Here are a few I came across last week.
Note: Each link is followed by a title and 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.
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Special Report: Interoperability
The new secretary of state for health and social care has placed interoperability at the heart of his vision for the NHS. So is the long-standing nut of information sharing between systems about to be cracked? Jennifer Trueland investigates.
With his initial technology strategy, secretary of state for health and social care Matt Hancock has made it perfectly plain what he wants to see in the realms of NHS IT – and interoperability is right at the heart.
Outdated and obstructive digital systems will become a thing of the past, he has frequently stated. A set of standards will be the order of the day, to ensure systems can speak to one another. Indeed, he has said such standards will be mandatory.
It would be easy to react with cynicism to Mr Hancock’s vision which, after all, is hardly revolutionary. He is not the first health minister in a UK country to express the wish that systems could better communicate with each other, and it’s fair to say that none has entirely turned that wish into reality yet.
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Digital guide for ‘pregnancy, birth and beyond’ launched for parents
Doctors in north-west London have developed a digital maternity new parents.
Hanna Crouch, 15 November, 2018
Developed alongside mothers and and midwives, the Mum and Baby app provides women with NHS information on “pregnancy, birth and beyond”.
The app allows women to choose where in north west London they would like to give birth and how they wish to have their baby delivered.
It also gives access to essential information on different stages of maternity, from pregnancy to giving birth and looking after a new baby, as well as access to personalised plans of care.
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NHS issues guidance on use of instant messaging apps
NHS England has issued new guidelines for clinicians around the use of instant messaging apps during emergencies.
Owen Hughes – 14 November, 2018
The guidance sets out how and in which circumstances doctors, nurses and other healthcare staff can use messaging apps within acute care settings.
It also includes outlines privacy rules and procedures for sharing patient information.
Andrew Miles, consultant general surgeon and Royal College of Surgeons Council Member, said: “Patient safety is enhanced when NHS staff can quickly communicate confidential patient information between teams, such as by instant messaging.
“Doctors have a responsibility to abide by all relevant rules on patient confidentiality and a professional responsibility to ensure they do not breach that confidentiality when using instant messaging tools.
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Roundup: 12 healthcare algorithms cleared by the FDA
As AI cements its role in healthcare, more and more intelligent software offerings are pursuing 510(k) and De Novo approvals.
By Dave Muoio
November 15, 2018
“FDA is lagging in the production of guidance to explain its approach for these newer products. This is a problem, because Commissioner Gottlieb himself in a blog post noted well over a year ago that individual decision-making by FDA is not enough for digital therapeutics to thrive,” Bradley Merrill Thompson, a lawyer at Epstein Becker & Green who also leads CDS Coalition, an industry group, wrote in an email on the subject.
“Industry has been asking since 2015 for better guidance on the use of software-based algorithms in connection with drug administration. The commissioner, starting in April 2018, has been promising new guidance focused on the use of software with drugs, and in fact reiterated that promise only a couple weeks ago. But the concern is that the new guidance may not be focused on the issues of greatest concern to industry. We shall have to wait to see.”
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https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/half-companies-have-stalled-digital-transformation-study-finds
Half of companies have stalled digital transformation, study finds
Researchers pinpointed five main points of failure for digital transformation plans.
By Diana Manos
November 16, 2018 11:28 AM
Digital transformation is a business-wide challenge, and many large organizations are struggling with it. That’s as true in healthcare as it is in other industries.
More than half (51 percent) of the organizations surveyed for a new report, in fact, were stalled in either the planning or the implementation stages or had abandoned their IT projects altogether, according to a survey titled, “The Challenge of Change: IT in Transition,” commissioned by Insight Enterprises, Inc.
WHY IT MATTERS
For the study, researchers surveyed 200 IT executives working in organizations with a median of 6,250 employees across a wide range of industries, and they discovered that most are still in the early stages of digital transformation. This included 65 percent of enterprises with more than 10,000 employees.
Implementing change across multiple legacy systems is one of the major sources of pain, the study found, with 64 percent citing legacy IT infrastructure, processes and tools as one of the top five barriers to transformation. Other barriers included: data security (60 percent), technology silos (59 percent), budget (54 percent) and competing priorities (53 percent).
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Hacking and mega-breaches: 2018 the worst year yet?
While the number of overall data breaches is down, incidents involving 100 million or more records continue to be a concern, a new report found.
