This Makes It Very Clear That Well Designed E-Prescribing Systems Are Vital To Preserve Patient Safety.

This appeared last week.

Poorly implemented IT systems lead to medication errors

by Evan Sweeney 

Mar 17, 2017 10:58am

IT systems designed to streamline medication ordering and administration can contribute to medication errors.

Health IT systems designed to improve prescription ordering and medication administration can just as easily contribute to medical errors.

That’s according to a study released by the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Advisory (PPSA), which found that computerized prescriber order entry (CPOE) systems, pharmacy IT systems and electronic medication administration tools were frequently to blame for medication errors. Nearly 70% of those errors reached the patient.

Last year, researchers at Johns Hopkins published a study indicating that medical errors are the third-leading cause of death in the U.S., a study that drew harsh criticism from many physicians. Some have warned that digital prescription systems miss potential drug errors, and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT has called on vendors and providers to reduce the number of “pick list” medication errors.

More here:

http://www.fiercehealthcare.com/ehr/poorly-implemented-it-systems-lead-to-medication-errors

There is also coverage here:

Half of Medication Errors Involve CPOE, Data Shows

Alexandra Wilson Pecci, March 17, 2017

Computerized prescriber order entry systems and pharmacy systems are the most commonly reported factors contributing to medication errors in Pennsylvania healthcare facilities, data shows.

Although health IT tools can help prevent patient safety problems, they can also lead to significant patient safety errors if they're not used correctly, finds research from the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority.

Between January 1 and June 30, 2016, Pennsylvania healthcare facilities reported 889 medication-error events that indicated health IT as a contributing factor.

The most frequently reported errors included dose omission, wrong dose or overdosage, and extra dose. The most commonly reported systems involved in the errors were computerized prescriber order entry systems (CPOE) and the pharmacy systems.

"As more healthcare organizations adopted [EHR/EMRs (electronic health records systems)] and such systems became increasingly interoperable, the Authority observed an increase in reports of HIT-related events, particularly in relationship to medication errors.

In response, the Authority implemented additional event reporting questions that would better capture whether HIT was a contributing factor in reported events," the Authority's executive director,Regina Hoffman, said in a statement accompanying the report.

In 2015, a new question was added to the Pennsylvania Patient Safety Reporting System (PA-PSRS) reporting form: "Did Health IT cause or contribute to this event?" opening a topic that had not been explored before, it says.

PA-PSRS is a web-based system that a secure, web-based system where healthcare facilities, including hospitals, ambulatory surgical facilities, and birthing centers, are required to submit reports of "serious events" and "incidents."

Lots more here:

http://www.healthleadersmedia.com/technology/half-medication-errors-involve-cpoe-data-shows

Clearly any medication management program needs to start with sorting these sorts of findings out and getting the error rates to as close to zero as possible!

David.

Here Is A Really In-depth Review Of What Has Gone On With National E-Health Records In Australia. Lots Of Lessons Here.

This was published a while ago but I only spotted it a few days ago.

National electronic health record systems as `wicked projects': The Australian experience

Article (PDF Available) in Information Polity 21(4):1-15 · July 2016 

DOI: 10.3233/IP-160389

Karin Garrety University of Wollongong

Ian Mcloughlin  Monash University (Australia)

 Andrew Dalley University of Wollongong

 Ping Yu University of Wollongong

Abstract

Governments around the world are investing in large scale information and communication technology projects that are intended to modernize and streamline healthcare through the provision of nationally accessible electronic health records. In this way, they hope to 'tame' the complex 'wicked' problems facing healthcare, such as rising costs and fragmented delivery. However, these projects often encounter difficulties. Using a case study of Australia's 20-year journey towards a national electronic health record system, we show how these projects can ironically take on the characteristics of the 'wicked problems' they are intended to solve, and how a failure to recognize and cope with these 'wicked' characteristics can lead to waste, conflict and frustration among potential users. We suggest some alternative approaches to the management of large-scale ICT projects in healthcare and other public service sectors that deal with complex, sensitive data.

Conclusion:

The story of NEHRSs in Australia is far from over and new enthusiasms for the use of big and open data to drive innovation in the healthcare sector suggest that the digital health record is a thin end of a much larger digitalization wedge. It remains to be seen whether the proposed shift to an opt-out model and financial incentives for use by GPs will help to evolve the Australian MyHR system into a more useful tool that is valued by those delivering and receiving healthcare. Regardless of what happens in the future, we now have 15 years of experience of attempts to build a workable NEHRS. (More on the site)

Lots more found on the link:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305627600_National_electronic_health_record_systems_as_wicked_projects%27_The_Australian_experience

There are about 10 pages supported by 91 references so a lot of work has gone into this!

