Cultures of The Online World

Do Medical Records Belong Online? New York Times Today.

Re “Your E-Health Records” (editorial, Feb. 1):

While it’s true that patient privacy and prurient commercial objectives can disastrously collide in electronic health records, the specter of doom camouflages other issues that demand consideration.

What about the outrageous cost of our health care system and the 45 million uninsured Americans? And the foreclosures and bankruptcy caused by medical bills? And let’s not forget that an estimated 100,000 lives are lost each year because of medical errors, and that there are large discrepancies in access to quality care across economic and geographic strata.

Electronic health records and patient privacy are not mutually exclusive. We cannot let concerns about privacy morph into paralysis. The stimulus package’s financing for electronic records will bring us technology innovation and job creation, better-educated patients, improved health outcomes and advances toward affordable personalized medicine.

Brent Gendleman
Reston, Va., Feb. 3, 2009

Link to New York Times Article

Google begins testing health records system with Cleveland Clinic

Google plans to begin testing its long-anticipated health records project this week by partnering with an Ohio hospital group over the next couple of months. The pilot will involve transferring the health information of between 1,500 and 10,000 patients who have records at the Cleveland Clinic, which already has over 100,000 records stored in its own digital database. Patients will then be able to have access to their own records online, wherever they go (with an Internet connection), which Google thinks will help reduce conflicts in diagnoses and prescriptions between doctors.
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The pilot project is expected to last six to eight weeks, Google health VP Marissa Mayer told The New York Times, with a public launch expected sometime later this year. Patients will be able to approve the secure transfer of any number of records—from lab results to known allergies to other medical conditions—to Google's system, allowing them to take the records to another doctor or have them available while traveling. One doctor pointed out to the Times that many Cleveland Clinic patients are retirees that travel for nearly half the year, so the clinic's own digitized system isn't very helpful during that time. If the records are accessible through Google's system, patients won't have to worry as much about keeping accurate records on hand in the case of an emergency.

Google isn't the first company to dip its toes into the online health records pool. Microsoft managed to beat Google to the punch by launching a beta of its own health records system, HealthVault, last October. The system allows users to manage records for not only themselves, but also spouses, children, relatives, guardians, patients, and even pets. Information can be transferred directly from a healthcare provider like Google is doing with Cleveland Clinic, but it can also be uploaded directly from a PC, entered by hand, or transferred from a device (such as a glucose monitor).

Google did not give any indication as to whether its health records database would be tied into the same Google login required to access Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs, and other Google services. Hopefully it will not (or at least require an additional level of security), as privacy and security have become major sticking points for companies attempting to launch online health record systems. Microsoft's system requires both a Windows Live ID and a HealthVault account that are tied together and require complex passwords, and the company has a strict privacy policy about who can have access. That is, no one has access to your health records unless you specifically grant them permission, and Microsoft makes an effort to ensure that you know exactly what you're doing when you do so.

There is another issue that has skeptics doubtful that such an initiative could ever take off. The level of freedom allowed in Microsoft's HealthVault means that patients can enter (or omit) anything they want, meaning that any healthcare provider that bases diagnoses on what they find on HealthVault is taking a serious risk—the data available there is no more reliable than a patient survey at the doctor's office. We observed in October that a system that restricts write access to doctors, with patients being granted read-only access and the ability to request changes if they find inaccuracies, would be much more reliable.

There are not enough details about Google's system to know whether it will be implemented like HealthVault, though. From the description of what's happening with Cleveland Clinic, it sounds as if records will only be transferred by healthcare providers and not by patients themselves—if that's the case, then doctors can have a little more confidence in the information there. But with several months to go before Google's public launch, anything can change.

Cardiocom - preventive solutions

MINNEAPOLIS, MN — Cardiocom® Multi-Disease Management, an industry leading developer and manufacturer of remote patient monitoring equipment and disease management software, announced that it has entered into a relationship with Heritage Provider Network, Inc., a Management Service Organization (HPN, Inc.) extending over Central and Southern California service areas.  The two partners will combine the benefits of well-managed Medical Group/IPA networks, which offer value-added clinical resources to community-based physicians, with the innovative and cost-effective technology of an experienced telemonitoring company.  The overall goal is to improve the care and clinical outcomes of Heritage Provider Network patients.

            

“The Heritage physician groups are committed to providing quality clinical programs that empower patients to actively participate in the management of their clinical diseases in an effort to improve their health and life,” says S. Ian Drew, M.D FACP FRCP FACEP, Executive Vice President, Clinical Affairs of Heritage Provider Network, Inc.  “By using the flexible Cardiocom technology-based management solutions, we can offer new benefits to help people improve their self-management skills, remain in constant communication with their treating physician and reduce unnecessary emergency room visits and in–patient hospitalizations.” 

            

The Cardiocom Telescale® and Commander equipment are placed in the homes of HPN Network patients. The sophisticated software system provided by Cardiocom allows nurses at remote locations to monitor daily vital signs and health status of patients.  Nurse case managers intervene to provide education and coaching designed to assist HPN patients with the management of their chronic conditions.  The telemonitoring system enables physician groups to provide high quality care that follows national practice standards.

