Open Health News Weekly Summary - 11/9/2013

November 9, 2013 - The following is a brief listing of some of the hot news items, selected news clips, feature stories, and blogs posted on Open Health News (OHNews) over the past week that we believe will be of interest to our readers across the U.S. and around the world. We've also included links to some upcoming open source and health IT conferences and events.

Some of the key themes dominating the news this week involved: (1) Continuing issues surrounding the rollout of the national Health Insurance Exchanges (HIX) on HealthCare.gov; (2) Activity associated with analysis and use of  'Open Data' in healthcare continues to grow; and (3) Ongoing news about a wide range of innovative 'Open Health' activity and solutions from around the world.

Roger Maduro
Publisher & Managing Editor, Open Health News

Headlines

OHN News, Features & Blog Posts

Selected News Clips

Brief Abstracts of Selected News Stories

Intel's 'open source' Galileo computer is now on sale

Intel’s Galileo, an 'open source' computer hardware solution for the do-it-yourself (DIY) crowd, is scheduled to ship at the end of this month.  It is about the size of a credit card and uses Intel’s extremely low-power Quark processor. It is priced at around $65 per unit.Intel has decided to tap into the 'maker' community to help figure out how to best use its new line of Quark chips. It will be a great tool for  prototyping projects from building robotic devices, wearable systems, health sensors, micro-PCs, automating home appliances and much more. Read More »

Bloomberg Health Care Summit on "Connecting Healthcare Policy with Next Century Innovation"

Earlier this week, the Bloomberg Government Health Care Summit appropriately named "Mind the Gap: Connecting Healthcare Policy with Next Century Innovation", was held in Washington, D.C. It was convened to discuss perspectives of healthcare innovators, medical professionals, and government officials who are helping to redesign U.S. healthcare during a time of innovation.  Read More »

Upcoming Open Source & Health IT Conferences – November/December 2013

The following are some upcoming Open Source & Health IT Conferences our readers at Open Health News (OHN) might be interested in attending in the coming months.

•  EHI live 2013
•  10th Annual Open Education Conference
•  AMIA 2013 Annual Symposium
•  mHealth Summit 2013  Read More »

McKinsey Global Institute Report on Unlocking the Value of 'Open Data'

The McKinsey Global Institute has just release a new report entitled, "Open data: Unlocking innovation and performance with liquid information." According to the report, 'Open Data' has great potential to empower citizens, change how government works, and improve the delivery of public services. It may also generate significant economic value, according to a new McKinsey report. Their report suggests that 'Open Data' can help unlock $3 trillion to $5 trillion in economic value annually across seven sectors of the global economy. Read More »

Selected Articles about Open Source & Business

The following are a series of selected news articles, feature stories, and blogs about Business & 'Open Source' activities and solutions that have been posted on Open Health News (OHN) over the past couple of years. Topics covered include:

  • Finding Financial Investors for new 'Open Source' Health IT Companies
  • Investing in Open Source Companies & Solutions is Smart Business
  • Open Source Business Models   Read More »

Medical Mobile Services Will Open Up Access By Masses In India

Nitin Puri | ZDNet | November 1, 2013

In a country where universal healthcare is a daily challenge to meet because of difficult geographic constraints, one leading hospital group in India has turned to mobile to increase its accessibility and coverage. Read More »

Microsoft and Apple unleash thermonuclear war on Google & Android

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes | ZD Net | November 4, 2013

Former Apple co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs didn't like Android and he told his biographer Walter Isaacson that he would "destroy Android" because it was "a stolen product" and said that he was "willing to go thermonuclear war" on the platform... Read More »

Pentagon's Electronic Health Record Gets a Life Extension

Bob Brewin | NextGov | October 31, 2013

The Defense Health Agency plans to extend the life of the department’s electronic health record -- the Armed Forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application, or AHLTA -- through 2018, a sign that it will take until then to field a new and improved EHR. Read More »

Epic EHR Still Costing Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center

Kyle Murphy | EHR Intelligence | November 1, 2013

It may be about time that Epic EHRs come with a warning label that has nothing to do with systems themselves but everything to do with the costs incurred by healthcare organizations adopting solutions from Epic Systems and how they will affect their bottom lines during the earliest phases of implementation. Read More »

Government Taps Engineers From Google, Red Hat To Fix Healthcare.gov

Adrianne Jeffries | The Verge | October 31, 2013

The government has tapped engineers at Google, Oracle, and Red Hat, among other companies, to assist in untangling the problems with its online health insurance marketplace. The site, a key part of President Barack Obama's healthcare reform effort, has numerous bugs that have prevented Americans from signing up for health insurance...  Read More »

EHR Data Could Tailor Local Public Health Planning

Anthony Brino | Government Health IT | November 4, 2013

Public health researchers in Indiana are trying to figure out if they can use data from a source that’s potentially hugely insightful but has typically been off-limits: electronic health records. Read More »

EnSoftek, Inc. Wins Peace Corps Global Electronic Medical Records (EMR) System Development and Implementation Contract

Press Release | EnSoftek, Inc., DrCloud Healthcare Solutions | November 7, 2013

EnSoftek, Inc. has been awarded a five-year contract with the US Peace Corps to develop and implement OpenEMR/DrCloudEMR, Dynamics CRM, SharePoint, BizTalk and SQL Server platforms and applications. Read More »

Why Opening Up Clinical Trials Data Is Good For Pharma Companies

Glyn Moody | TechDirt | November 5, 2013

Earlier this year we wrote about how AbbVie, the pharma company spun out of Abbott Laboratories, had gone to court to stop the European Medicines Agency (EMA) from releasing clinical trials information about one of its drugs. Read More »

How States Launched Successful Health Exchanges

Joseph Marks | Nextgov | November 1, 2013

In the second half of August, six weeks before rollout, the best tech minds building Washington D.C.’s Health Benefit Exchange gathered to test the system end to end... Read More »