Well worth a browse to appreciate there are perspectives out there other than that we get from the ADHA.

David.

It Is Very Important To Make Sure Data Mining Patient Records Is Properly Managed.

Here is a saga that has just started to unwind and be revealed.

http://uk.businessinsider.com/deepmind-royal-free-london-nhs-deal-inexcusable-mistakes-2017-3?r=US&IR=T

DeepMind's first deal with the NHS has been torn apart in a new academic study

• Sam Shead

• Mar. 16, 2017, 8:07 AM

A data-sharing deal between Google DeepMind and the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust was riddled with "inexcusable" mistakes, according to an academic paper published on Thursday.

The "Google DeepMind and healthcare in an age of algorithms" paper — coauthored by Cambridge University's Julia Powles and The Economist's Hal Hodson — questions why DeepMind was given permission to process millions of NHS patient records so easily and without patient approval.

"There remain many ongoing issues and it was important to document how the deal was set up, how it played out in public, and to try to caution against another deal from happening in this way in the future," Powles told Business Insider in Berlin the day before the paper was published.

DeepMind and Royal Free say that the study "completely misrepresents the reality of how the NHS uses technology to process data" and that it contains "significant mistakes."

Powles and Hodson said the accusations of misrepresentation and factual inaccuracy were unsubstantiated, and invited the parties to respond on the record in an open forum.

DeepMind has used the data access it was given to create a mobile app called Streams, which was initially designed to help clinicians monitor patients with acute kidney injury (AKI).

Powles, a research associate in law and computer science at St John's College, Cambridge, and Hodson, a technology correspondent for The Economist, argue in the paper published in the Health and Technology journal that the terms of the initial deal (a subsequent one has been made) were "highly questionable" and that they lacked transparency.

DeepMind has tried to defend the deal by saying that it's providing something known in the healthcare industry as "direct care," which assumes that an identifiable individual has given implied consent for their information to be shared or uses that involve the prevention, investigation, or treatment of illness.

"The specific problems are they had access to the data of every patient in the hospital on the legal basis that they were providing direct care to every patient," said Powles. "We think that's problematic given that they only ever asserted that they were interested in helping patients with acute kidney injury. They've since pivoted to look at a bunch of conditions but they haven't addressed the gap in the initial deal between what the purpose was and why they had the access they did."

She added: "If they'd had a small sample set with appropriate consents that proved the results, that showed that this app was working, and then they engaged patients and said we're going to roll it out on these terms, for this period and with this amount of money passing hands, then it would be a totally different game."

Powles believes that the case should be considered a "cautionary tale" for the NHS and other public institutions that are look to work with innovative tech firms.

Vastly more is found here:

http://uk.businessinsider.com/deepmind-royal-free-london-nhs-deal-inexcusable-mistakes-2017-3?r=US&IR=T

This is a hard one to me. Clearly the proponents of the program think they are doing valuable and useful work while the authors of the report have a range of concerns and issues.

It seems to me it is likely the friction is due to a failure of governance and planning before the work began and in that there is certainly a lesson. We are clearly going to have more discussions like this as AI and data mining come together - so we all need to be alert to the risk of problems and issues.

The article is well worth a read for the various nuances.

David.

We Really Have To Move Slowly And Carefully With Health Record Apps. It Is Not All That Easy!

This appeared a few days ago.

http://www.medicalrepublic.com.au/now-need-take-myhr-emr-apps-seriously/

16 March, 2017

Now you need to take the MyHR and EMR apps seriously

Posted by Jeremy Knibbs

We’re great ones for predictions at The Medical Republic so here goes a couple of big ones regarding personal electronic health records and GPs.

The My Health Record system (MyHR) is finally going to do some good, but patients carrying around their personal electronic medical records (EMR) isn’t going to look anything like government agencies or doctor groups have been saying it will for a while. That’s probably a relief because no one could quite work out how the MyHR was ever really going to work if neither doctors nor patients had particularly bought into uploading and maintaining the data.

