Again, in the last week, I have come across a few reports and news items which are worth passing on.
These include first:
http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897,22479783-16123,00.html
One privacy breach a day at Centrelink
Denis Peters | September 25, 2007
CENTRELINK says its staff breached privacy regulations 367 times in the past financial year, but only two employees were sacked.
The federal welfare support agency's checks also identified 289 conflict of interest cases, general manager Hank Jongen said.
He said 24 employees resigned and two had been sacked because of the breaches.
Mr Jongen said a privacy breach occurred when an employee accessed personal information when it was not part of their duty, commonly referred to as browsing.
"Last financial year, there were 367 proven privacy breaches,'' he said.
"It's important to note more than 40 per cent of these privacy breaches related to misdirected mail resulting from human error, and not employees browsing customer records.
…..( see the URL above for full article)
If ever a reminder was needed regarding the need to make sure everyone working for any organisation – and especially health care organisations – fully understands just what is expected of them this is it!
Just because you can snoop on other individuals information certainly does not mean you should!
The damage this sort of report does to public confidence in the deployment of e-health applications cannot be underestimated.
Second we have:
http://www.modernhealthcare.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070924/FREE/309240029
Health 2.0 or ‘Hairball 2.0’?
IT conference looks at how patients can help steer their care, transform system
By: Rebecca Vesely
Story posted: September 24, 2007 - 5:00 pm EDT
Empowering consumers to take the reins in their health decisions through robust technology and ultimately transform our healthcare system is the idea behind Health 2.0—a catchphrase that reflects the fresh influx of entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and established Internet companies into the healthcare fray.
About 400 of these early adopters gathered at the San Francisco Hilton Sept. 20 for the first-ever Health 2.0 conference, whose focus was “user-generated healthcare.”
Hot—and very profitable—Web tools such as targeted search (Google), social media (MySpace), wikis (Wikipedia), and user-generated video (YouTube) are transforming the Internet, and, some argue, will transform healthcare as well. The question is how to engage patients, payers and providers, make these tools relevant in our fragmented healthcare system and, perhaps most important, save money and make money.
“Health 2.0 is just getting beyond the buzzword phase,” said Matthew Holt, a noted healthcare blogger who organized the conference. “The next phase I see coming very rapidly is using tools and technology to connect people with providers.” The Big 3 search companies are already working on this. Representatives of Google, Yahoo and Microsoft Corp. didn’t reveal much of their plans, but all said health is an important part of their businesses because it’s information customers want.
…..( see the URL above for full article)
This is an interesting article which starts to explore the way Web 2.0 technologies and approaches may impact in the health sector
Third we have:
http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=7809
Coalition urges IT role in battling chronic disease
By Bernie Monegain, Editor 09/26/07
WASHINGTON – A coalition dedicated to fighting chronic diseases is calling for accelerating the use of information technology throughout the healthcare system.
The Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease, or PFCD is a national coalition of patients, providers, community organizations, business and labor groups, and health policy experts this week released “Ideas for Change” in healthcare. The report calls on the 2008 presidential candidates to address the country's chronic disease crisis in their healthcare plans.
"Healthcare reform will be the most important domestic issue in the upcoming election," said PFCD Executive Director Ken Thorpe, professor and chairman of the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University. " We want all presidential candidates to consider our ideas for change as they solidify and provide greater detail of their healthcare proposals.”
…..( see the URL above for full article)
This article is a brief reminder of the role IT can and should play in co-ordination of chronic disease care. There is no doubt Health IT can make a major difference.
Fourth we have:
Open Source Technology Could Boost Interoperable Health IT
by Colleen Egan, iHealthBeat Editor
The Certification Commission for Health Care IT, a not-for-profit certification body, and MITRE, a not-for-profit research and development firm, recently announced that they are teaming up to build an open source tool to test electronic health record networks for interoperability. The project signifies an important step in the development, testing and certification of EHRs, and its significance lies not only in the fact that the tool will be used to support and test interoperable EHRs, but also in that the format is open source.
Mark Leavitt, chair of CCHIT, said that his organization wanted to develop an open source tool "because open source software development is the equivalent to the open and transparent process we follow in developing our criteria."
…..( see the URL above for full article)
It is interesting to see the home of the commercial profit making software industry (the USA) sponsoring a government open-source approach. Very sensible in my view.
Lastly we have:
Gene information opens new frontier in privacy debate
By Peter Dizikes, Globe Correspondent | September 24, 2007
Scientific celebrities like James Watson and Craig Venter are making their genetic information public knowledge. Will you be able to keep yours private?
That question looms as the fast-moving world of genomics - the study of the full sequence of DNA in organisms - progresses toward the day when an individual's genetic makeup becomes a common part of the medical record. Such a development could vastly improve medical care, but leave a wealth of sensitive data within reach of employers, insurers, or other firms.
"Pretty soon, all of us will have access to our personal genetic data," said George Church, a Harvard scientist whose study, the Personal Genome Project, will release genetic records of 10 people this fall, including Church's.
Church would like to find 100,000 more volunteers to build a scientific trove of genetic data and estimates he can already sequence the portion of human DNA containing genes for $1,000.
"Ideally, everybody on the planet would share their medical and genomic information," Church said.
....( see the URL above for full article)
This article raises a timely issue. Genomics is moving at an amazing pace and it is certain the public – and most professionals – really do not understand what the medium term let alone the long term implications are. The risks of discrimination based on genetic information which may only impact an individual’s life 40 years later need to be carefully assessed and prevented.
All in all an interesting start to the week!
More next week.
David.
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