The Health Care Blog

Podcast with Silverlink and IncentOne

By Matthew Holt Those of you regular THCBers are by now probably bored with me going on about the problems (and opportunities) with incentivizing people in health care to do the right thing. So today Silverlink which does automated voice...
May 13, 2008 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

Interview with CEO of Limeade, Henry Albrecht

By Jen McCabe Gorman Henry Albrecht, CEO of Limeade online employee wellness firm, was nice enough to talk with me on his cell phone in the evening (after 5 p.m. West Coast, 2 a.m. Amsterdam time). Both of us were...
May 8, 2008 in Consumers, Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

Interview with Joseph Kvedar, Partners Center for Connected Health

By Matthew Holt Joseph Kvedar is the director of Center for Connected Health, which is part of the Partners HealthCare System's empire in Boston (that's Mass General and the Brigham for you old-schoolers). Joe emceed the conference I spoke at...
May 7, 2008 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

Should Hospitals Install Bar Coding or CPOE First?

By Bob Wachter Robert Wachter is widely regarded as a leading figure in the modern patient safety movement. Together with Dr. Lee Goldman, he coined the term "hospitalist" in an influential 1996 essay in The New England Journal of Medicine....
May 5, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (6)

The 2nd Annual DiabetesMine Design Contest

Over at DiabetesMine #1 blogger Amy Tenderich and her buds at Medgadget have got this years DiabetesMine Design Contest up. The winner gets to go to (and probably demo at) this years Health 2.0 contest—as if you needed more incentive!
April 30, 2008 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

Millennial Health Care Delivery

By Scott Shreeve Millennial (adj.) 1. Of or pertaining to the millennium, or to a thousand years 2. Generation of Americans younger than 29 in 2007 with unique social, cultural, and market identity The highlight of last month's Health 2.0...
April 17, 2008 in Physicians, Technology | Permalink | Comments (5)

Health 1.0h. . .Geez, This Is a Mess

By Craig Stoltz A family member just had surgery, but don't worry, this isn't about that. I want to share just one observation from the experience: Between the decision to have surgery and the moment scalpel touched flesh, the patient's...
April 10, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (16)

The Security of Patient Data

By Brian Klepper EXCLUSIVE TO THCB: HIMSS Analytics, the research arm of the powerful, thoughtful and highly regarded Health Information Management Systems Society, has published a sobering study, Security of Patient Data - see here - that highlights the gap...
April 8, 2008 in Brian Klepper, Electronic Medical Records, Health 2.0, Hospitals, Privacy, Technology, The Industry, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (1)

HEALTH 2.0: Getting the PHR, Privacy and Deborah Peel issue off my chest

By Matthew Holt I’m a card carrying member of the ACLU. I oppose the Patriot Act. And I absolutely oppose the current Administration's decision to ignore the FISA law that already bends over backwards to help the government spy on...
March 13, 2008 in Health 2.0, Policy, Policy/Politics, Privacy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (9)

HEALTH 2.0: Healthline personalizes Aetna (and more)

By Matthew Holt Healthline Networks is pursuing a really interesting strategy as it attempts to "dance with the elephants" in vertical search in health care. Today, it's announcing a number of new partnerships and perhaps most interestingly a deal with...
March 12, 2008 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (14)

TECH/HEALTH 2.0: Eliza & Silverlink, strategic healthcom 2.0

So the gang is all in San Diego getting ready for the Health 2.0 conference which starts Monday (gulp, that's today!) Feverish last minute preparations are apace. I spent some time on Saturday morning talking to two people at the...
March 3, 2008 in Health 2.0, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Drugs & technology--Allscripts and SafeMed

To finish off the last but not least of my HIMSS interviews, here are two companies that both announced being part of the Google ecosystem on the Thursday of HIMSS. One is well known and a leader in ePrescribing and...
March 2, 2008 in Pharma, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Location tracking, RadarFind's view

I’m still hot on location tracking. The idea is that if you can locate devices like pumps and wheelchairs and eventually staff and patients, hospitals should become much more operationally efficient. But this market which is now 4–5 years old...
March 1, 2008 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH/PODCAST: Microsoft speaks health care

Microsoft has made some big strides in health this past year. You can easily argue that a) its search has outpaced Google (following the acquisition of Medstory), b) that it’s making strides in the provider market with the renamed Amalga...
March 1, 2008 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Interview with Newt Gingrich