Two things are happening about the MyHR project that should be far more interesting to GPs:

• The Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA) (formerly the NEHTA) is starting to cut through the murky world of pathology, radiology, pharmacy and hospital reporting to offer centralised data on the MyHR which doesn’t consist of just messily cobbled together health summaries from GPs who aren’t being paid well enough to stop and do this job properly.
• The private sector is starting to move rapidly on the mobile opportunity of personal health records and some, such as MediTracker, have cracked the problem of talking to the major patient management systems in a live, and reasonably seamless, manner.

GPs are now faced with the very real prospect of having technology which allows them, their patients, and allied network, to share a mobile patient record that is live and useful, and, most importantly, is not difficult for you or your patient to maintain.

Such technology can now serve a very immediate and practical purpose, such as help GPs provide chronic illnesses much better. And it isn’t going to get in the way of you and your patient, such as loading health summaries tend to do now.

Today, only one mobile app actually talks to the MyHR, and that is Chamonix’s offering, called Healthi.

Unfortunately, Healthi is currently next to useless because it doesn’t talk to your patient management system, such as Best Practice. Plus, Healthi doesn’t appear to understand the ecosystem of GPs and allied health professionals, where the most impact from a mobile personal EMR can be achieved.

To even get the Healthi app to work you have to set up a myGov account, and if you’ve ever tried to do that, you know that it’s going to be painful to get it all going.

MediTracker, which TMR reported on in our last edition, does talk to the major patient management systems and has a cloud network that talks to allied health, specialists and hospitals. But it isn’t talking to the MyHR yet. This apparently is going to change in the very near future.

When this occurs, GPs will have a lot of what they need for the personal mobile EMR to be very useful for them and their patients and GPs should start thinking about embracing it.

Undoubtedly the people from Chamonix are thinking of talking to the major medical software systems as well. And according to Tim Kelsey, CEO of ADHA, no fewer than 30 software and mobile developers are currently working on talking to the MyHR application program interface (API). So the race to produce a useful personal mobile EMR has well and truly started.

There is a great deal more here:

http://www.medicalrepublic.com.au/now-need-take-myhr-emr-apps-seriously/

So it seems there is a bit of a ‘gold rush’ on to get access to the myHR and make it available to the patient and other carers.

On the surface this all seems to be a splendid idea. As I was just digesting this, I had this little article appear!

Data breach fear for 26m GP records

Nadeem Badshah

March 18 2017, 12:01am, The Times

An investigation has been launched into the security of a computer system that holds 26 million patients’ records.

The Information Commissioner is looking into a potential breach involving 2,700 GP surgeries. It centres on SystmOne, which is used by family doctors. When GPs switch on “enhanced data sharing” so that records can be seen by a hospital, they also can be accessed by thousands of staff even if there is no medical reason to do so.

Paul Cundy, of the BMA’s IT committee, has written to GPs who use the system, which is owned by TPP, calling on them to take “urgent action”. He warned doctors that they had breached data protection laws. “This is a serious issue with potentially huge implications for patients, GPs and TPP. At the moment GPs are at risk of complaints being made against them,” he said.

More here:

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/data-breach-fear-for-26m-gp-records-9zsjzpkwv

My reaction was that there must rather have been a loud “oops!” coming from the developers. Clearly the design of the enhanced data sharing needs a little more work.

At the same time this appeared from the US.

GAO details weaknesses in federal push to share patient data

By Joseph Conn  | March 16, 2017

A federal watchdog group said HHS isn't doing enough to measure how much patients are using their medical records. The Government Accountability Office also found patients aren't accessing their medical records because they can't aggregate all of their information into one medical record, underscoring the need to streamline and standardize systems.

Patients often have to go through different portals for each provider, the GAO said, adding that patients generally have to manage separate login information for each provider-specific portal.

Personal health record technology is available to collect the records, but these systems “are not widely used,” a 55-page GAO report stated.

That is despite the federal government having spent more than $36 billion to incentivize hospitals to buy the technology to make it easier for patients to access and use their medical information. The federal government has long promoted the idea that informed patients are healthier and could potentially drive down costs.

Congress asked the GAO to look at interoperability of health IT systems from the patient's perspective. It was tasked with describing the extent and type of information available to patients, their views about access and what actions providers are taking to encourage access. Congress also asked the GAO to evaluate efforts by the HHS to boost patient access.

The agency looked at data from 3,318 hospitals and 194,200 physicians.

