The Pistoia Alliance, a global, not for profit alliance that works to lower barriers to innovation in life sciences R&D, is calling upon the industry to improve collaborative efforts to use patient data to its full effect. In a series of keynote speeches delivered at The Pistoia Alliance’s annual member conference in London, speakers from Amgen, Accenture and AstraZeneca, discussed the need to more closely connect outcomes data with the R&D process – to help pharmaceutical companies focus their research efforts and deliver real benefits to patients. Building machine learning and deep learning systems, and incorporating data from therapeutic interventions or diagnostics into R&D is technologically challenging, and would benefit significantly from industry-wide pre-competitive collaboration...
News Clips
How Healthy Are We?
Reliable data on health is an essential part of a comprehensive health information system, which is central to evidence-informed, responsive decision-making for better public health program. A well-functioning health information system also helps policy-makers and program managers to monitor population health and plan interventions accordingly. In line with the vision of a Digital Bangladesh, one of the more significant changes that have happened in our health sector is transforming paper-based health reporting into an electronic health information system, along with initiating a medical record system through the Open MRS software...
- Login to post comments
The Pistoia Alliance Calls on the Life Sciences to Support Greater Collaboration to Overcome Technology Challenges
- Login to post comments
Tractor Owners Using Pirated Firmware To Dodge John Deere's Ham-Fisted Attempt To Monopolize Repair
We've been noting for a while how numerous states have been pushing so-called "right to repair" bills, which would make it easier for consumers to repair their own products and find replacement parts and tools. Not surprisingly, many tech companies have been working overtime to kill these bills. That includes Apple, which recently proclaimed that Nebraska's right to repair bill would turn the state into a nefarious playground for hackers. Opposition also includes Sony and Microsoft, which both tend to enjoy a repair monopoly on their respective video game consoles...
- Login to post comments
UK's Bolton NHS Trust Goes Live with OpenEyes Open Source Software
A million-pound open source electronic patient record has gone live in a northern NHS trust’s eye department. Bolton NHS Foundation Trust deployed the ophthalmic OpenEyes software in January. David Haider, consultant ophthalmologist and chief clinical information officer at Bolton, told Digital Health News that he was doing a “slow deployment”, with the EPR being used in cataracts first...
- Login to post comments
TransCelerate Identifies Pharmacovigilance as an Operational Challenge in Need of Transformation
TransCelerate BioPharma Inc. today announced that it has added Pharmacovigilance to its portfolio, establishing two new global initiatives: 1.) Interpretation of Pharmacovigilance Regulations and 2.) Value of Safety Information Data Sources. Both initiatives aim to create solutions that will reduce resource inefficiencies, enhance information exchange with global health authorities and improve patient safety to drive more value for patients...
- Login to post comments
Physician Burnout Is A Public Health Crisis: A Message To Our Fellow Health Care CEOs
The Quadruple Aim recognizes that a healthy, energized, engaged, and resilient physician workforce is essential to achieving national health goals of higher quality, more affordable care and better health for the populations we serve. Yet in a recent study of U.S. physicians, more than half reported experiencing at least one symptom of burnout—a substantial increase over previous years—indicating that burnout among physicians is becoming a national health crisis. Leadership is needed to address the root causes of this problem and reposition the health care workforce for the future. The authors of this paper—the CEOs of our respective institutions—are committing to do just that...
- Login to post comments
Could There Be a Blockchain Solution to High Prescription Drug Prices?
Prescription drugs are one of the biggest contributors to soaring healthcare costs in the U.S. And for both individuals and families, particularly where multiple prescriptions are needed, drug expenses can quickly escalate to thousands of dollars. According to a report from the Kaiser Family Foundation, 8 in 10 Americans would like the government to negotiate prices for those on Medicare. Additionally, Americans want limits set on the amount drug companies can charge for high-cost drugs, such as those to treat cancer...
- Login to post comments
Can Open Source EHRs Offer a New Path for Health IT Usability?
