service, which is very difficult to find on the Federal health
department’s website, say they are taking phone bookings only.
For the minority of practices that say they allow online bookings via the
national booking service website, nobody is actually able to make an online
booking.
The national booking service website connects to the HealthEngine booking system site, but all patients eligible for vaccines in the 1B rollout who try to make a booking are met with the message ‘this practice is not accepting online bookings for existing patients’.
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https://itwire.com/security/knowbe4-comments-on-eastern-health-cyber-incident.html
Thursday, 18 March 2021 12:39
KnowBe4 comments on Eastern Health 'cyber incident'
The likelihood of ransomware having impacted upon Eastern Health's ability to perform some surgeries has attracted some commentary from KnowBe4, which bills itself as "the world's first and largest New-school security awareness training and simulated phishing platform" that helps organisation manage the ongoing problem of social engineering.
Already covered in iTWire this morning is the news that Eastern Health has been impacted by a "cyber incident", which has seen many Eastern Health IT systems taken offline "as a precaution" while the company seeks "to understand and rectify the situation".
Jacqueline Jayne, the Security Awareness Advocate at KnowBe4 APAC, has provided the following commentary:
Jayne said: "Hospitals are a very attractive target for cybercriminals due to the nature of the information they hold on their patients. Information that, once obtained, can be used for identity theft and sold multiple times on the dark web.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/melbournes-eastern-health-hit-by-suspected-cyber-attack-562325
Melbourne's Eastern Health hit by suspected cyber attack
By Justin Hendry on Mar 18, 2021 1:03PM
Some elective surgery cancelled.
One of Melbourne's largest metropolitan public health services has postponed some elective surgery procedures after experiencing a "cyber incident".
The incident, which took place late on Tuesday, has forced Eastern Health to pull a number of its IT systems offline as a precaution.
Eastern Health operates the Box Hill, Maroondah, Healesville and Angliss hospitals, as well as a number of health services, including Yarra Ranges Health and Wantirna Health.
In a statement, Eastern Health said it had taken its systems offline while it investigates the incident, but stressed that "patient safety has not been compromised".
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https://www.itwire.com/security/melbourne-s-eastern-health-attacked,-some-surgeries-cancelled.html
Thursday, 18 March 2021 06:23
Melbourne's Eastern Health attacked, some surgeries cancelled
Hospitals across the east of Melbourne have been forced offline and some surgeries have been cancelled following a network attack on Eastern Health.
Eastern Health includes the Box Hill and Maroondah Hospitals and the organisation was forced to shut down IT systems following the attack which, it said, occurred on Tuesday.
It has more than 50 facilities under its management and looks after the clinical needs of three-quarters of a million people.
A statement from the organisation said: "Late on Tuesday, Eastern Health has experienced a cyber incident.
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Friday, 19 March 2021 10:40
The Withings Sleep Analyser is your data-driven key to better rest, health, and mood
Today, March 19, is World Sleep Day. This day brings attention to the need for quality sleep as part of one’s overall health. iTWire tested out a sleep analyser by health technology company, Withings, which can help you sleep better and reduce stress.
World Sleep Day is today, March 19. Yes, World Sleep Day is a thing, and while it may sound amusing at first glance, sleep is serious business. The day is organised by the World Sleep Society to raise awareness of sleep as a human privilege that is often compromised by the habits of modern life.
The annual event celebrates sleep and aims to be a call to action on important issues related to sleep, including medicine, education, social aspects and driving. The World Sleep Society aims to lessen the burden of sleep problems on society through better prevention and management of sleep disorders.
I’m sure we can all relate to being grumpy or less productive when our own sleep is compromised. I’m also sure our own General Practitioners - let alone our mothers - drum into us the importance of regular, and quality, sleep.
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InterSystems IRIS Data Platform Available as Fully Managed Service for AWS
Continued cloud investments enable InterSystems to provide a concierge-level of services for the cloud
SYDNEY, Australia, 18 March, 2021 – InterSystems, an innovative data technology provider dedicated to helping customers solve the most critical information challenges, has announced that its InterSystems IRIS® data platform and InterSystems IRIS for Health™ are now available as fully managed services for Amazon Web Services (AWS), providing customers with one of the lowest risk and easiest paths to taking full advantage of cloud resources.
InterSystems concierge-level managed service will handle the performance, security, availability, and operations of a customer’s InterSystems environment deployed in the AWS infrastructure. The end-to-end service frees customers to focus on their core business, with InterSystems taking ownership of software deployment, infrastructure, monitoring, high availability, security, patches and upgrades.
“At InterSystems, we’re committed to providing a concierge-level of managed services to our customers, with cloud provisioning and maintaining secure, scalable and performant environments on the AWS cloud,” said Scott Gnau, vice president of data platforms at InterSystems.
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Watch Alcidion's presentation at the ASX Small and Mid-Cap Conference
Alcidion (ASX: ALC) Managing Director Kate Quirke presented
at the ASX Small and Mid-Cap Conference this week. Kate spoke about Alcidion's
market-leading Miya Precision product suite, the growing market opportunity in
the UK, Australia and New Zealand, and the Company's outlook for FY2021.
We hope those in attendance found the presentation and Q&A session
informative. If you were unable to attend, we are pleased to advise that a
recording of Kate's presentation has been made available on YouTube. We invite
you to watch it above or via this link.
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Friday, 19 March 2021 10:01
The ONE Way To Deliver Digital Healthcare Solutions
Company News: The focus on digital health has become a global trend. The long-term benefits of technological adaptation in this space will most likely be a reduction in unnecessary use of health services, alleviating the burden on undermanned or under-resourced health providers, reduced costs and better, more efficient patient care.