The controversial and not-shy-with-his-opinions former speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has been very active in recent years promoting the automation of health records and EMRs. But he’s never been a great pains to stress how that would get done...
March 1, 2008 in Podcasts, Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PODCAST: ICW's Jeremy Coote

ICW is a German-based consumer facing record company, that is dominant in Germany and several Eastern European countires. Over here they decided that their skills lie in integrating data from disparate systems, very much a Health 2.0 trend (which is...
February 26, 2008 in Health 2.0, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

More on Google and the Cleveland Clinic

For a start, as I said in my last post and many times, and at least one of these commenters has written at length, the benefits of sharing health data in clinical situations massively outweigh the risk. So that should...
February 25, 2008 in Google, Privacy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (20)

TECH: HIMSS Today

Today it's HIMSS. Yesterday I spoke to the CHIME CIOs and had a good time. Today I’m talking to the Cisco Community for Connected Health and the rest of the time I’ll be accosting people with a microphone. Come back...
February 25, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Google to Store Patients' Health Records

The AP has announced that Google's first step into the world of storing health records will be in conjunction with the Cleveland Clinic—which of course already has a boatload of patients using EMRs and PHRs on the Epic MyChart system....
February 21, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (5)

TECH: Beating up on Maggie'sFarm Blog

Maggie Mahar's blog HealthBeat is so good that I've been itching to find something wrong over there to criticize! (That's a British trait of criticizing your heroes; sorry!). And finally I have. Her co-conspirator Niko Karvounis wrote a piece on...
February 11, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

PODCAST/TECH: Interview with Todd Cozzens, CEO of Picis

Todd Cozzens is the CEO of Massachusetts-based Picis, a company that's made a lot of headway in selling clinical automation software to operating rooms, emergency departments and ICUs in American hospitals and abroad. Last week I got the chance to...
February 4, 2008 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

HEALTH 2.0/TECH: Collective intelligence in AthenaHealth

Scott Shreeve has spent much of his career promoting open source as a way to harvest collective intelligence. But (irritated by a description from a knocker) he’s done a great job at defining one shining example of a network that...
January 30, 2008 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: An Anonymous Bit of Cynicism, by Anonymous

Sometimes THCB’s anonymous contributors really stick the boot in—I got this email last week after Wal-Mart Dossia progress was announced. Twenty-odd Wal-Mart employees (including the VP of benefits / former CIO) are piloting a ten-year-old PHR system (built by Children’s...
January 28, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (5)

TECH: Google Health getting closer

Those purists who spend their time pondering Google's next move have found a login page for Google Health.... Here's what it says Google will do (no, the page itself doesn't work!) With Google Health, you can: Build online health profiles...
January 24, 2008 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

TECH: Best headline ever?

Experts: Internet Helpful, But Not a Replacement for Doctors One wag who sent me this noted that it was not very likely that doctors would think that they were replaceable by the Internet, or any one else for that matter....
January 22, 2008 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

PHARMA/TECH: Drug interaction checkers and more

I'm up over at the Health 2.0 Blog talking about my favorite drug interaction checker. Meanwhile if you (yes, that means you) want to write on the Health 2.0 Blog, please email me and let me know.
January 17, 2008 in Health 2.0, Pharma, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Telepresence--very cool & that's official!

I've mentioned a couple of times on THCB that Telepresence from Cisco is a really cool technology that had a big future in health care. But now it's official! Healthcare's coolest CIO, John Hamalka has proclaimed it his Cool Technology...
January 14, 2008 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

PODCAST: Interview with Michael O'Neil GetWellNetwork

This podcast I did with Michael O'Neil who is the founder of GetWellNetwork. Michael had an episode of cancer relatively early in his adult life and although he was the recipient of great medical care from one of our nation's...
January 8, 2008 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: UPDATE The British & Germans are coming.....to Disease Mangement?