By Diana Manos
November 16, 2018 09:59 AM
The number of reported data breaches in 2018 is at a consistent pace with this same time period in 2017, according to new research from Risk Based Security, but there’s a catch: mega-breaches and hacking persist as top cybersecurity concerns across all industries.
WHY IT MATTERS
So far there have been 3,676 publicly disclosed data breaches across all industries exposing approximately 3.6 billion records.
Seven of the breaches through the third quarter of this year exposed 100 million or more records, with the 10 largest accounting for 84.5 percent of the records exposed, the report said.
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Data-Driven Medicine Will Help People — But Can It Do So Equally?
Technological advances threaten to make a crushingly unequal system even more so.
The promise of data-driven medicine is clear. Using the latest analytical techniques can lead to better health outcomes and — over time as data technology inevitably becomes cheaper and more widely available — help many more people. But as medicine moves from the kind of clinical practice that has informed centuries of treatment to the data-driven practices that have already transformed commerce, finance and the media, it will also find itself facing some of the same social challenges. In particular, big-data technology might seem like a social neutralizer or even a leveling force, but it can have a way of increasing divisions.
One hint at why this is comes from what communications theorists describe as a knowledge gap. Basically, people who already have better information are also better at getting more information, even if that information is in theory universal and available to all. We see this again and again in different fields. In my own research on schools and computers, for example, I often encounter students doing advanced and creative “technology” activities on the computers in well-off schools, and students doing rote learning and typing on the computers in poorer ones. That division means that later on, when the kids face a putatively even playing field, some will know better than others how to get ahead. Privileged kids get more resources not simply because they (or the schools) can afford to pay for them but because their parents are better equipped to advocate for their acceptance into gifted and talented programs, or to academically support them better through tutoring, attention and encouragement — harder tasks for a poor or single parent. There is also the effect of expectations and a lifetime of socialization: If you experience life as unfair, you are probably less likely to demand better when you encounter more injustice.
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FDA deficient on device cybersecurity readiness, watchdog says
Author Susan Kelly
Published Nov. 2, 2018
Dive Brief:
- HHS' office of inspector general in a new audit called FDA's policies and procedures deficient for addressing postmarket cybersecurity threats to medical devices.
- Specifically, FDA had not adequately tested its ability to respond to cybersecurity emergencies involving devices, and in two of 19 district offices had no written standard operating procedures covering recalls of vulnerable devices, OIG found.
- FDA said the report paints "an incomplete and inadequate" picture of the agency's oversight of medical device cybersecurity.
Dive Insight:
U.S. government agencies are scrambling to improve strategies for addressing and preventing cybersecurity risks to medical devices and healthcare organizations after a wave of attacks against the industry in the past two years, including the high-profile WannaCry breach in May 2017.
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New milestone for two data exchange alliances
Published November 16 2018, 5:34pm EST
Two industry initiatives that have worked together to advance interoperability are teaming again to further expand connectivity.
Commonwell Health Alliance, a vendor-led organization that embeds interoperability services into health information systems, brings its 3-year-old health information exchange to the table.
Carequality has been working on a governance framework that enables different networks to link to each other in much the same way that the telephone system works—pick a participating stakeholder listed in Carequality’s data repository and make the connection.
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HIT Think Blockchain's top challenge: Securing the world’s most secure technology
Published November 16 2018, 4:53pm EST
“Blockchain, it’s an immutable distributed ledger,” is something we’ve all heard from bitcoin enthusiasts time and time again, but what does that really mean? How safe is it? How can we secure tech’s most secure technology?
An immutable distributed ledger sounds complicated but at its core, the idea is simple: blockchain works as a shared record of information that multiple parties reference and can observe any addition made to it.
Any questionable addition to the blockchain will always be recognized by the other holders of the same record. The questionable addition is then compared against the records held by every other party to determine if it was indeed a legitimate addition. If a transaction is legitimate, it is added to the record permanently.
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HIPAA update inches closer to reality
HHS said it is looking to remove regulatory barriers to health information sharing and the plan just took a first step.
By Diana Manos
November 15, 2018 09:06 AM
Federal regulatory efforts to upgrade HIPAA have taken a step toward reform. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Civil Rights (OCR) passed the HIPAA request for information (RFI) on to the Office of Management and Budget, appearing on the OMB docket for review on Nov. 13, 2018.
WHY IT MATTERS
This is just one step in many for HIPAA reform’s long march from its origin in the days of paper medical records to the accommodation of the electronic data-sharing needed to coordinate care under today’s value-based payment models.