They found that hospitals participating in the EHR incentive payment program offered 88% of their patients electronic access to their medical records, but only 15% of those patients electronically accessed their information. For physicians and other eligible professionals in the incentive program, the numbers were 87% and 30%, respectively.

Lots more here:

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20170316/NEWS/170319916/gao-details-weaknesses-in-federal-push-to-share-patient-data

So, as always, care in handling patient information is vital! Additionally patients are apparently rather less interested in their health information than many imagine so it is important to have engaging and useful systems.

I hope all the relevant information controls and access controls are being mandated by the ADHA and that sensible pilots to confirm attractiveness and utility are also being conducted. I hope so!

David.

Weekly Australian Health IT Links – 20th March, 2017.

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

A very quiet week with very little apparently going on.

The biggest theme seems to be that Government IT projects keep falling over and causing delays and suffering.

There were a couple of interesting job adds this week with the descriptions of most interest.

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http://www.medicalrepublic.com.au/now-need-take-myhr-emr-apps-seriously/

16 March, 2017

Now you need to take the MyHR and EMR apps seriously

Posted by Jeremy Knibbs

We’re great ones for predictions at The Medical Republic so here goes a couple of big ones regarding personal electronic health records and GPs.

The My Health Record system (MyHR) is finally going to do some good, but patients carrying around their personal electronic medical records (EMR) isn’t going to look anything like government agencies or doctor groups have been saying it will for a while. That’s probably a relief because no one could quite work out how the MyHR was ever really going to work if neither doctors nor patients had particularly bought into uploading and maintaining the data.

Two things are happening about the MyHR project that should be far more interesting to GPs:

• The Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA) (formerly the NEHTA) is starting to cut through the murky world of pathology, radiology, pharmacy and hospital reporting to offer centralised data on the MyHR which doesn’t consist of just messily cobbled together health summaries from GPs who aren’t being paid well enough to stop and do this job properly.
• The private sector is starting to move rapidly on the mobile opportunity of personal health records and some, such as MediTracker, have cracked the problem of talking to the major patient management systems in a live, and reasonably seamless, manner.

-----

https://theconversation.com/dr-google-probably-isnt-the-worst-place-to-get-your-health-advice-73835

Dr Google probably isn’t the worst place to get your health advice

March 13, 2017 6.19am AEDT

Author Rachael Dunlop  Honorary Research Fellow, Macquarie University

Who is your preferred source for health advice? Gwyneth Paltrow? Pete Evans? Or qualified medical practitioners – like Dr Oz?

I hate to break it to you, but if you’re getting advice from any of these people, you’re quite likely being misled.

For example, contrary to Gwyneth Paltrow’s website, experts advise inserting jade “eggs” into your vagina is a very bad idea.

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https://ajp.com.au/news/health-record-need-know/

My Health Record: What you need to know

Sheshtyn Paola — 15/03/2017

Pharmacy has the greatest opportunity to benefit from this system, say Shane Jackson and Vicki Ibrahim from the Australian Digital Health Agency

APP presenters Mr Jackson and Ms Ibrahim have urged pharmacists to sign up to access and upload information via My Health Record.

“The Australian healthcare system is complex and we know its complexity is predicted to rise due to an ageing population and the burden of chronic illnesses,” says Ms Ibrahim.

She says consumers want to be active participants in their health.

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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/govt-held-back-by-triangle-of-despair-shetler-454872

Govt held back by 'triangle of despair': Shetler

By Paris Cowan on Mar 16, 2017 6:24AM

Ex-digital guru diagnoses the illness within.

Bureaucracies like Canberra are suffering from a "triangle of despair" blocking them from adapting to the digital ways of the 21st century, according to the federal government’s former digital guru Paul Shetler.

Despite departing the public sector amidst a very visible spat with Assistant Minister for Digital Transformation Angus Taylor, Shetler has continued to tout his digital mantras down under.

"[Digital transformation] can be a very painful experience," he told the audience at Sydney’s CDO Summit yesterday.

"I can tell you that because I know from experience."

Shetler argued that all complex organisations - such as his former employers, the UK and Australian governments - can be hamstrung by three "fiendish" elements conspiring to block digital change: inappropriate procurement, inappropriate governance, and ancient IT.