Health Dialog sold itself to partial investor BUPA, a British insurance company, today. The price tag valued Health Dialog at $775m However, this may not be the only European incursion into DM this week. Rumor has it that The Health...
December 19, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

Policy- vs. Market-Based Reform: RHIOs as a Case Study - Brian Klepper

As Anonymouse insightfully commented, the Harvard team's RHIO study in Health Affairs is very telling about the barriers facing do-gooder health care projects. That said, I wanted to add two comments. First, while RHIOs are unquestionably good public policy, what...
December 18, 2007 in Brian Klepper, Health 2.0, Policy/Politics, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: RHIO, RHIO, ree-ay-yo,by anonymouse

OK, the title is a take off on the Police song, but the subject has got a little more influence lately. A sometime THCB correspondent had these thoughts: The December 11 edition of Health Affairs contains a very important article...
December 17, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Shout-out for Phil Chuang

One of my favorite ex-colleagues Phil Chuang got a nice bit of recognition last week being named as one of the ComputerWorld Top 100 CIOs for 2008. Note that this isn’t just health care CIOs, it’s among all CIOs! Also...
December 17, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

HEALTH 2.0: Creating a Universal Individual Healthcare Identifier By Barry Hieb

For many years it has been widely acknowledged that there are many benefits which could be realized by healthcare through the creation of a system of unique individual healthcare identifiers. These identifiers could enable the creation of a comprehensive medical...
December 7, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

Rating Doctors Like Restaurants, by Bob Wachter

Robert Wachter is widely regarded as a leading figure in the modern patient safety movement. Together with Dr. Lee Goldman, he coined the term "hospitalist" in an influential 1996 essay in The New England Journal of Medicine. His most recent...
December 4, 2007 in Bob Wachter, Health 2.0, Quality, Technology | Permalink | Comments (16)

TECH: An appeal for help on visualization software

An old colleague writes to me from the land of multiple project coordination hell. We're managing about 60 concurrent projects in just one of our teams, and dozens of other concurrent projects with other teams. We're rapidly becoming victims of...
November 26, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Yes there are other conferences...

Apparently Health IT is feeling left out and needs a CEO forum-type conference. The people at CCS are trying to create it at a flash hotel in Bel-Air no less. For a pretty humorous run down take a look at...
November 16, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Charlie Baker is concerned about Bill Gates....

So on Weds night I met longtime THCB commenter (and old world pension fund manager) Barry Carrol. He told me that he also reads the Harvard Pilgrim blog. I didn’t even know they had one. Thursday morning, Tom Donald at...
November 9, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

Patients: Coordinated Physician Care Pilots - Paul Grundy MD, IBM

Dr. Paul Grundy helped organize the Patient-Centered Primary Care Collaborative at IBM and serves at its Chair. IBM spends about $1.7 billion a year on healthcare for its employees and families, providing coverage for half a million people. The company...
October 30, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

HEALTH 2.0 Connecting Consumers and Providers

It's official! The waiting is over. The follow-up to the first Health 2.0 conference has been scheduled. "Health 2.0 Connecting Consumers and Providers" will be held on March 4th, 2008 at the Westin San Diego. For details, visit the Health...
October 27, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

QUALITY: Stents cannot be killed, well perhaps not

So in the latest of the stent wars a new study suggests that Medicare has been saving money as drug-eluting stents have replaced by-passes. This of course is music to the ears of J'n'J & Boston Scientific -- not to...
October 26, 2007 in Quality, Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

HEALTH2.0: Vertical Search--The only way is up?

Forrester data in iHealthbeat: Seventy percent of online consumers surveyed said they have used a Web-based search engine to find health-related information, but just 7% of online consumers surveyed said they have used a health-specific search engine, according to a...
October 19, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (7)

TECH/HEALTH2.0: Marissa Mayer speaks Google Health

At Web2.0 Summit yesterday (no, Matthew isn't important enough to be invited to apply for a ticket, but I met a VC for lunch there so I knew it was happening!) Google's new (and presumably temporary) head of health care...
October 18, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (11)

CONSUMERS/TECH: Molly and Don write a Gray Paper

So this morning and yesterday afternoon at the Ix Conference I've heard some really interesting technology presentations from Silverlink (disclosure Ix and THCB sponsors!) & Eliza, who are both in the voice automated outbound call space. Popped in on Resolution...
October 10, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

CONSUMERS/TECH: David Sobel stars on Tuesday morning at the Ix Conference

Yesterday (Monday) there was a great session about advertising in health care—but actually impossible to blog about as it was mostly funny videos! Great stuff from Hollywood writer Marty Montgomery who works with Vic Stretcher, HealthMedia Inc, & also from...
October 9, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

HEALTH2.0/TECH: Athena Health: The History of the First Health 2.0 IPO By Scott Shreeve

Scott Shreeve writes frequently about Health 2.0, open source and healthcare, topics that as the co-founder of Medsphere, one of the most-closely followed companies in the industry, he is extremely well qualified to write about. If you enjoy this piece,...
October 9, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

TECH/CONSUMERS: Ix Therapy time again!!

