Note: I have excluded (or marked out) any commentary taking significant funding from the Agency or the Department of Health on all this to avoid what amounts to paid propaganda. (e.g. CHF, RACGP, AMA, National Rural Health Alliance etc. where they were simply putting the ADHA line – viz. that the myHR is a wonderfully useful clinical development that will save huge numbers of lives at no risk to anyone – which is plainly untrue) (This signifies probable ADHA Propaganda)
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Note: I have broadened this section to try to cover all the privacy compromising and impacting announcements in the week – along with the myHR. It never seems to stop!
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Wills 2.0: how to protect digital wealth before you log off from life
- By James Whiley
- 12:00AM March 2, 2019
A failure to protect digital assets was recently and emphatically demonstrated when the CEO of multi-million-dollar cryptocurrency exchange start-up Quadriga CX died suddenly, taking with him the passwords to $275 million worth of coins and cash.
Gerald Cotton, who started his company five years ago, was security-conscious, protecting his laptop, emails and messaging with encrypted passwords. He took sole responsibility for running the company and, unfortunately, all attempts by his widow to find any passwords or business records for the company’s digital assets have failed.
Hopefully, his family can find a breakthrough. Either way, there are valuable lessons in this for all of us. OK, we may not have a $200m-plus estate to worry about, but we may each be holding substantial digital assets that must be considered as part of our estate planning should we wish to pass these assets on.
Also, it may be difficult for our family to find these assets, given there is no longer a paper trail — even traditional assets such as bank accounts may all be online.
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Welcome to the ‘open era’ of health information
“When I graduated, my medical notes were an aide-memoire to help me treat my patients. When I joined a group practice, I realised that my notes helped my colleagues and me treat our patients. Since computerisation, my notes and health summaries have helped me to write better referrals so that colleagues outside my practice can assist me in treating patients more effectively. Now that I can share an up-to-date health summary on MyHR, I realise that my notes can help my patients to achieve better outcomes from the health system, even when I am not directly involved.”
Five years ago, in 2014, I wrote about OpenNotes because I thought it was a new and fascinating concept. I soon discovered that giving patients access to health records triggered strong emotional reactions: patients loved it and many doctors thought it was one of the scariest ideas ever.
Fast forward to 2019, and about 90% of the Australian population has access to the national My Health Record (MyHR). According to the Australian Digital health Agency over 80% of general practices and pharmacies, 75% of public hospitals, and 64% of private hospitals have registered.
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Who pays for Google and Facebook's free lunch?
By Ross Gittins
March 2, 2019 — 12.00am
There may be banks that are too big to be allowed to fail, but don’t doubt that the behemoths of the digital revolution are too big to be regulated. It won’t be long before Google and Facebook cease to be laws unto themselves.
It’s the old story: the lawmakers always take a while to catch up with the innovators. But there are growing signs that governments around the developed world – particularly in Europe and Britain - are closing in on the digital giants.
And here in Australia, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is busy with the world’s most wide-ranging inquiry so far, which will report to the newly elected federal government in June. The commission’s boss, Rod Sims, gave a speech about it a few weeks ago, and another this week.
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My Health Record could be $2 billion waste
RENDEZVIEW: Seven years after its launch and $2 billion down the track there isn’t much to celebrate in the My Health Record so far, writes Sue Dunlevy. If it’s to succeed, medicos must embrace it.
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Coalition claims credit for $14b digital economy growth
- 01 March 2019
- Written by Sam Varghese
Australia's digital economy has grown by slightly more than $14 billion between the years 2012-13 and 2016-17, a report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics says.
The Coalition Government has been in power from September 2013 to date and, in a statement Industry, Science and Technology Minister Karen Andrews claimed her government was responsible for this growth. Labor was in power from 2007 uptil September 2013.
The ABS report said domestic production of digital products had grown from about $79 billion in 2012-13 to $93.5 billion in 2016-17.
Andrews said: “Australia’s ongoing economic success depends on our ability to embrace the benefits of technological advances and use them to improve existing businesses, create new products and markets, and enhance daily life.
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How can Australia do remote healthcare better?
Hafizah Osman | 28 Feb 2019
With an evolving healthcare tech environment and changing consumer needs, Australia has to rethink the way it approaches telehealth and remote care, a major healthcare conference has heard.