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http://www.afr.com/technology/australia-will-lead-world-in-medical-technology-says-bill-ferris-20170314-guy969

• Mar 16 2017 at 12:01 AM

Australia will lead world in medical technology, says Bill Ferris

by Yolanda Redrup

Innovation and Science Australia chair Bill Ferris has pinpointed the medical technology sector as the shining light of the country's innovation, believing it could become the world leader in genomic medicine. 

The comments from Mr Ferris come ahead of a speech on Thursday to the Australian American Chamber of Commerce, where he will outline the six key challenges for the country to become a "top tier innovation nation".

They will form the backbone of the recommendations Innovation and Science Australia is preparing to deliver to the government by the end of the year to position Australia to be a global innovation leader by 2030.

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http://www.itwire.com/security/77300-australian-data-breach-notification-does-it-really-solve-everything.html

Australian data breach notification: does it really solve everything?

• 16 March 2017
• Written by  Alex Tilley and Ray Shaw

 Last month, the Australian Government implemented Privacy Amendment (Notifiable Data Breaches) Bill 2016 legislation. It is a huge move, but in the end, does it change anything?

Analysts applauded the move but many are asking if it is the whole answer, especially exempting business with less than $3 million in turnover. They rightly ask, “Will this legislation solve the security problems – will it ensure all companies take precautions and implement top grade security?”

iTWire asked Alex Tilley, senior security researcher, Counter Threat Unit at SecureWorks (a public company spun out of Dell), to explain the issues in his own words. Alex is a former Australian Federal Police Senior Technical Analyst and prominent commenter on enterprise security matters.

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http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/cash-injection-right-medicine-for-doseme-push-into-hospitals/news-story/61605dbcb8b21a9aaad6501f6b6bd0d0

Cash injection right medicine for DoseMe push into hospitals

• The Australian
• 12:00AM March 14, 2017

David Swan

Australian medical start-up Dose­Me is looking to shake up how hospitals dose patients, landing $2.6 million in funding and deploying cloud-based technology that it says can lead to a reduction in hospital stay length by up to 10 days per patient.

“We’re about calculating a precise individualised dose of a medication,” DoseMe CTO and founder Robert McLeay told The Australian.

“When you think about the way drug dosages are calculated, they’re based on the average person. And there’s no such thing,” he said. “We give clinicians the power to calculate individualised doses; many things change what the right dose is; someone’s genes or other medications they’re on. When you calculate a more precise dose of a drug, it’s more effective and leads to better outcomes.”

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http://www.themandarin.com.au/75781-reviewing-evidence-evidence-based-policy/

Reviewing the evidence on evidence-based policy

By David Donaldson

14.03.2017

FEATURE: Evidence-based policy is a simple and alluring concept — who could disagree with the idea of basing decisions on facts? So why don’t we have it yet? Figuring out ‘what works’ can be more complicated than it seems.

Calls for public policy based on evidence are so common as to border on the ritualistic. ‘Evidence-based policy’ is such a woolly — yet self-evidently good — idea that it is nearly impossible to disagree with.

It’s hardly a new idea. Kevin Rudd told public servants early on in his prime ministership that “policy innovation and evidence-based policy-making is at the heart of being a reformist government.” The Blair government in the UK advocated basing reform on evidence, popularising the term “what works”. Deng Xiaoping famously quipped that “it doesn’t matter whether the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice.” Back in the nineteenth century Florence Nightingale wrote that health decisions “must be tested by results.”

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http://www.medicalrepublic.com.au/watson-cancer-story-ibm-doesnt-talk/

14 March, 2017

The Watson cancer story IBM doesn’t talk about

Posted by John Birmingham

IBM tells a nice story about Watson and oncology in India. The country has a paucity of oncologists — roughly 2000 in fact — to cover a population of 1.3 billion. Get cancer in India and your chances of receiving specialist care are, in relative terms, almost non-existent.

Enter Big Blue’s artificial intelligence platform. The company threw its AI firepower at the problem and — by IBM’s telling — within a few years the machine had ingested so much information and learnt so much that it could outperform cancer specialists in both diagnosis and treatment recommendations. As a story it is a powerful way to illustrate the potential of artificial intelligence.

More a series of APIs and applications than a unified platform, Watson is one of IBM chief Ginni Rometty’s great bets, as she recasts the global company and oversees another operational transformation.