Today Indu and I are at the Ix Therapy Conference in Park City, UT. I'm here as a guest of Josh Seidman, Dorothy Jeffress and the crew at the Center for Information Therapy David Kibbe is up first. His talk...
October 8, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Glen Tullman, Allscripts CEO on HealthVault

Microsoft's HealthVault brings lots of partners to the table. And so far it's announced one major EMR vendor as a partner. That partner is Allscripts and this morning I got to talk with CEO Glen Tullman. Glen explained his take...
October 5, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Microsoft Healthvault

Microsoft released its new Health Vault system this morning. You can read lots about it all over the Internet (NY Times article here). Briefly the Health Vault allows you to save searches and information you’ve collected on the Internet, also...
October 4, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (15)

TECH: Search, Microsoft gets serious

Having said that search is the most important part of Health2.0, I thought I’d better find out something about it. As it happens Microsoft, the #3 search company by user volume, is announcing a major revision to its Live Search...
September 27, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: RWJ sponsors gamers health contest

RWJ’s Susan Promislo writes to tell you all: RWJ has a new open source competition going on that closes in 6 days that I thought also might hold interest for your readers. The current competition, "Why Games Matter: A Prescription...
September 24, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

Best of: AthenaHealth's Jonathan Bush on the end of software

AthenaHealth's Jonathan Bush was patient enough to talk through two interviews with me. The first died in a software flameout--the second crashed my computer, but thankfully the recording was still there after my very fearful restart! Jonathan explains AthenaHealth's business...
September 16, 2007 in Health 2.0, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

BEST OF: JD Kleinke talks about PHRs, Omnimedix and the Dossia controversy

JD Kleinke is always one of the more controversial and fun people in health care policy and health care IT. He doesn't just write about stuff--he also gets really involved. From his early days at HCIA to his more recent...
September 16, 2007 in Podcasts, Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

HEALTH2.0/TECH: Way too much going on!

I'm trying to organize a conference with everyone and their brother claiming that they need the last seat and that the dog ate their mouse so they couldn't register. And we've been coaxing our demo panelists through their demos--which are...
September 12, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

HEALTH PLANS/TECH: Selling out a name--et tu Harvard?

Over at HISTalk there's frequent criticism of "awards" that are handed out by analysts to vendors, and frequent assessment of which consultants can be trusted as independent, as opposed to which ones will "sell" an award. Frost and Sullivan gets...
September 10, 2007 in Health Plans, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

BEST OF: Interview with Shawn Jenkins, CEO BenefitFocus

When I was contacted by the PR folks representing BenefitFocus I found out that they'd quietly put into place the original 1995 business plan of Healtheon--connecting employers and health plans electronically around enrollment and billing. (Remember The New New Thing?)...
August 31, 2007 in Health 2.0, Health Plans, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

What Are They Thinking: ONCHIT and RTI - Brian Klepper

I'm sure I don't really get the deeper issues involved here, but sometimes its hard to not have your breath taken away by some people's notion of a good idea. Maybe its because I'm not a true geek, but what...
August 24, 2007 in Brian Klepper, Policy, Policy/Politics, Technology | Permalink | Comments (15)

OMNI: The Oncology Metrics National Index - Brian Klepper

An innovative Ft. Worth consulting firm comprised of experienced oncology professionals, Oncology Metrics, has linked private oncology practices throughout the country in a collaborative, knowledge-sharing enterprise, called the Oncology Circle. The first round of information brought together 22 practices containing...
August 20, 2007 in Brian Klepper, Pharma, Physicians, Quality, Technology, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (5)

PODCAST/QUALITY/TECH/HEALTH PLANS: Disease management, technolgy and the future of health care--Gordon Norman tells all

Gordon Norman is Exec VP and Chief Science Officer at Alere Medical, formerly head of DM at Pacificare and a font of knowledge and opinion about disease management, technology, the role of health plans, and the chances for overall change...
August 6, 2007 in Health Plans, Podcasts, Quality, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH/HEALTH2.0: Harris Shows Number of Cyberchondriacs increases to an Estimated 160 Million Nationwide