Speaking during a panel session at the recent AFR Healthcare Summit, Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) President Dr Harry Nespolon said the way remote healthcare and telehealth is offered has changed little since the 1960s.
“Doctors still need to see patients in front of them to dispense care. It hasn’t changed much over the last 50 years. I used to work for the AMA [Australian Medical Association] and my boss once said, ‘fish and chips shops today have more technology than most GPs’. There is still some truth in that,” he said.
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My Health Record: 5 problems and 1 solution
In an ideal world, e-health records are a terrific idea - in real life, however, there are several medicolegal issues that are of concern
Dr Craig Lilienthal
28th February 2019
I have been trying to get my head around the medicolegal implications of My Health Record for some time now.
I have studied the legislation (which is confusing for a non-lawyer) and statements from the Minister for Health (which change every time pressure is applied by diverse, interested groups).
In an ideal world, e-health records would be terrific if they could be relied upon and privacy could be guaranteed. I doubt either of these objectives can be fully achieved.
Nevertheless, the following issues with My Health Record (MHR) strike me as areas of medicolegal concern.
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ACCC seeks more ad industry data for digital platforms inquiry
- 28 February 2019
- Written by Sam Varghese
ACCC chair Rod Sims is seeking more data from the advertising industry about the preliminary conclusions reached by the competition watchdog's inquiry into digital platforms.
He told the Australian Association of National Advertisers and a ThinkTV audience of marketing and television advertising executives in Sydney on Wednesday night that a company was allowed to be be big and exert substantial market power.
It has been estimated that more than two-thirds of every digital advertising dollar spent in Australia goes to either Google or Facebook.
Pricing of intermediary services, such as the cut of the amount paid by the advertiser for the ad impression, is being examined by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission as it can often be quite opaque.
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India hosts ‘4th Global Digital Health Partnership Summit’
25 February 2019 | News
Digital health interventions are accelerating transformation of health sector in India: J P Nadda
J P Nadda, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare inaugurated the ‘4th Global Digital Health Partnership Summit’ in the presence of Ravi Shankar Prasad Union Minister of Law & Justice and Electronics & Information Technology and Health Ministers from several countries.
The global intergovernmental meeting on digital health is being hosted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in collaboration with World Health Organization (WHO) and the Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP).
Upendra Yadav, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Health, Nepal; Dr Tawfiq Al Rabiah, Minister of Health, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia; Zahid Maleque, Minister of Health and Family Welfare, Bangladesh; Lena Hallengren, Minister of Health, Sweden; Dr Arlindo Nascimento do Rosário, Minister of Health, Cape Verde; Dr Ulana Suprun, Minister of Health, Ukraine; Faizal Cassim, Deputy Minister of Health, Nutrition and Indigenous, Sri Lanka; Biggie Ganda Butale, Assistant Minister of Health and Wellness, Botswana; Dr. Shah Mahir , State Minister of Health, Maldives and government officials from over 35 countries were also present at the inaugural session.
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GCPHN staff able to help patients learn more about My Health Record at General Practices
26/02/2019 ADHA Propaganda
Now that patient records have been set up for My Health Record, Gold Coast Primary Health Network (GCPHN) is providing one-on-one support for patients visiting a general practice, to assist them in how to use the system.
Gold Coast Primary Health Network CEO Matt Carrodus said it was an important free service that practices could take advantage of.
Gold Coast Primary Health Network CEO Matt Carrodus said it was an important free service that practices could take advantage of.
“We understand that practice staff may be getting a number of inquiries from their patients, about how to access the records that have been created for them,” Mr Carrodus said.
“We understand practice staff are very busy, which is why we have staff available to provide a practical demonstration to patients about the My Health Record software, helping them a set up and access their My Health Record, setting up access codes, authorised representatives or recording personal notes.”
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“We understand practice staff are very busy, which is why we have staff available to provide a practical demonstration to patients about the My Health Record software, helping them a set up and access their My Health Record, setting up access codes, authorised representatives or recording personal notes.”
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My Health Record – where to from here?
February 26, 2019 ADHA Propaganda
While the My Health Record (MHR) opt-out date of January 31 has come and gone, people still have the option to permanently delete their record at any time. Here’s some top tips to communicate to patients about MHR moving forward.