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http://www.itwire.com/health/77244-future-of-digital-health-gets-top-billing-at-cebit.html

Future of digital health gets top billing at CeBIT

• 13 March 2017
• Written by  Peter Dinham

The latest strategic advancements in digital health, designed to improve service delivery and health outcomes in Australia, will be one of a number of key discussions at CeBIT Australia to be held in Sydney in May.

The CeBIT focus comes as an Austrade report says Australia’s digital health industry is set to reach a market value of $2.21 billion by 2020, an expected annual growth of 12.3%.

CeBIT takes place at the International Convention Centre Sydney, between 23 to 25 May and the CeBIT Digital Health conference will take place on 25 May.

Chris Harwood, platforms and operations at Healthdirect Australia, says the company recognises CeBIT Australia as an essential forum to discuss the future of technology in delivering healthcare services.

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http://www.hospitalhealth.com.au/content/technology/article/surgery-of-the-future-903903890

Surgery of the future

By Australian Hospital + Healthcare Bulletin Staff
Wednesday, 15 March, 2017

Surgery of the Future is an interactive experience which highlights research technologies funded by The National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB) that improve surgical procedures. Move through a virtual operating room to learn about technologies including new imaging tools, robotics, biomaterials and more. Surgery of the Future showcases government-funded technologies currently being developed to make surgery safer, more effective and less invasive.

Thanks in large part to the development of a wide range of biomedical technologies, tremendous strides have been made in surgical outcomes during the past 50 years. For example, advances in imaging technologies have made it easier for surgeons to plan surgical approaches so that they avoid cutting through healthy tissue, while robotic technologies have enabled surgeons to operate inside smaller incisions with greater accuracy and precision.

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http://apo.org.au/node/74334

Retired Australian’s use of information technology: a preliminary study

Joanne Phythian, Julie Tucker, Tim Comber, Bruce Armstrong, Simon Pervan

15 March 2014

Source: International Technology Management Review

In July 2010, Coffs Harbour, Australia was announced as one of fourteen National Broadband Network (NBN) second release sites and in February 2013, a number of households and businesses in Coffs Harbour had infrastructure installed to enable them to access the NBN (www.minister.dbcde.gov.au (link is external)).

High speed internet and the new generation of internet-based services has the potential to provide better health outcomes, increased social connectedness, enhanced functional capability and caregiver support for those most likely to need these services. A survey of technology use of residents of a retirement home on the Mid North Coast of NSW, Australia, showed a low uptake of technology and low engagement with online activities. An understanding of perceptions of technology usefulness, together with actual usage is necessary to assist in informing public policy and ensure that information, resources and programs aimed at increasing levels of internet uptake and use by older Australians is targeted, appropriate and effective. 

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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/hackers-steal-nhs-staff-data-after-breach-of-it-contractors-server-454572

Hackers steal NHS staff data after breach of IT contractor's server

By Danielle Correa on Mar 14, 2017 7:45AM

Thousands of hospital staff affected.

A hacker has stolen the personal details of thousands of Welsh NHS medical staff following an attack on a server operated by the service's IT contractor Landauer.

NHS Wales said not every staff member was impacted in the same way since a different combination of data was held on each staffer.

Over 500 people working at Velindre NHS Trust and 654 at Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board were victimised.

Hackers made off with information including names, birthdates, national insurance numbers, and radiation doses.

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https://ajp.com.au/news/guild-releases-latest-iteration-scriptmap/

Guild releases latest iteration of ScriptMAP

Sheshtyn Paola — 14/03/2017

Pharmacy owners can now access customised analyses of changes to the PBS predicted to 2020, based on their pharmacy’s own dispensing data for 12 months

The Pharmacy Guild of Australia has released the latest iteration of its financial forecasting product ScriptMAP.

A spokesperson for the Pharmacy Guild says the new tool, ScriptMAP 2020, will help community pharmacy assess alternative business strategies over the next four years.

“Prescriptions account for an average 66.5% of pharmacy revenue, making intelligence on projections the necessary first step in helping owners manage their pharmacy business and minimise risk,” says the spokesperson.

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http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-12/ndis-rollout-plagued-with-problems-foi-documents-reveal/8346892

National Disability Insurance Scheme rollout plagued with problems, FOI documents reveal

Exclusive by political reporter Dan Conifer and FOI editor Michael McKinnon

The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) stopped processing thousands of applications from service providers, critical staff were untrained and properties were not ready when the scheme's nationwide rollout began, documents have revealed.

