Peter Groen

See the following -

Simulation Technology and 'Open' EHR Systems for Medical Education & Training

Models of human patients have been used in medicine for thousands of years. Some of the first medical 'simulators' were simple representations in clay and stone that were used to demonstrate the clinical features of disease states and their effects on humans. Today, ever more sophisticated medical simulation tools and techniques have been developed and integrated into the education and training programs for medical professionals. There are now approximately 300 medical simulation centers in the U.S. Most are affiliated with medical schools, nursing schools, and major teaching hospitals.

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Social Networking & Health Care Systems

Social networking has created new ways to communicate and share information and have become a part of everyday life for many people. Social networks are now beginning to be adopted by healthcare organizations as a means to better manage institutional knowledge, disseminate peer to peer knowledge, and to reach out and better serve their patients. Read More »

State University of New York at Albany Launches VistA EHR Studies Program

The Albany Campus of the State University of New York (SUNY) has launched a new VistA EHR Studies program—the most comprehensive one of its kind in the United States. The program, which began on March 24, provides students the basis to learn and manage VistA’s fast-growing open source electronic health record (EHR) system. The decision to launch the full program follows a successful pilot course taught at the university this past fall. Read More »

Tablet Computers, Open Source, & Healthcare

The tablet market has experienced rapid growth over the last two years. It has outpaced other computer devices at a similar point in their lifecycle.  In fact, shipments of tablet computer devices may exceed 350 million units by 2016 according to various estimates from various  industry experts. The medical community, in particular, has taken to tablets in droves over the past year and sales show no signs of slowing.  The reason is that clinicians have found tablet computer devices to be a user-friendly product that readily fits into their clinical business practices.  Read More »

The 'Open Source Maturity Model'

The following is a description of the Open Source Maturity Model as defined by Open Health News (OHNews). It lays out the six major phases open source systems may go through during their systems life cycle – from the birth of an idea to a mature global solution....The conceptual stage begins with some ideas being kicked around by an individual or a small handful of people, who in this case are convinced that developing an open source solution may offer the best approach to collaborate and rapidly produce high quality, a low-cost shareable solution that may be of benefit to many others. The following items characterize some of the major steps in this initial phase of the maturity model and systems development life cycle...

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The Growing OpenEMR Business Community

The OpenEMR community has been very active over this past year.  This 'open source' electronic medical record (EMR) system continues to be enhanced by developers around the globe, the number of healthcare providers that have installed and begun using the system (over 15,000 sites world-wide) continues to grow, and a fairly robust business community of companies offering services and support is now in place. Read More »

The Value of EHR Interoperability that Money Can't Buy

There seems to be something missing in our national debate about health care and the use of health information technologies (IT) in this marketplace. Do we want a more 'open' healthy society, or a more closed system? What role should markets play in public health and medical sociology? How do we decide which EHR solutions to acquire? Should we be looking more closely at open source alternatives versus proprietary programs. Should money, quality of care, or some other non-market values determine what's best for the patient? This cuts to the heart of the debate. Consider the hospital that chooses to not pay an expensive proprietary EHR vendor for the enhanced code required by a doctor in order to get the latest real time knowledge for treating a patient's disease.

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Understanding 'Open' Terminology

Having heard so many people using the terms "open systems", "open computing", and "open source" interchangeably, believing they all mean the same thing, it seemed appropriate to  write a short blog defining some of these terms and soliciting input on other 'open' terminology. Read More »

VA, U.K. health service team up on IT

Joe Conn | Modern Healthcare | March 22, 2013

The healthcare arm of the Veterans Affairs Department and the United Kingdom's National Health Service are teaming up under a three-year agreement to swap leaders, staff and ideas about the use of healthcare information technology by the two huge government-financed systems, according to a new joint report. Read More »

Value Measurement and Return on Investment for EHRs

Health care provider institutions today are faced with many new challenges, including the need to implement Health Information Technology (HIT) solutions, especially Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems. However, these institutions are also faced with a demand for capital investments outpacing their available funds. This means HIT or EHR projects must compete against other capital investment requests for scarce funds. Senior management teams will need to see the business and quality case that justify the return on investment (ROI) and return on quality (ROQ) before significant financial commitments for health information technology are made.

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VistA's open-source extension into West Virginia

Joseph Conn | Modern Healthcare | April 29, 2013

David Elyard, a health IT coordinator in West Virginia's bureau of behavior health and health facilities, drove the winding roads of his mountainous state last week to trouble-shoot the launch of the computerized laboratory information module being added onto the predominately open-source VistA electronic health-record system... Read More »

Wearable Health IT Systems

The 1980's were dominated by the use of personal computers (PC). The 1990's saw the widespread acquisition and use of laptop computers. This decade has seen the widespread acceptance and use of mobile personal digital assistants (PDA) or smartphones, e.g. iPod, Blackberry, etc.

What is the Role Of the 'Open Source' Movement in Healthcare?

Every so often, we need to go back and remind ourselves why the open source movement is so important. We need to revisit and ask questions about the role of the open source movement in improving healthcare. How does the non-profit open source movement relate to companies operating in the for-profit marketplace?

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Why Should Consumers Care About 'Open Health' Software Solutions

Health care provider organizations and computer specialists have begun to understand the benefits of using 'open' health IT solutions. However, most consumers still have no clue why this should be of any concern to them. Here are some key points that need to be communicated to health care consumers: Read More »

OSEHRA 2012 Open Source Summit

Event Details
Type: 
Conference
Date: 
October 17, 2012 - 8:00am - October 18, 2012 - 6:00pm
Location: 
Gaylord National Washington, DC
United States

The Open Source Electronic Health Records Agent (OSEHRA) will be hosting its First Annual Open Source EHR Summit & Workshop October 17 and 18, 2012, at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland. OSEHRA is a non-profit organization dedicated to creating an open source ecosystem around the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) world-class EHR, VistA. Since its creation a year ago by the VA, the organization has grown rapidly and now has more than 1,000 members. Members include a large number of private companies that are engaged in implementing VistA private sector hospitals and clinics, as well as in the large number of foreign countries that are adopting VistA. These solution providers are also developing a whole range of  enhancements to the VistA core.

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