The national MHR opt-out period received widespread media attention. So much so, that the deadline was extended from 15 November 2018 to 31 January 2019.
Now that the opt-out period has passed, records will be created in February for every Australian who has chosen to have a MHR.
Benefits of having a My Health Record
Much of the public discussion has focused on privacy and security concerns, while the benefits of the system have received comparatively little attention. It is valuable discussing with your patients the benefits of having a MHR to help them make informed choices about how they wish to use the system.
For instance, it will be possible to collate key health information in one place, such as a medicines list. This makes it easier for pertinent health information to be accessed by their doctors, pharmacists, specialists or hospitals. This will help improve medicine safety by reducing risk of duplication, missing therapy or dose errors, particularly at transitions of care.
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How parliament hack response showed we are actually doing cybersecurity better
By James Turner
Updated Feb 25, 2019 — 1.39pm, first published at 12.00pm
Leaders in the cyber security industry have been saying for years that cyber risk isn't merely an IT problem, it's a business risk.
Never is this more apparent than when an organisation goes through a serious security incident in the public eye.
We are seeing this with increasing frequency in Australia, and each disclosure is merely further proof that we are all in this together. It's a digital ecosystem now, and the hyper-connectedness between our organisations means that all business executives should absolutely care about the welfare online of their suppliers, customers, peers and competitors.
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On the record
Pharmacy’s contribution to the uptake of My Health Record revealed to Parliament
The impact of the new My Health Record program to health care has been graphically illustrated in testimony presented to the current Senate Estimates hearings.
And even the Australian Journal of Pharmacy garnered a mention as Senators discussed the uptake of the system and what it is bringing to the table in terms of health benefits.
Tim Kelsey, CEO of the Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA) outlined anecdotal evidence of how the MHR had proven its worth during the recent North Queensland flooding.
“We have put in place a benefits realisation program to evaluate benefits of My Health Record both currently, before opt-out had finished, and obviously subsequently,” he said.
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Get ready for the age of sensor panic
Cameras, microphones and other sensors are showing up everywhere. And this is just the beginning.
Mike Elgan (Computerworld (US))23 February, 2019 22:00
A passenger on a Singapore Airlines flight this week noticed a small, circular indentation below the image playing on the seatback in-flight entertainment system in front of him. Could that be, he wondered, a camera?
The passenger did the only logical thing: He tweeted out a photo and asked the Twitterverse for opinions, setting off a chorus of complainers on Twitter.
Singapore Airlines also responded to the tweets, saying that the camera was not used by the airline to capture pictures or video. It then told media outlets in a statement that the embedded cameras “have been intended by the manufacturers for future developments. These cameras are permanently disabled on our aircraft and cannot be activated on board. We have no plans to enable or develop any features using the cameras.”
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Algorithm flaw meant Census responses could be identified
By Justin Hendry on Feb 25, 2019 11:55AM
Vulnerability already fixed by ABS.
Researchers from Macquarie University uncovered a vulnerability in the Census data visualisation tool that would have allowed individuals to be re-identified through their responses.
The exploit, which the Australian Bureau of Statistics says has now been addressed, also made it possible to reconstruct original data from the population count, the new study [pdf] reveals.
Dr Dali Kaafar and Hassan Jameel Asghar discovered the vulnerability in the perturbation algorithm used for the agency’s online tool TableBuilder, which allows users to create tables, graphs and maps of census data.
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Women's health is the next tech boom, but that's not necessarily all good news
ABC Science
By technology reporter Ariel Bogle
Updated 9 January 2019 at 11:41 am
Do women know what women want? A new generation of start-ups focused on their health and wellbeing test that theory.
Key points:
- Emerging start-ups are focused on women's health and wellbeing
- There are concerns about the privacy implications of the technology, including period-tracking apps
- Some women criticise femtech's 'one-size-fits-all' approach to women's health
For years, consumer health technology has been faulted for overlooking women as customers and building devices for the default white male consumer.
Men also control the purse strings, and for that reason, what gets built. A 2017 Crunchbase survey estimated that among the top 100 global venture firms, the percentage of women partners hovered at only 8 per cent.
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Comments welcome!
David.
