Bill Seeks to Provide SBA Loans to Solo & Group Practices

30 Jun
2009

Recent legislation introduced in the U.S. House intends to provision $10 billion in loans to help solo and small group practices acquire technology that supports meaningful use requirements under the federal economic stimulus package. The big debate in the industry is what constitutes “meaningful use”.

The loans can be used for the installation and acquisition of software, hardware and related technologies that will:

Enhance the continuity of care

Enhance quality measurement reporting

Improve evidence-based decision support

Enhance patient or consumer empowerment

Providers are not eligible for loans for acquiring applications whose entire use is for management of scheduling, fiscal, or basic supply inventory.

Case for Better Healthcare

26 May
2009

IBM Case for Better Healthcare

Desktop Marketshare of Linux Passes 1%

2 May
2009

screenshot13
Watch out Apple and Microsoft…Linux has just hit the 1% mark in desktop market share!!!    I jest ever so slightly but I type this blog entry on the latest 9.04 release of Ubuntu which by far has been the best out of the box Linux experience I have had on a laptop.  Mark Shuttleworth and his team are doing some fabulous things wtih Ubuntu.  No complicated video drivers to install to get compiz fusion working, just a simple effects radio button to enable.  Default fonts are very easy to read and configured automatically for LCD screens making the overall look and feel of the OS a great experience.  I especially like the notification service which I equate to using Growl on OS X and those darn pop-up bubbles on Windows.  I’m proud to say my two boys have been Ubuntu users for the past several years.  I just recently installed Wine and can report that several windows based games run very well under linux.  I must admit it is a far better method than trying to run a virutal machine under Linux.    Kudo’s to the entire community for putting forth such a great effort.  Will Linux overtake OS X and Microsoft anytime soon….  I still say no but times they are a changin.

2009 Data Breach Investigations Report

16 Apr
2009

It is difficult to live the life of a security officer knowing that you are simply managing risk and constantly trying to stay ahead of some of the brightest minds in the world.  One of the many things that keeps me awake at night is the security of our data which is job one throughout all layers of IT in our organization from network, infrastructure, informatics, and application development.  To get to this point requires a lot of planning and collaboration between all areas of IT and the individuals who utilize those resources.


Source:  Verizon

Malware has become a very serious threat so limiting access to online resources has almost become a necessity as the 2008 report from Verizon mentioned that more than one-third of all cases investigated were malware related contributed to nine out of ten of all records breached.  Security requires a vigilent and proactive approach.  With CMS guidelines for payers becoming more strigent the risk to business is much more pronounced requiring security to become an important part of an organizations strategic initiatives.  You can check out the story here or download a PDF version of the report here.

20 Disturbing Facts on US Healthcare Everybody Should Know

16 Apr
2009

In the current economic climate, rising health care costs are scarier than ever. This list sheds light on the 20 most disturbing facts about US health care that everyone should know and most people probably don’t.

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Motion Computing Brings New Upgrades To Their Tablet PC’s

1 Apr
2009


It has been a while since Motion Computing updated their slate style Tablet PC’s.  Since then Panasonic has creatively borrowed the unique and “healthcare oriented” design to their line of rugged devices also targeted at healthcare professionals.  The new upgrades include a new black exterior and more interesting outside of aesthetics are the support for Verizon Wireless’ EV-DO network and built in 802.11 a/g/n network connectivity.  The Core 2 Duo CPU is a nice bump in performace but I will wait for the real-world affect on battery performance before making a determination if this is a worthy upgrade.   I’m sure to get a hands on at HIMSS next week with both Panasonics new entry as well as Motion’s upgraded slate PC’s.

E-prescribing to soar with new spending

26 Mar
2009

http://healthit.ahrq.gov/images/apr07norcerxreport/eRxInterimEvaluationReport_files/image072.jpg
Image Source: Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

As many as 75 percent of U.S. doctors will be writing electronic prescriptions within five years, thanks to new federal spending to encourage e-prescribing.

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iPhone Development

24 Mar
2009

Curiosity got the best of me this evening so I signed up for the iPhone Developer Program.  Being a person who has lived through several horrible user interfaces, Apples approach is refreshingly simple and with many more capabilities in the 3.0 release of the iPhone firmware I think there are many more unique applicaitons to be built.  I have more than an idle curiousity with developing an application utilizing some of the  initiatives we currently have going on at work but time will tell what direction our mobile strategy moves in.  In the mean time I’ll test the waters to see what new API’s Apple has released with their new 3.0 SDK.  Bluetooth communications, dock connector API’s, all have some interesting possiblities.

 

Healthcare spending from 1965 to 2008

12 Mar
2009

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/02/28/business/0301-sbn-webHEALTH.gif

Apple’s Tablet iBook?

9 Mar
2009

aaplnetbookmock

If we are to believe Apple then there is no intent on offering a slate based tablet platform.  However as evidenced by recent Chinese-language financial newspapers this week it is claimed that Wintek has been selected to manufacture touchscreens for a device targeted at the netbook category.  I’ll be the first to admit that I think Apple is poised to offer a device that picks up where Microsoft’s third-party device manufacturers left off.  It is clear to me that the capacitive touch screen on the iPhone/iPod is a great interface to a large screen slate based device.  While the above picture is surely a fake it does draw my attention to the fact that Apple’s recent Beta release of Safari has some very “Touch Friendly” features including the “Top Sites” at-a-glance preview of your favorite websites and Google Chromesque tab management which is uncharactaristic of Apples typicaly UI design within OSX. 

Safari 4 web browser demonstrating Top Sites feature
I became the recent receipient of Dell’s capacitive touch 12″ tablet and can assure you it does not compare to the iPhone’s interface.  Time will tell what Apple does in the coming months and if this rumor has any traction but for my work in developing applications I would love to see some well crafted UI’s sitting atop Apple’s hardware.  As novel as it may sound…”Flicking” through medical records using cover flow would be a pretty neat feature for managing a stack of patient medical records.

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