A much-publicised IT meltdown saw people with disabilities wait weeks for their care packages to be approved while payments to providers froze.

After a six-month Freedom of Information (FOI) battle, even more chaos plaguing the NDIS's transition from trial sites to a full scheme on July 1 can be exposed.

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https://www.seek.com.au/job/33007229

APS5 Executive Assistant x 2

• Executive support to Senior Management in e-Health environment
• Brisbane

Better use of data and technology can help people live healthier, happier and more productive lives. Digital health can make a real difference to people's health by giving them greater control and better access to information.

Tasked with improving health outcomes for Australians through the delivery of digital healthcare systems and the national digital health strategy for Australia, the Australian Digital Health Agency (the Agency) commenced operations on 1 July 2016.

The Agency is responsible for national digital health services and systems, with a focus on engagement, innovation and clinical quality and safety. Our focus is on putting data and technology safely to work for patients, consumers and the healthcare professionals who look after them.

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https://www.seek.com.au/job/33041075

EPAS Communications Advisor

S.A. Health -

• Department for Health & Ageing, eHealth Systems, EPAS Program
• Indicative Total Remuneration: $83,509-$93,437 – Temp F/T (up to 29/12/2017) – ASO5

SA Health is implementing a new Enterprise Patient Administration System (EPAS) as the foundation of Australia's first fully integrated state-wide electronic Health Record. The implementation of the EPAS signals significant change throughout SA Health, and most if not all, medical, nursing, midwifery, allied health and support staff will be affected by the introduction of the new system and in particular the new capabilities and associated ways of working that will result from the introduction of an EPAS. In this role, you will be accountable to the Program Director for implementing effective communication projects within the EPAS Communications Plan, working in consultation with the project team, vendor and other technical and clinical partners across SA Health. You will support the Implementation and Business Change Team and the Training Team to embed the EPAS Communication Strategy across SA Health sites throughout the course of the EPAS Program. This will involve building partnerships with key stakeholders to facilitate the communication of key messages and information to the right users at the right time, levering a range of communication mediums, models and forums.

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https://www.digitalhealth.gov.au/news-and-events/news/1311-webinar-zen-and-the-art-of-managing-multimorbidity

Webinar: Zen and the art of managing multimorbidity

Created on Friday, 17 March 2017

The Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine (ACRRM) are holding the final webinar of its 'eHealth Enabled Management of Chronic and Complex Conditions' series on Tuesday 21 March 2017.

In this webinar, rural GPs and general practice nurses share the top tips that they have learnt, and the resources that they have discovered over many years.

The webinar will take place on Tuesday 21 March at the following times:

• WA – 5:00pm-6:00pm
• NT – 6:30pm-7:30pm
• QLD – 7:00pm-8:00pm
• SA – 7:30pm-8:30pm
• TAS, NSW, VIC, ACT – 8:00pm-9:00pm

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https://www.digitalhealth.gov.au/get-started-with-digital-health/what-is-digital-health/features-of-the-my-health-record-system/clinical-documents/new-national-diagnostic-imaging-program-march-2017

New national Diagnostic Imaging Program

Working towards having Diagnostic imaging reports available in the My Health Record system and accessible by consumers and healthcare providers.

Brisbane 2 March 2017

The Australian Digital Health Agency is pleased to announce the establishment of a new Diagnostic Imaging Program.

The Agency is working towards having diagnostic imaging and pathology reports available in a single location and accessible by consumers and healthcare providers. This will enhance clinical management and care by reducing wasted clinical time trying to locate results, and avoiding unnecessary repeat examinations where a healthcare provider is unable to obtain access to a reports or is unaware that an examination has been previously performed.

This work is in line with the Agency's vision of giving people more control of their health and care by better access to information.

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Enjoy!

David.

This is The Question I Really Think ADHA Has To Address.

The question, after 5 years of the myHR program is, given we are having a having a digital health reset with a new strategy what are the key strategic choices that should be decided on. In summary we need to be clear:

1. Would we decide to build and continue to build on what now exists as the myHR? or

2 Would we face up to reality and use more modern technologies to create a more sensibly architected  and designed solution with a clearer agreed purpose? or

3. Would we accept that the cost and value vs. benefit of national EHR system simply is not there and work to develop much better local / regional solutions? With the Internet and the cloud national systems may just be unnecessary?

To address these it seems to me the first question to be addressed is just what is the purpose of the myHR?