Harris Shows Number of Cyberchondriacs increases to an Estimated 160 Million Nationwide As you know I've been following this number for 10 years (not to mention working with and at Harris during part of that time), and the increase in...
August 6, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

PODCAST: Fine art and healthcare--a conversation with David St Clair, MeDecision

A while back I got a rather unusual email from MEDecision-- an interesting tech company I've interviewed before on THCB. It was actually quoting their CEO David St Clair who'd just seen Malcom Gladwell and it said this: Picasso was...
August 1, 2007 in Podcasts, Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

PODCAST/TECHNOLOGY: Shiftwise Founder Jason Lander

Shiftwise wants to become the Travelocity or the Orbitz of the nurse staffing business by bringing web-based solutions to a field that has been dominated for years by agencies using outdated technology. By allowing HR managers to match available staff...
July 31, 2007 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: PHR of cool

Here's first press release I've seen claiming a PHR that works on your iPhone (from MedeFile). Having said that, as Apple advertises the iPhone as delivering the Internet (not a scaled down version) then presumably any web-accessible PHR is accessible...
July 30, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

HEALTH2.0/TECH: Big day for Healthline

It’s a big day for Healthline Networks. The health “search and much more service” (if I call them “search only”, President Dean Stephens gets grumpy with me!) has raised another $21m in venture funding and announced deals with several customers—including...
July 16, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Granger on the UK's NPfIT

On his way out the door Richard Granger is interviewed in CIO Magazine about the NPfIT in the UK’s NHS. A quick summary: 1) The budget scope went up because there was no PACS in the original program. The original...
July 10, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH: This sounds like deliberate trouble..

I was sent an email about a Global Competition Seeks Disruptive Innovations in Health and Health Care. Some of you like this kind of thing. The rest may be a touch cynical & I’m not sure $5,000 is going to...
July 4, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH/HEALTH2.0: Vince Kuratis Connecting the Dots...on Google Health

Vince Kuratis, who knows rather more than he should about DM and eHealth, and maybe knows rather too much to be as optimistic as he is—given all that he knows—has a long and excellent article on Connecting the Dots...Google Health...
July 3, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Why physicians don't want email from patients

Headline: Patient-Doctor E-mail Could Cut Income for Physician Practices. Kaiser Permanente Northwest’s Clinical Systems Planning and Consulting group did a study on its patient-physician email use in its NorthWest region and found that it worked as it was supposed to....
July 2, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (30)

TECH: Google trying to use Sicko to sell keyword advertising

Does negative press make health care companies Sicko? The solution is to buy a Google adword…Yup, that’s the headline of a come-on post on the Google Health Advertising Blog! Wonder if the “health advertising team” at Google isn’t trying a...
July 1, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/CONSUMERS: Perspectives on the Future of Personal Health Records

I am embarrassed to say that I have yet to read the CHCF report on Perspectives on the Future of Personal Health Records . But this is a reminder to myself to do it soon! (And no, I'm not bitter--honestly--that...
June 20, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

HEALTH2.0/CONSUMERS/TECH: Patient groups online are a source and a force

We know that patients have been organizing online and Laura Landro (who's been there herself) confirms it in a fascinating article. Go read it. Of course this is making some people nervous. Of course, the rush to link communities and...
June 15, 2007 in Consumers, Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

PODCAST/TECH: HEALTH2.0/TECH/PODCAST: Interview with Venky Harinarayan, Founder Kosmix

Here's this week's interview is with Venky Harinarayan, Founder and (unofficial) CEO at Kosmix. Kosmix wants its new RightHealth site to be the "unofficial home page for health". He'll tell you about categories and "broad" searching, the intricacies of the...
June 14, 2007 in Health 2.0, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

PODCAST/TECH: Interview with Luis Machuca, CEO Kryptiq

We had Luis Machuca CEO of Kryptiq on a podcast from WHCC talking about his company's health plan earlier in May. But he didn't get to talk much about his company's business or technology. This interview rectifies that, and it's...
June 13, 2007 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

HEALTH2.0: Knowledge Prostitution

The powerhouse that is Scott Shreeve, not content with jetting around the US, looking after his newest (and 4th) kid and filling my inbox with amazing stuff, is having a go at prostitutes by comparing them to doctors! Personally I’ve...
June 12, 2007 in Health 2.0, Physicians, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