Philips Remote Patient Monitoring

Philips Remote Patient Monitoring
Telemonitoring technology and comprehensive services for effective remote patient management and home care visits

With Philips Telemonitoring Services, clinicians can remotely monitor patients' vital signs data and send them short surveys about their health status. This combination of objective data and subjective responses enables the clinician to make more timely care decisions and helps prevent unnecessary hospitalizations. Philips Remote Patient Monitoring provides an efficient, effective solution to treating chronically ill patients.

Service delivery and implementation support includes a host of services designed to help home care agencies set up a telehealth program or make their existing program more efficient.

Telehealth

Every day, patients take their own vital signs measurements as prescribed by their doctor: weight, blood pressure, pulse, glucose level, blood oxygen level and/or ECG rhythm. They also answer survey questions sent by their clinician, which may include general health assessment questions and/or targeted follow-up questions, and enter self-reported data as directed. The information is then automatically transmitted through an ordinary phone line via modem to secure web-based Clinical Review Software. Clinicians can track daily patient measurements, store and retrieve historical data in both tabular and graphical format, and generate reports - promoting faster follow-up and intervention.

* Award-winning wireless measurement devices allow clinicians to remotely monitor patient vital signs.
* TeleStation home hub transmits vital signs data and daily interactive surveys to and from the patient.
* Web-based clinical software   sorts and flags patients with out-of-range data for timely clinical intervention. Customizable survey questions, risk assessment tools and care protocols provide support for clinicians so they can focus on patient care.
* Service delivery and implementation support includes a host of services designed to help home care agencies set up a telehealth program or make their existing program more efficient.

Virtual Medical Team for Amazon Swimmer

It's old news, my bad, I have just got Google Adsense working on this site and this was one of the ads.          

Professional audiovisual design services and next-generation telemedicine video conferencing, for the University of Arizona Telemedicine program, were provided by ExhibitOne.

            

UofA Doctor Leads Virtual Medical Team for Amazon Swimmer
              Jan. 3, 2007

            

Physicians at The University of Arizona are leading a virtual medical team to assist Martin Strel, a Guinness record marathon swimmer, as he swims the Amazon River from Atalaya, Peru, to the Atlantic Ocean at Belém, Brazil. On Feb. 1, Strel will take his first stroke toward his goal of swimming 3,375 miles (5,430 km) in 70 days.

            

Trauma surgeon Rifat Latifi, MD, UA professor of surgery and associate director of the Arizona Telemedicine Program, was asked to serve as medical director for the Amazon Virtual Medical Team for the Amazon Swim Project. He has assembled a team consisting of physicians from Arizona, Virginia, California, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Slovenia and Brazil. Team members also from the UA are Joseph Mills, MD, professor and chief of vascular surgery, and Eskild A. Peterson, MD, professor and chief of infectious diseases.

            

For the majority of the swim, Dr. Latifi will be in Arizona monitoring Strel through the telemedicine program and consulting with his virtual team of medical specialists. He will periodically make house calls on board Strel’s boat, working closely with the team physician, Mateja deLeonni Stanonik, MD, PhD, from the University of Tennessee.

            

“This is the first time that telemedicine technology will be used to help in this type of mission,” Dr. Latifi says. “The use of telemedicine will allow the medical team to include specialists and experts from all over the world.”

            

The Amazon Swim Project will take Strel through some of the most dangerous, unknown regions of the Amazon, says Dr. Latifi. Using telemedicine technology, the medical team will provide health care services for Strel and his support team of more than 20 individuals 24/7 for the duration of the swim. 

            

“The team will be responsible for the treatment of any injuries or disease that may occur during the swim,” Dr. Latifi says.
             
Strel and Dr. Latifi hope the project will be the catalyst for specific collaborative endeavors in the Amazon region and in the Andes that include telehealth initiatives, such as floating clinics and remote hospitals, as well as programs to enhance the emergency medical services and training programs in the remote areas of the South American region.

            

Strel swam the length of the Danube River in 2000, the Mississippi in 2002 and the Yangtze River in China in 2004. Strel has dedicated this swim to the preservation of the rainforest, to raising awareness for Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative disorders, and to promoting telemedicine as a valuable tool in bringing modern medicine to remote areas.

New wireless networking system brings eye care to thousands in India

BERKELEY – Thousands of residents of rural villages in India are receiving quality eye care thanks to a collaborative effort between an Indian hospital network and the researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, and at Intel Corporation who have developed a new technology for low-cost rural connectivity.

This new technology, based on "Wi-Fi" wireless networks, allows eye specialists at Aravind Eye Hospital at Theni in the southern India state of Tamil Nadu to interview and examine patients in five remote clinics via a high-quality video conference. Link

Continua: The Wellness Sphere

Post Modern Fitness:
 

 

New Possibilities with Continua

 

Continua, since its inception, has considered device and   information interoperability in the general health and wellness sphere a   ”core” use case of fundamental importance, alongside disease management and   independent living scenarios. We sought out two visionary thought leaders   from the fitness world for their views regarding Continua’s value   proposition in this space. Their ruminations about the emergent paradigm for   fitness provided startling insights on the scale of change and potential   impact of Continua’s work.Link