1. Is it to facilitate access to critical clinical information when the patient is away from their usual doctor? or

2. Is it to improve the coordination of care for patients receiving complex care ? or

3. Is it to provide a data-base for the DoH to mine? or

4. Is it to do something else.

As it is unlikely all these purposes can be successfully met in the one system the issue becomes what, if anything, should be done locally vs. regionally vs. nationally.

What has to be done flows from properly addressing these issues above IMVHO.

What do others think?

David.

Why Do So-Called Experts Keep Making Total Nit Wits Of Themselves When Talking About The myHR?

This article popped up a few days ago.

• Mar 16 2017 at 12:01 AM

Australia will lead world in medical technology, says Bill Ferris

by Yolanda Redrup

Innovation and Science Australia chair Bill Ferris has pinpointed the medical technology sector as the shining light of the country's innovation, believing it could become the world leader in genomic medicine. 
The comments from Mr Ferris come ahead of a speech on Thursday to the Australian American Chamber of Commerce, where he will outline the six key challenges for the country to become a "top tier innovation nation".
They will form the backbone of the recommendations Innovation and Science Australia is preparing to deliver to the government by the end of the year to position Australia to be a global innovation leader by 2030.
"We're looking to 2030 and setting out what Australia can hope to be doing in a world leading sense," he said. "The one I'm most optimistic about is under the banner of digital health service delivery and medical documentation and history platforms, with these leading to better preventative procedures, analysis, big data access and all manner of new business applications.
"Big data will also fall under the heading of precision medicine, which stems from our capabilities in gene sequencing and pathology analysis. That is a huge area of activity and from our analysis Australia is already right up there and could be positioned at the front of the bus."
Precision medicine aims to create targeted therapies for individuals based on unique factors such their genes, environment and lifestyle. One branch of precision medicine is pharmacogenomics, which examines how genes affect a person's response to particular drugs.
The country already has the Australian Genome Referencing Facility, with the Melbourne branch based at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, while Sydney has the Kinghorn Centre for Clinical Genomics at the Garvan Institute. In November 2015 the National Health and Medical Research Council made the second largest grant in its history of $25 million to the Australian Genomic Health Alliance, a national network of 47 partner organisations including research institutes, hospitals and universities.
Mr Ferris said the medical sector was already world-class when it came to knowledge creation and the $500 million Biomedical Translation Fund would lead to more commercial successes. He also said the Department of Health's My Health Record database would open up new opportunities for start-ups.
"My Health Record works on an opt-out basis and privacy issues have already been well covered and in that sense we're ahead of almost anyone in the world ... it can become a valuable resource for better service delivery, prognosis, diagnosis and the basis for a whole pile of new business applications, including precision medicine," he said.

Lots more here:

http://www.afr.com/technology/australia-will-lead-world-in-medical-technology-says-bill-ferris-20170314-guy969

Talk about simplistic magical thinking on the myHR.

First I am not sure anyone would suggest the privacy issues around the myHR have been fully addressed – we will only get to know that, if the system actually get used! Just how access can be provided securely to a mob of excited app developers hoping to develop the ‘next big thing’ is also a real worry.

Second it would be hard to imagine a system less suited to precision / genomic medicine than a large scale collection of .pdfs which is ill equipped to handle atomic data – especially atomic genomic data!

Third the lack of evidence of impact on service delivery improvement, diagnosis and prognosis etc. is pretty profound for the myHR.

It is interesting to note Mr Ferris apparently thinks the decision around opt-out has been taken – as was pointed out in a recent comment. No one seems to have told the public!

Lastly does anyone really believe this system will get to be so dramatically improved some time in even the far future that all this will actually be delivered. With the myHR track record to date I would be amazed!

My suggestion is that Mr Ferris confines his public comments to things he actually has significant in-depth understanding of, and not assume an ADHA briefing will provide the full picture!.

David.

AusHealthIT Poll Number 362 – Results – 19th March, 2017.

Here are the results of the poll.

Is The ADHA Being Adequately Transparent With The National Digital Health Planning Process To Ensure A Well Supported And Agreed Outcome?

Yes 3% (5)

No 78% (152)

I Have No Idea 19% (38)

Total votes: 195

I think it would be fair to say readers believe ADHA could do a little better with the transparency of its planning.

A really great turnout of votes!

Again, many, many thanks to all those that voted!

David.