HEALTH2.0/TECH: Kosmix unveils new page

Kosmix has been known for having a number of search engine deals going with Revolution, Vimo and others. I spent a little time with the crew last week down in Mountain View, and will be interviewing Founder/CEO Venky Harinarayan later...
June 11, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (3)

POLICY/TECH: AP exposes Gingrich, well sorta

The AP says that Newt's Center for Health Transformation is a front for companies that want him to promote their points of view and that he's doing it for the money. Well first this is not exactly news--and Newt has...
June 11, 2007 in Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

HEALTH2.0/TECH: PeerWisdom vs OrganizedWisdom

In the great Pacific Northwest, today's fun start-up is called PeerWisdom, which apparently has pulled down a quick $2m to build something in the patient communities space. They’re not alone of course, and even the articlethat "exposes" them (in an...
June 11, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH/POLICY: Obama--looking to Neal Patterson for a contribution?

I was called by the LA Times for a comment on whether increasing access would increase cost. After giving my standard lament about how no one talks about the real underlying problem of practice variation and waste (or at least...
June 11, 2007 in Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Healthcare Informatics 100 is not very helpful

The Healthare Informatics 100 list of companies in Health IT is out. It’s fawned over with reverence by lots of companies on the list, and it even gets an encouraging nod from MrHISTalk—who’s usually a lot more sensible. Which is...
June 8, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH/POLICY: Mr Quinn is a little cynical about Dr Brailer

Ex-Health IT Czar David Brailer is starting a fund for health care IT with a pretty damn ambitious goal — reducing health care costs —and some $500m in funding from the state of California (or at least its employees pension...
June 6, 2007 in Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Fotsch talks sense on PHRs (let's hope someone's listening)

There’s a whole lot of rubbish talked by various MDs quoted in an article in Modern Physician called PHR liability, data overload making docs a little queasy. Essentially they’re all saying that they’re gong to be overrun by patients with...
June 5, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

TECH/CONSUMERS: Mental Health--Bloggers Prefer Web Over Therapist by James Harris

James Harris a marketing consultant for WebTribesInc.com, an operator of MySpace-style websites for individuals with mental health concerns. wrote to me about the results of a new survey the company made of its members. Now it’s a small survey of...
June 4, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH: Community for Connected Health

We'd like to welcome aboard THCB 's latest sponsor, Cisco's Community for Connected Health. Connected Health’s core focus is to provide value to caregivers, end-users, CIOs and other IT professionals through education, interaction and access to Cisco healthcare and technology...
May 31, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: A robot train (very cute)

Aethon (whom I interviewed at HIMSS) make the TUG, an autonomous robot which moves stuff around hospitals. And for children's hospitals, they’ve made a rather more fun version named JR. Go read the story of how JR came to life...
May 31, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/HEALTH2.0: Healthcamp2

I was sick on Saturday plus had had certain domestic issues arise after telling my fiancee that I was planning on abandoning her for work on a Saturday that was, err, unpaid. So I missed HealthCamp2. But it looked pretty...
May 31, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PODCAST: Interview with Bob Fisher, CEO of Foresight

Here's the transcript of the recent podcast with Bob Fisher from Foresight. The original interview is here and a 7 minute cut down version is up on Foresight's site too. Matthew Holt: This is Matthew Holt with the Health Care...
May 30, 2007 in Health Plans, Technology | Permalink | TrackBack

TECH: Put this one down in the somewhat bizarre category

A NY Times op-ed, no less, exhorting physicians to adopt VistA. I assume this means that Scott Shreeve & Fred Trotter's phones will be ringing off the hook. Now I know this is a good idea and all that, but...
May 30, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (5)

TECH: A good use of Twitter?