Yale researchers last month, for instance, said that even despite HIPAA's intent, hospitals wind up being roadblocks to patients trying to access data in EHRs, and calls to overhaul the law for the digital age have grown louder recently.
“The HHS Deputy Secretary recently launched an initiative called the Regulatory Sprint to Coordinated Care. The goal of the Regulatory Sprint is to remove regulatory barriers that impede coordinated, value-based health care. This RFI is being produced to support the Regulatory Sprint,” according to the OMB docket.
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AMIA calls for tighter coordination of data privacy rules
Informatics group said the blurring lines between consumer and medical information systems demands privacy policies relevant to both sides.
By Mike Miliard
November 15, 2018 12:11 PM
The American Medical Informatics Association is asking the Trump administration to take a close look at both HIPAA and the Common Rule to see how they might be updated or harmonized for a new era of privacy policy.
Specifically, the AMIA wants a more integrated approach to how policies aimed at both the "health sector" and "consumer sector" are defined.
WHY IT MATTERS
A patchwork of consumer and patient privacy policies already exists in healthcare, AMIA told the National Telecommunications and Information Administration this week.
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AI outperforms cardiologists in detecting heart murmurs, study suggests
A new artificial intelligence algorithm was able to detect pediatric heart murmurs more accurately than human cardiologists in a clinical study, according an abstract presented at the American Heart Association's scientific sessions in November.
The AI algorithm, developed by software developer and cardiac monitoring company Eko, analyzes heart sounds data from non-invasive sensors with machine learning, a type of AI in which a computer learns over time, rather than having to be programmed like typical software.
To test the algorithm's ability to detect heart murmurs, a team of researchers used an independent dataset of pediatric heart sounds. The research team then compared the AI's findings to independent diagnoses from five pediatric cardiologists, who listened to the same heart sound recordings.
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VA Achieves Several Milestones in Cerner EHR Implementation
OEHRM Executive Director John Windom recently detailed VA’s progress toward completing its Cerner EHR implementation.
By Kate Monica
November 14, 2018 - Over the past six months, VA has awarded Cerner three task orders, conducted a Current State Review of VA initial operating capability (IOC) care sites, and established 18 EHR councils to support the development of national standardized clinical and business workflows for the federal agency’s Cerner EHR implementation.
Office of Electronic Health Record Modernization (OEHRM) Executive Director John Windom reported on these and other VA activities during a November 14 VA technology modernization subcommittee hearing.
Since June, VA has awarded Cerner task orders related to data migration and enterprise interface development, functional baseline design and development, and IOC deployment.
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Cost of VA’s EHR modernization program grows by $350M
Published November 15 2018, 7:28am EST
The Department of Veterans Affairs has added $350 million to its cost estimates for the VA’s electronic health record modernization program—an increase that isn’t sitting well with members of Congress.
According to the latest VA data provided to Congress, the total cost to implement a new Cerner EHR system over 10 years will now exceed $16.1 billion—up from $15.8 billion—of which, the agency’s contract with the health IT vendor remains valued at $10 billion.
John Windom, executive director of the VA’s Office of EHR Modernization, told lawmakers on Wednesday that the additional $350 million now included in the latest agency program estimates are budgeted to cover staff salaries for VA employees over a decade.
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Variety of healthcare entities see a bright future for AI
Published November 15 2018, 5:20pm EST
A survey of 500 senior healthcare executives by Optum reveals optimism on the promise of artificial intelligence, offset by the work needed to achieve results.
Participating vice presidents and C-level executives that included CEO, COO, CFO, CTO and CMOs represented hospitals, clinics and delivery systems, life sciences organizations, health insurers and employers. Nearly all the executives reported that they believe AI can make the industry more affordable and accessible.
The survey indicates a tipping point has arrived in adoption of AI in healthcare, with significant investments to be made within the next five years, resulting in positive returns on investment for employers and insurers within three years, and a ROI for hospitals in four or five years.
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HIT Think What 'Amazon healthcare' could look like in 5 years
November 15 2018, 5:15pm EST
While Amazon has grabbed headlines this week by announcing the location of its new headquarters (to be split between New York and Northern Virginia), the healthcare industry has been keeping a close eye on the retail, technology, and logistics giant for several months now.
Over the past year, the company has hired a slew of former healthcare leaders, acquired the direct-to-consumer pharmacy business PillPack, and moved forward with a high-profile venture to jointly manage the health of its employee population alongside JPMorgan Chase and Berkshire Hathaway.