In an article published in JMIR Medical Informatics, researchers from the University of California-Davis decided to explore the small but intriguing world of open source EHRs, which may fit very neatly into the growing interest in application programming interfaces, FHIR, and other open data standards that encourage customized mix-and-match health IT development without the historical pitfalls of proprietary systems. Using data from 2014, the researchers identified 54 open source projects that met the HHS definition of an electronic health record. At the time, four of those packages had achieved Certified EHR Technology status from the ONC.
- Login to post comments
Rivet Logic Named in KMWorld’s “100 Companies That Matter in Knowledge Management”
Rivet Logic Corporation (http://rivetlogic.com), a leading consulting, systems integration and design firm focused on helping major enterprises build digital experiences with leading open source and cloud-based software, announced today that it has been named in KMWorld’s “100 Companies That Matter in Knowledge Management” for the ninth consecutive year...- Login to post comments
Antimicrobial Resistance Diagnostic Challenge Selects 10 Semifinalists in First Phase of Competition
Ten semifinalists have been selected in the first phase of the Antimicrobial Resistance Diagnostic Challenge, a federal prize competition that will award up to a total of $20 million in prizes, subject to the availability of funds, for innovative rapid, point-of-need diagnostic tests to combat the emergence and spread of drug resistant bacteria. The semifinalists were selected for their concepts for a diagnostic based on a technical and programmatic evaluation from among 74 submissions. While semifinalists will each receive $50,000 to develop their concepts into prototypes, anyone can submit a prototype to compete in the second phase of the challenge to win up to $100,000...
- Login to post comments
New Arms Race: Science Versus Antibiotic-Resistant Superbugs
The death rate from bacterial infections plummeted following the discovery of penicillin. However, these microbes developed ways to resist our antibiotics. What threats do superbugs pose and what factors contribute to their emergence? The discovery and development of antibiotics saved millions of lives during the latter half of the 20th century. Scottish bacteriologist Alexander Fleming, who witnessed soldiers with infected wounds perish while serving in the Royal Army Medical Corps during the First World War, per chance discovered a penicillin producing mold in 1928...
- Login to post comments
Inside OpenSSL's Battle to Change its License: Coders' Rights, Tech Giants, Patents and More
The OpenSSL project, possibly the most widely used open-source cryptographic software, has a license to kill – specifically its own. But its effort to obtain permission to rewrite contributors' rights runs the risk of alienating the community that sustains it. The software is licensed under the OpenSSL License, which includes its own terms and those dating back to the preceding SSLeay license...
- Login to post comments
Health Information Exchanges Report Information Blocking
Despite widespread disapproval and Congressional scrutiny, information blocking remains a problem for health information exchanges working to connect providers and their EHR systems. Drawing data from a national survey of 60 HIE leaders, a new study by researchers at University of Michigan Schools of Information and Public Health found information blocking to be widespread and the policies in place to mitigate the practice ineffective...
- Login to post comments
Kenya's Ushahidi Launches Apps for Offline Data Collection
Kenyan company Ushahidi, a crowdsourcing data platform that allows for the better collection and management of information, has released iOS and Android apps that allow users to make reports even when they lack internet connectivity. The Ushahidi platform enables organisations to better collect, manage, visualise, and respond to data across various communication channels, including SMS, web form, mobile app, email, and Twitter...
- Login to post comments
OpenMRS Releases 2016 Annual Report - Shows Explosive Growth of Open Source EHR
OpenMRS®, a free and open source health IT software platform built by volunteers around the world, is marking the start of its second decade by releasing its second annual report, for 2016. The document highlights the achievements of the open source community in the past year, improvements to the OpenMRS software, and lays out the strategic goals for 2017. For over 10 years, people around the world have leveraged OpenMRS to improve health status and achieve health equity through the use of health information technology. OpenMRS is a global leader in open technologies and open standards in healthcare...
- Login to post comments