I am really struggling to understand the point of Twitter. But maybe there is some use to it. Via #1 blogger Amy Tenderich, here's a diabetic recording his life on Twitter. Amy, will of course be at Health2.0. Maybe we’ll...
May 25, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/CONSUMERS: Musings on IFTF, Health2.0 and social networking

I sat in a meeting today put on by my old colleagues at IFTF. (There are some other bloggers here, so there’ll be more about the meeting elsewhere). The room is filled with an interesting mix of techies, health care...
May 24, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/HEALTH2.0: The trademark for Health2.0

I’m at IFTF’s meeting today with a group discussion health new media. The Health2.0 term has been used alot and at Dmitriy’s urging I thought I’d clarify something. Yes I’ve trademarked Health2.0. No, I will not stop anyone using it....
May 24, 2007 in Health 2.0, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH/PODCAST: Interview with Bob Fisher, CEO of Foresight

Foresight is a highly focused tech company working (mostly) deep in the transactional guts of payers and plans providing claims editing tools, business intelligence and a variety of other services. Recently they had a very convivial user conference in Carefree,...
May 24, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

HEALTH2.0/TECH: And in your Health2.0 moment of zen

I’ll be at an IFTF meeting today where they too are talking about Health2.0 but in the much wider context of a shift in bio-citizenry. Hey, they’ve got way high fallotin' since my days there as a grunge health care...
May 24, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PODCAST: Generic Medical Devices, really? The interview with Richard Kuntz, CEO

This is the transcript of the interview with Richard Kuntz, the CEO of Generic Medical Devices—a start up making, well, generic medical devices. The audio is here Matthew Holt: This is Matthew Holt with the Health Care Blog, and this...
May 24, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH: Scott Shreeve, Health 2.0: From Concept to Reality

Scott is being a Health2.0 hero. He's all over the wiki for Health2.0, preaching the gospel at TEPR today and has a nice piece about the evolution of the concept on his blog called Health 2.0: From Concept to Reality....
May 21, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PODCAST: Generic Medical Devices, really? The interview with Richard Kuntz, CEO

At a great meeting in Nashville last week Brian Klepper was explaining to us all how medical supplies were 40% of a hospital’s budget and how the margins on those devices were in the stratosphere. You’d assume that someone would...
May 18, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/CONSUMERS/THCB: Health2.0 Agenda Announcement!

I am delighted to announce the line-up and agenda for Health2.0–User Generated Healthcare, which will be held on September 20th in San Francisco. After an introduction and summary of the Health2.0 report (from little ol’ me and my colleague Indu...
May 18, 2007 in Consumers, Technology, THCB | Permalink | Comments (4)

TECH: Virtual HIMSS show is up

HIMSS is having a virtual trade show…. it looks quite interesting, go take a look. It takes a minute to register, but looks quite interesting.
May 16, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Exercise while working

The WSJ's Health Blog actually features something about health (normally it’s just about drugs). It’s about a doctor at Mayo who’s working with Steelcase to create a treadmill that you walk on while standing at a desk. While we’re talking...
May 16, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/QUALITY: Are Employers the Future Leaders in Chronic Care Management

My article in Digital Healthcare & Productivity about the NYC meeting about remote monitoring and chronic care management is called Are Employers the Future Leaders in Chronic Care Management? As you may know I’m not that optimistic about the role...
May 15, 2007 in Quality, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: A top 10 list from Quadramed

Health tech vendor Quadramed sent me this Top 10 list about Consumers and Health Information Technology 10. Health Information Technology Improves the Quality of Care Received 9. Health Information Technology is Critical in the Event of a Nation-Wide Emergency 8....
May 15, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

TECH: David Pogue inadvertently pimps Whoissick

Pogue's techy columns are usually great. This one is too, but he had missed WhoIsSick in his quest to Ask the Crowd to Spread the News about health care online. Of course we’re all over the Health2.0 phenom at THCB...
May 14, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

PODCAST/CONSUMERS/TECH: Interview with Joseph Kvedar, Partners' Connected Health guru

This is the transcript of the podcast interview I did with Joseph Kvedar, from Partners Center for Connected Health. Coincidentally this past Tuesday in NYC, the Center, along with Continue Health Alliance and others, sponsored a meeting about the use...
May 14, 2007 in Consumers, Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/HEALTH PLANS: AthenaHealth causing trouble again

AthenaHealth caused a ruckus last year when it put out a ranking of how fast health plans were paying doctors. Now they're at it again. Cigna ranked No. 1 and United didn't do so well. Of course if just speed...
May 7, 2007 in Health Plans, Technology | Permalink | Comments (5)

TECH: Quadramed surveys consumers on EMRs et al

Just to show that you don't have to be Kaiser to survey the public on EMRs, mid-tier vendor Quadramed has done so too. The basic findings are that few consumers were aware that national quality ratings exist. And frankly I...
May 7, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