These moves have led many to speculate as to how Amazon could disrupt the healthcare industry. And while these musings often come alongside a healthy dose of well-warranted skepticism, there's little doubt that Amazon is unique among the growing list of outside players eyeing the healthcare space.
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What are the top health IT priorities in Europe? Not so different from the U.S.
New research from HIMSS Analytics finds widespread interest in patient-generated data and interoperability, along with a need for tech talent and bigger cybersecurity budgets.
By Tom Sullivan
November 14, 2018 12:52 PM
Hospital IT executives in Europe share many of the same priorities and face many similar challenges as CIOs in other regions of the globe, including the United States, according to the HIMSS Analytics Annual European eHealth Survey 2018 released on Wednesday.
Among them: empowering patients, sharing health information, protecting sensitive data and managing the growing need for a deeper talent pool.
WHY IT MATTERS
Healthcare entities around the globe are all facing what is essentially the same set of opportunities and challenges in digital transformation.
Whether you call it patient experience, engagement or empowerment, HIMSS Analytics found that consumers owning and managing their own data, whether in apps or wearables, is a high priority among the 571 health information and technology professionals who participated in the survey.
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Rural patients use telehealth less frequently than urban patients, USDA finds
Telehealth has the potential to support patients in rural areas where physician shortages may make it difficult to access healthcare services. However, rural residents have not been as receptive to remote care services as their urban counterparts, according to a report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Researchers from the USDA analyzed household data from 50,000 households comprising more than 130,000 individuals who participated in the U.S. Census Bureau's 2015 Current Population Survey to assess how people living in rural areas use telehealth services.
The analysis, which focused on three telehealth activities practiced by patients aged 15 or olders, found rural residents were less likely than urban residents to engage with telehealth services.
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Allscripts ranks as No. 1 in Black Book's survey: Top 10 integrated EHRs
Allscripts ranked as the top integrated EHR, practice management and revenue cycle management platform for health systems and integrated delivery networks, according to a survey from Black Book Market Research.
Black Book polled more than 3,000 users of integrated hospital and physician EHR, practice management and revenue cycle management platforms for its annual survey. The poll measures customer satisfaction for more than 150 EHR systems with practice management or revenue cycle management capabilities across 18 performance indicators.
Allscripts, the most highly recommended system on Black Book's poll, scored 11 out of the 18 performance indicators.
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6 factors that will propel the use of telehealth
Published November 14 2018, 4:00am EST
A new report from Chilmark Research examines a largely untapped market in the telemedicine field—the use of telehealth outside of the hospital. The researchers say there will be increased interest in cases in which patients are not being cared for directly but are participating in their care through passive monitoring or active engagement with their care team.
As providers seek telehealth partners, Brian Eastwood, an analyst at Chilmark, assesses the challenges that telehealth vendors face. “Vendors should prepare to support value-based care as payers continue to transition away from fee-for-service and look to telehealth as a way to provide low-cost access to convenient care with the potential to improve both clinical and financial outcomes,” he advises. Consequently, Eastwood offers six areas of functionality that are essential to best serve providers and insurers.
As providers seek telehealth partners, Brian Eastwood, an analyst at Chilmark, assesses the challenges that telehealth vendors face. “Vendors should prepare to support value-based care as payers continue to transition away from fee-for-service and look to telehealth as a way to provide low-cost access to convenient care with the potential to improve both clinical and financial outcomes,” he advises. Consequently, Eastwood offers six areas of functionality that are essential to best serve providers and insurers.
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AMA president calls for end to electronic health record abuse
Published November 14 2018, 7:24am EST
The nation’s largest physician group is calling for an end to electronic health record “abuse” which is relegating doctors to the role of data entry clerks and leading to widespread professional burnout.
According to the American Medical Association, the problem of physician burnout is impacting about 50 percent of practicing doctors, and EHRs are squarely to blame, given that for every hour physicians spend on direct patient care they spend two hours on EHR data entry and other administrative tasks.
“Doctors are spending excessive time on data entry, contributing to physician burnout, with implications for quality of care,” AMA President Barbara McAneny, MD, told the opening session of the group’s Interim Meeting, held this week in National Harbor, Maryland.