Global Market Insights estimates the global digital health market to be worth US$639B in 2026 and outlines several growth drivers, including the rising adoption of smart devices, improving healthcare IT infrastructure, favourable government regulations and initiatives, and rising demand for remote patient monitoring services.
The factors have been at the forefront of OneView Healthcare plc’s (ASX: ONE) thinking.
ONE is a health tech company that provides hospital patients with a “virtual care and digital control centre” at their bedside to deliver the best possible patient experience during their stay.
Its software (SaaS) platform is sold as a yearly license fee per hospital bed, with the pandemic accelerating the uptake of this platform.
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Digital engagement key to post-COVID business survival, says report
Wednesday, 10 March, 2021
Cloud communications platform Twilio has released its second annual State of Customer Engagement Report, which reveals that digital communications were critical to business survival in 2020 and that the solutions that were built will shape business success in the post-pandemic economy.
The report combines insight from the Twilio platform — which powers more than one trillion human interactions annually — with results of the global research of 2500 enterprise decision-makers.
Highly regulated industries, including health care, increased their digital engagement on Twilio more than 104% year on year, with 92% of healthcare business leaders reporting that COVID-19 spurred their company to explore new strategies to serve customers.
Healthcare providers embraced multichannel tools to deliver care virtually, with 87% reporting that digital engagement will be critically or very important to their success going forward.
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Catering for a 'new normal': why health care needs to rethink its digital infrastructure
By Rajaneesh Kurup, Segments and GTM, Equinix Asia Pacific
and Japan
Monday, 15 March, 2021
During the first wave of COVID-19 in March 2020, there were plenty of reasons to be concerned for NSW Health, which was at the centre of Australia’s response. However, while it may have seemed like the world was caving in, there was one area that could be relied on to ease the burden: digital services.
NSW Health spent the five or six years preceding the pandemic investing in digital infrastructure, digitising existing applications and building a modernised hybrid/multi-cloud architecture. This enabled the rapid scale-up of digital and remote tooling to support a physical working exodus and further lean on public clouds to cater for increased demands.
The result was a world-class public-facing digital health services platform, spun up to full capacity shortly after COVID-19 hit. This totally transformed patient experiences and accessibility, providing NSW Health with what could aptly be described as ‘pandemic-level’ agility.
Unfortunately, NSW Health is more of the exception to the rule. Historically, the healthcare industry has tended to avoid off-premise IT deployments and cloud adoption due to data regulations and privacy laws. However, COVID-19 has driven a necessity for healthcare providers to embrace hybrid multi-cloud architectures, as they often deliver agility, flexibility and the greatest level of innovation.
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Australia's average 5G mobile speed is outpacing 4G by 5.3 times: OpenSignal
Meanwhile, average upload speeds on 5G is nearly double of 4G.
By Aimee Chanthadavong | March 19, 2021 -- 03:34 GMT (14:34 AEDT) | Topic: 5G
While 5G may still be in its infancy, OpenSignal has revealed that Australian users are already seeing a huge boost in mobile speeds when compared to 3G and 4G connections.
Based on data collected between 1 November 2020 to 29 January 2021, 5G average download speeds racked up 240.9Mbps when connected to 5G -- 5.3 times faster than the 45.3Mbps experienced on 4G.
The speed gap for average download speed between 3G and 4G was smaller at 39.3Mpbs, but still significant as 4G was still 7.5 times faster than the average 3G download speed of 6Mbps.
For the same period, users saw average 5G upload speeds hit 15.5Mbps, nearly double the upload speeds of 4G, which was only 8.2Mbps. The average 3G upload speeds, meanwhile, sat 1.3Mbps.
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Wi-Fi from space — an innovative leap set to create a digital revolution
Martin Rogers
Telstra’s recent plan to restructure and buy the National Broadband Network has had its critics, saying it would be a terrible outcome for taxpayers, competition and consumers.
Do consumers need even more actual land-based, wired internet?
The speculation is that 5G will trump the use of Australian fibre NBN, yet there is an innovative leap that is set to create a radical change.
Just as the combination of the steam engine with ingenious machinery drove the industrial revolution, the combination of new Wi-Fi technology, low earth orbit satellites (LEO) and Internet of Things (IoT) connected devices are set to create a digital revolution.
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DIGITAL HEALTH IN THE HEADLINES
Each week, ANDHealth brings you a selection of the latest news and reports on digital health and related matters from Australia and around the world.
- Feds extend MBS items for telehealth until June 30 (Pulse+IT)
- Digital health literacy as a social determinant of health (Healthcare IT News)
- Qantas trials commonpass digital health pass on repatriation flights (Qantas)
- UK’s top 100 digital health innovators given a global boost (Healthcare IT News)
- FDA's enforcement discretion for digital health is more ambiguous than ever in 2021 (MobiHealthNews)
- Digital health solution helps reduce key symptoms of chronic pain (News Medical)
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Enjoy!
David.
1 comment:
Talking about the Australian Immunisation Register ...
If there ever was any doubt that the government isn't really interested in (or capable of understanding) the medical/health use of data:
Better data left up in the AIR
22 March 2021
Holly Payne
New legislation may require that all vaccinations be reported to the Australian Immunisation Register (AIR), but immunisation researchers fear the register still fails to record relevant data.
Since the beginning of the month, it has been mandatory for all vaccination providers to upload every immunisation to the AIR, including the influenza and COVID-19 vaccines.
The AIR was created in 2016, and reporting vaccines has always been a discretionary duty.
In a Perspective piece in the MJA, childhood immunisation researcher Professor Jane Tuckerman and colleagues called for additional information on medical risk factors to be collected by the AIR.
... etc
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