News Clips

Open Source an open goal for Health Care IT - Research finds both cost and security benefits 08 March 2011 Warwick, University of

Press Release | University of Warwick | March 8, 2011

Globally the sale of health care information systems is a multibillion dollar industry.  The vast costs, frequent failed systems,  and inability of systems to talk to each other regularly attract media comment. However policy makers still shy away from a class of software, Open Source, that could address many of these problems, because of worries about the safety and security of Open Source  systems. Now new research by the University of Warwick’s Institute for Digital Healthcare, and the Centre for Health Informatics and Multiprofessional Education at  UCL Medical School, finds that Open Source software may actually be more secure than its often more expensive alternatives.

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Massive data volumes making Hadoop hot

Jaikumar Vijayan | ComputerWorld | March 8, 2011

Increasing efforts by enterprises to glean business intelligence from the massive volumes of unstructured data generated by web logs, clickstream tools, social media products and the like has led to a surge of interest in open source Hadoop technology, analysts say. Hadoop, an Apache data management software project with roots in Google's MapReduce software framework for distributed computing, is designed to support applications that use massive amounts of unstructured and structured data.

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Lessons from m-Health Projects: The Tech is the Easy Part

Anneryan Heatwole | MobileActive.org | March 8, 2011

Adherence reminders, patient data transmission via community health workers, HIV/AIDs info services – mobile phones can be used in a variety of health settings. As mobiles have become cheaper and more easily available around the world, mobile health projects have followed, taking advantage of the devices’ data storage capabilities, information transferring potential, and social networking features. The article briefly discuses the benefits of using open source mHealth solutions.

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PLoS ONE, Open Access, and the Future of Scholarly Publishing

Roger Poynder | Open and Shut? | March 7, 2011

Open Access (OA) advocates argue that PLoS ONE is now the largest scholarly journal in the world. Its parent organisation — Public Library of Science (PLoS) — was co-founded in 2001 by Nobel Laureate Harold Varmus

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How Can eHealth Help the Poorest (Part 3, Systems and Education)

David | Global Health Ideas | March 7, 2011

The third and final cluster focuses on systems and education. Along with the optimism in the responses, there is a strong dose of caution – even an implicit warning that poorly designed eHealth interventions may do more harm than good. While evaluating eHealth interventions has been the subject of some discussion, the problem of doing so effectively is still far from solved.  This holds even more true for eHealth interventions in low-resource settings, with difficult field conditions and vulnerable populations.

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Gartner Open Source Software Survey Reveals OSS Adoption Trends And Initiatives

Jeevak Kasarkod | InfoQ | March 6, 2011

Gartner published a report in early February which revealed that more than half of the organizations surveyed have adopted Open Source Software(OSS) as part of their IT strategy but only one-third of the responding organizations had a formal OSS policy in place. Gartner OSS surveys from the past 5 years reveals that OSS has increased from less than 10 percent of responding organization's portfolio to more than the expected 30 percent within the next 18 months. The perceived value of adopting OSS as part of IT strategy has also changed over the years from purely TCO benefits to benefits accumulated from flexibility, increased innovation, shorter development times and faster procurement processes.

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CDD Provides Technology in Global Consortium to Identify New Tuberculosis Drugs

Press Release | Collaborative Drug Discovery, Inc. | March 4, 2011

Collaborative Drug Discovery, Inc. has joined [several] other research groups from 13 different countries, to form the More Medicines for Tuberculosis consortium, which aims to develop new drugs for successful and shorter treatment of Tuberculosis (TB). Read More »

Open Source Cellphone Networks are Now on Every Continent

Robert Goodier | Engineering for Change | March 4, 2011

Three men who believe that cellphone service should be cheap and accessible to everyone have found a way to make it happen. The creators of OpenBTS, the open-source cellphone network, launched a startup and have delivered cheap cellphone networks to the world's biggest mobile tech corporations, governments and other clients on every continent. Read More »

Incorporating Methods for Basic and Advanced Meta-Analysis of Diagnostic Tests Into Open Source Software for Meta-Analysis

Project | Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality | March 4, 2011

While software is available for meta-analysis in general, there is not yet any open-source user friendly software available for specific meta-analysis of diagnostic test data. AHRQ is funding development work on an open source software product called OpenMeta-Analyst.

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UK: Open Systems Towards Improving NHS IT

Press Release | City University London's Centre for Health Informatics | March 4, 2011

The City University London's Centre for Health Informatics (CHI) launched Health Informatics research programme and policy challenge paper to identify how NHS information technology (IT) services can be improved and made more cost-effective. The programme will employ information systems, such as electronic health records, and will use a combination of the following key elements to achieve this goal:  open standards;open source software;open systems interfaces; and agile development. 

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iPhone Suitable for Reading Virtual Colonoscopy Studies

Erik L. Ridley | Healthcare Informatics | March 3, 2011

An iPhone can be successfully used for preliminary reading of virtual colonoscopy studies, according to research presented Thursday at the European Congress of Radiology (ECR).

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How SMART addresses the PCAST Report on Health IT

Smart | Smart | March 3, 2011

A couple of months ago, The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology issued its Report to the President on Realizing the Full Potential of Health Information Technology to Improve Healthcare for Americans. We want to tell you how SMART fits in. At a high level:  Read More »

Open Source Sesame

Chris Dippel | Retronyma blog | March 3, 2011

One concept for accelerating the development of drugs for neglected diseases is application of the “open source” innovation model which originated the software industry.  This model is based on easy access to source code, distributed work among unaffiliated programmers, and rights to use and sell derivative products to produce usable and useful programs quickly and at low-cost (c.f., Open Source Initiative). 

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Medgate Appoints Chief Medical Officer

Press Release | Medgate | March 3, 2011

Medgate Inc., the leading global provider of software for health and safety data management, is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Reza Alemy as Chief Medical Officer of the Company. Dr. Alemy is an experienced family physician, radiation oncology specialist, and a renowned e-health expert. He was also active on the technical development committee for the OSCAR open source EHR system..

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Do You Like Open Source? See you at POSSCON!

Bobby Rettew | Bobby Rettew, LLC | March 3, 2011

Do you like Open Source Software and Development? Well…you should check out POSSCON! What is POSSCON, well it is the Palmetto Open Source Software Conference held in Columbia, SC. There are going to be a host of presenters from four different program tracks that pertain to you: Leadership, Technical, Healthcare, and Education. Open source software continues to be one of the hottest and most relevant topics in information technology as organizations strive to meet the increasing demand for innovation while struggling with shrinking budgets.

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