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HIT Think Top trends that will affect database managers in 2019
By Oren Eini
Published November 14 2018, 5:00pm EST
This past year has proven to be one of enterprise tech’s most tumultuous years. Major outages like that of YouTube, coupled with the massive security and privacy debates which infused conversations in board rooms all over the world, showed technology professionals just how sticky things can get when database management goes awry.
Looking ahead to 2019, organizations should use what they’ve learned from the past year to understand and take action towards improvement, starting with their central command—the database. With data being produced, analyzed and stored at exponential rates (thanks to the growing technological ecosystem), the database is perhaps the most crucial element in overcoming—and preventing—similar outages and data breaches in the coming year.
There are several things likely to occur in 2019. Here’s what database managers and developers can expect to see happen in the coming months.
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The quest for identified data: Why some firms are bypassing hospitals to buy data directly from patients
by Eli Richman
Nov 14, 2018 2:23pm
Would you sell your own healthcare data to a private company? What if it could help them discover a new treatment? What if you were poor and desperate for income?
Those are the questions patients are faced with in the new world of protected health information (PHI) marketplaces. Data brokers have long bought deidentified data from healthcare organizations, but recently, firms have begun going outside the traditional healthcare system and offering to pay patients directly for their data.
These offers put patients in a tough position. On the one hand, people are almost never offered money for their own data—usually data are sold by a third party, like Facebook or a hospital. And the prospect of getting cash in exchange for something intangible like data could be very attractive to someone who's very sick and/or under tight budget constraints.
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Lawmakers grill VA officials on higher costs of EHR overhaul
by Evan Sweeney
Nov 14, 2018 4:17pm
Members of a House committee overseeing the Department of Veterans Affairs’ massive EHR overhaul questioned agency leaders on Wednesday about new program costs that have added $350 million to the budget.
During a 180-day review hearing before the House Veterans Affairs Committee's Subcommittee on Technology Modernization, Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind., wondered why despite $650 million in lower infrastructure costs over the next three years, the overall EHR modernization budget has increased $350 million to $16.1 billion.
"The total estimate has already gone up before any real work begins," he said. "How can that be?"
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HIMSS launches executive education program from Harvard Medical School
The three-day program at Harvard Medical School aims to educate healthcare leaders about best practices for using data analytics to drive business objectives.
November 13, 2018 11:14 AM
HIMSS on Tuesday announced the Data, Insights and Strategies for the Health Enterprise program.
Designed by Harvard Medical School, the education program is open to healthcare executives and will feature thoughts leaders discussing plans for leading the enterprise to "new levels of success through data, analytics and technology," according to HIMSS.
"Today's healthcare environment is increasingly complex," said HIMSS in a statement. "Maintaining a competitive advantage requires organizations meet these challenges head-on without compromising clinical excellence or technical competence."
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Healthcare IT News has gone global: Here's what you need to know
A look at how both Healthcare IT News and sister site MobiHealthNews are now serving an international audience and what that means.
By Tom Sullivan
November 13, 2018 09:49 AM
Welcome to the global edition of Healthcare IT News!
As most readers already know, Healthcare IT News recently launched as a global brand, which means you will get the same coverage and more.
With this exciting change brings a new era for Healthcare IT News and its sister site, MobiHealthNews, both of which are complimentary and have an international footprint. We both report breaking news and daily happenings in the information and technology space, as well as deep-dive features, analysis and insights into the hardest problems health IT pros face.
But we also draw distinctions between our coverage areas. In order to better inform our readers and to help guide them to the content that they’re most interested in, we wanted to break down those distinctions as we enter this new era.
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Telehealth Companies, Home Health Providers See Major Upside in CMS Proposal
By Robert Holly | November 11, 2018
A recently proposed rule by federal policymakers expanding access to telehealth services through Medicare Advantage (MA) plans would likely be a major boon to home health providers and technology vendors alike, industry insiders say.
Currently, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) largely restricts telehealth reimbursement to clinical settings in rural areas, apart from certain exceptions in Alaska and Hawaii. While that regulatory landscape has opened the door for telehealth use in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) operating in sparsely populated, non-urban markets, it has mostly shut out the home health industry and slowed providers’ innovation pace.
Other roadblocks have hurt industry adoption as well, Lee Horner, CEO of Clearwater, Florida-based virtual care company Synzi, told Home Health Care News via email.
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Microsoft releases FHIR Server for Azure to empower developers
Published November 13 2018, 7:36am EST
A Microsoft open source project—based on HL7’s Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources standard—is looking to empower developers to exchange and manage clinical health data in the cloud.
