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Transparency, in the form of a complete, patient-centered and accessible health record is a policy principle that can drive the next wave of health care innovation. Investing exclusively in institutional EHRs will further stifle efficiency, innovation and improvement.
I woke up at 2:30 a.m. eastern this morning with a single thought
-- what the American health system needs is an X Prize. Had it not been so cold (it's hard to keep a Maine country house warm when it's 20 below zero), I might have written my blog immediately. I'm glad I didn't.
In recent weeks, a worm called Conficker has infected 9 million Microsoft Windows desktops and servers throughout the world via a Windows security flaw identified in October 2008. The BIDMC Security team has provided me with several briefings that I'd like to share with you.
Now that the Obama administration and Congress have committed to spending billions of tax payers’ money on health IT as part of the economic stimulus package, it’s important to be clear about what consumers and patients ought to expect in return -- better decision-making by doctors and patients.
Most healthcare information technology vendors want you to believe that their software can meet any organization's needs. As a matter of fact, healthcare IT vendors and their software are quite unique. The single most important process for a successful software implementation is the selection of the correct solution.
Those of you paying attention for the past few days might have noticed on the one hand a sense of optimism and unity as Barrack H. Obama, somewhat somberly, began his Presidency.
(By John Halamka, MD) It's inauguration day. The energy is palpable. Dozens of people have emailed me about their sense of optimism, their commitment to personal responsibility, and their "Yes We Can" attitude toward the audacious healthcare reform work ahead.
In Washington, Healthcare Information Technology policy planning is accelerating at a pace that is faster than at any time in history (at least my 30 years in healthcare IT).
Show of hands -- how many people think Steve Jobs has an electronic medical record? Yeah, me too. So if EMR security is so lousy, how come we haven't seen Jobs' private data?
On Dec. 19, we published an Open Letter to the Obama Health Team, cautioning the incoming Administration against limiting its Health Information Technology (IT) investments to Electronic Health Records (EHRs). Instead, we recommended that their health IT plan be rethought to favor a large array of innovative applications that can be easily adopted...