Microsoft Healthcare’s FHIR Server for Azure, an open source project on GitHub, provides support infrastructure for “immediate provisioning in the cloud including mapping to Azure Active Directory as well as the ability to enable role-based access controls,” according to the vendor.
Heather Jordan Cartwright, general manager of Microsoft Healthcare, made the announcement about the release of FHIR Server for Azure on Monday in a blog post, emphasizing that this open source project will make it easier for organizations working with healthcare data to leverage the cloud for clinical data processing and machine learning workloads.
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Microsoft releases FHIR Server for Azure to empower developers
Published November 13 2018, 7:36am EST
A Microsoft open source project—based on HL7’s Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources standard—is looking to empower developers to exchange and manage clinical health data in the cloud.
Microsoft Healthcare’s FHIR Server for Azure, an open source project on GitHub, provides support infrastructure for “immediate provisioning in the cloud including mapping to Azure Active Directory as well as the ability to enable role-based access controls,” according to the vendor.
Heather Jordan Cartwright, general manager of Microsoft Healthcare, made the announcement about the release of FHIR Server for Azure on Monday in a blog post, emphasizing that this open source project will make it easier for organizations working with healthcare data to leverage the cloud for clinical data processing and machine learning workloads.
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Dartmouth-Hitchcock adopts telehealth to expand ICU care
Published November 13 2018, 4:26pm EST
New Hampshire’s largest delivery system is adopting telehealth technology to conduct consultations for intensive care patients.
Dartmouth-Hitchcock, the state’s only academic health system, serves 1.9 million residents across New England with more than 1,200 physicians delivering care. This initiative is aimed at reducing mortality, lengths of stay and ventilation days while providing patients with the care they need wherever they are.
With fewer than half of intensive care units in U.S. hospitals employing full-time intensivists, telehealth consultations using remote intensivists can help providers offer around-the-clock monitoring of critically ill patients at Dartmouth and rural hospitals.
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HIT Think Why organizations need to know full benefits of artificial intelligence
Published November 13 2018, 4:36pm EST
Artificial Intelligence is dominating both headlines and the agendas of business leaders. Our 2018 Views from the C-Suite survey of global executives finds widespread agreement that there are tremendous opportunities in digitization and new technologies such as AI.
Fully 71 percent of executives expect AI to have "transformative effects for economic growth and competitiveness" over the next 12 months. However, executives may need to temper their expectations for the short-term implications of AI.
Much of executives’ enthusiasm is justified. AI is already being deployed in a range of arenas, from digital assistants and self-driving cars to predictive analytics software providing early detection of diseases or recommending consumer goods based on shopping habits. A recent Gartner study finds that AI will generate $1.2 trillion in business value in 2018—a striking 70 percent increase over last year. According to Gartner, the number could swell to close to $4 trillion by 2022.
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Health privacy advocates worry DeepMind will break its promise not to share health data with Google, but the company says nothing is changing
- DeepMind Health will be absorbed into Google Health, the newly-formed subsidiary led by former hospital executive David Feinberg.
- DeepMind has stressed that it will not share sensitive health information with its parent company. And a spokesperson said that won't change in the wake of the re-org.
- But critics are concerned about this growing relationship between the two companies.
13 November, 2018 CNBC.com
DeepMind, the Alphabet subsidiary focused on health and AI, announced in a company blog post on Tuesday that its health group will be absorbed by Google. That news comes just days after Google disclosed plans to form a new, centralized health unit at its Silicon Valley, California headquarters led by David Feinberg, a physician and former hospital executive.
As part of the move, Google will now manage the Streams app that DeepMind created. Streams is a tool to help doctors and nurses figure out which of their patients are at increased risk for acute kidney injury. It does that by analyzing patient information and sending an alert to a clinician's phone to let them know that they're urgently needed.
The move concerns some privacy advocates, as DeepMind had previously promised not to share data with its parent company.
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Alphabet merges DeepMind and health efforts into Google
Published November 14 2018, 4:52pm EST
Alphabet is merging part of its London-based artificial intelligence company DeepMind into sister company Google.
DeepMind executives say the team that created a mobile app to alert healthcare providers to hospital patients at risk of deteriorating will join a newly formed Google division, called Google Health. The unit is being headed by David Feinberg, the former chief executive officer of Geisinger Health Systems.
Google bought DeepMind, founded in 2012, for 400 million pounds in 2014. The next year, the company began working on healthcare research, eventually creating an entire division dedicated to the area.
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What the midterm elections could mean for the federal cybersecurity agenda
When Democrats take control of the House of Representatives in January, expect a continuation of the current federal cybersecurity agenda on Capitol Hill with slight modifications.
Both houses of Congress will be tasked with overseeing President Donald Trump’s new cyber strategy, which has been trumpeted by administration officials for taking more offensive cyber operations and bolstering the federal government’s cyber defenses.
“IT modernization will always remain a top priority no matter who is in control because it is a legacy priority,” Robert Ferrell, a vice president at World Wide Technology and former Army CIO told Fifth Domain. “There is a huge demand to fix things" on both sides of the aisle.
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Quest Diagnostics becomes 2nd national lab to join Apple Health Records
by Evan Sweeney
Nov 9, 2018 12:45pm
Just over a week after LabCorp announced it would make test results available through Apple’s Health Record app, another national laboratory is doing the same.
Quest Diagnostics announced that its MyQuest portal is available to iPhone users through the Apple Health app that has connected more than 120 hospitals, provider groups, and now the two largest clinical laboratories in the country.
"Consumers play a more active role in managing their health and wellness than ever before, and they expect the most accurate and up-to-date diagnostic information, so that they can make educated decisions," Cathy Doherty, senior vice president and group executive of Clinical Franchise Solutions & Marketing, said in an announcement. "The MyQuest update supporting Health Records on iPhone is another resource for individuals to empower better health."
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Vanderbilt leverages multi-factor authentication
Published November 12 2018, 7:07am EST
Faced with mounting phishing attacks, Vanderbilt University Medical Center is implementing multi-factor authentication for online access to data.
According to VUMC, cybercriminals have been launching email scams against the Nashville, Tenn.-based healthcare organization to steal employee login credentials. Data held by human resource departments is often the target of these attacks—in fact, it’s become almost a daily occurrence for someone at Vanderbilt to receive a phishing email.
“When a phishing attack on an employee succeeds, the hacker might go first to the human resources system to get the employee’s bank account information (on file to allow automatic deposit of paychecks) and Social Security number,” warns VUMC’s Enterprise Cybersecurity group.
However, starting on November 19, multi-factor authentication will be required when users of C2HR (the HR self-service portal) try to access their direct deposit information, tax information or personal profile.
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Athenahealth to be acquired by investment firms for $5.7B
By Fred Bazzoli
Published November 12 2018, 11:32am EST
After a lengthy search for a buyer, athenahealth has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired for $5.7 billion in cash.
The purchasers are Veritas Capital and Evergreen Coast Capital (the private equity subsidiary of Elliott Management), which will buy athenahealth through an affiliate.
Under terms of the agreement, athenahealth shareholders will receive $135 in cash per share. That per share price represents a premium of about 12 percent over the company’s closing stock price on Friday, November 9, the last day of trading for the stock prior to the announcement.
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12 Steps to Accelerate Physician Adoption of Digital Strategies
AMA Playbook helps physicians and health systems overcome barriers to implementation and achieving scale.
In an age of disruptive innovation, there are a lot of great ideas to transform healthcare, yet tremendous difficulty implementing digital strategies among physicians. The American Medical Association (AMA) has done something to change that dynamic with the Digital Health Implementation Playbook.
“Accelerating the pace of digital health adoption requires an efficient and proven path to success, but best practices are not widely shared," says Michael Hodgkins, MD, AMA chief medical information officer. "The Playbook responds to a growing demand for proven guidance that physicians and care teams need to successfully integrate effective digital solutions into practice.”
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Doctors are not using summary care records as intended
November 11, 2018 - 06:25
Article from Norwegian centre for E-health research
Most Norwegian doctors do not use the Norwegian summary care record to find critical information, such as allergies. Instead, they use the journal to search for the patient's medicines.
By: Lene Lundberg
New research indicates that Norwegian doctors do not use the summary care record in the way that authorities think. This is the conclusion of a new study by researchers at the Norwegian Centre for E-health Research.
By 2017, all residents and health personnel in Norway received access to the summary care record. This is where healthcare professionals can see the same information, regardless of whether they work as a GP, in a hospital, or emergency room.
In the new study, 25 doctors in Trondheim were asked what they think of the summary care record and how they use it. The doctors worked for emergency care, hospital emergency services, or as a general practitioner. Compared with other regions, Trondheim has used the core journal the longest.
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Enjoy!
David.