PODCAST/TECH: Interview with Chris Hobson, Orion Health

Since John Irvine's taken over as the business lead for THCB, we now have a raft of new sponsors including CDW, Silverlink and now Orion Health. Apparently the marketing folks at Orion thought that it would be a good idea...
May 4, 2007 in International, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH: Andy Grove 's Prescription By John Irvine

Former Intel Chairman and CEO Andy Grove is in the latest issue of WIRED talking about the paradoxical relationship between healthcare and technology. “We have the Human Genome Project, personalized medicine, war on cancer, CyberKnife, stem cell research on one...
May 3, 2007 in irvine, Technology | Permalink | Comments (10)

TECH: KP promoting EHRs

Kaiser Permanente is trying to shift the focus on its EHR programs back to the good things about it (and we’ve heard plenty about the controversy). They are having a conference today in DC with big guns like Carolyn Clancy...
May 2, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | TrackBack

TECH: Medecision launches blog

There’s lots of blogs about health care IT, but not too many from health care IT companies themselves. Today Medecision launches one. For more on Medecision and what it does see my interview with President John Copabianco
May 2, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

PODCAST/CONSUMERS/TECH: Interview with Joseph Kvedar, Partners' Connected Health guru

Joseph Kvedar wrote a piece for THCB a couple of weeks back on Connected Health and its potential. As I'm in Boston I dropped in on him in his office at the center of the world's greatest collection of medical...
April 30, 2007 in Hospitals, Physicians, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/HEALTH PLANS: Interview/Podcast with Mark Ganz, CEO Regence and Luis Machuca, CEO Kryptiq

This is the transcript from an interview I did at WHCC last week with Mark Ganz, the CEO of Regence, the Oregon based Blues plan that operates in the Pacfic Northwest, and Luis Machuca, the CEO of Portland-based health IT...
April 30, 2007 in Health Plans, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/POLICY: Boston Friday dog blogging

This week I've been in Washington DC at the World Health Care Congress and I've talked to a lot of people--some on and some off the record. Much of that of course has been available at WorldHealthCareBlog, and some smattering...
April 27, 2007 in Policy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/THCB: Health2.0 Conference, September 20th, San Francisco

I am delighted to tell you all about a brand new conference that THCB is putting on with Etude Scientific , in conjunction with the World Health Care Congress. It’s a conference and report called Health2.0: User-Generated Healthcare. The conference...
April 24, 2007 in Blogs, Technology, THCB | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Justen Deal rehashed in the WSJ

In an article called The Email Kid Takes On HMO's Corner Office the WSJ has a rehash in some decent historical perspective of the Justen Deal—Healthconnect issue. I get a minor billing as the venue for Andy Wiesenthal’s podcast. For...
April 24, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

PODCAST/TECH: Interview with Chris Hobson, Orion Health

Last week THCB picked up a new sponsor, as evidenced by the banner to the right. Orion Health provides messaging, interoperability and clinical work-flow solutions. So I thought that it might not be a bad idea to interview Orion to...
April 24, 2007 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

POLICY: Is Michael Porter getting better?

Well he did mention incentives, even though me and one of the smartest guys I know (Kim Slocum) both agreed that the evidence that he was seeing of lots of activity moving to his models, was largely fictional. What am...
April 23, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: Interview/Podcast with Peter Neupert, Microsoft

Next couple of days, lots of me over at the WHCC blog. For a start here's the Interview/Podcast with Peter Neupert, Microsoft.
April 23, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PHYSICIANS: The real state of play in eRx, by Jonathan Pearlstein

The very careful reader will have noted that I met a very smart (and, to a rapidly becoming old fogey like me, disturbingly young!) THCB reader, Jonathan Pearlstein at HIMSS. Jon works for the academic survey firm NORC and has...
April 19, 2007 in Physicians, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/CONSUMERS: Quality, Cost and Connected Health by Joseph Kvedar

Joseph C. Kvedar, MD is the Director of the Center for Connected Health at Partners Healthcare System in Boston. Given that so many organizations are talking about Connected Health in one flavor or another, I thought it might be interesting...
April 19, 2007 in Consumers, Quality, Technology | Permalink | Comments (6)

TECH: Health 2.0 article

This article in Government Health IT by Brian Robertson is a reasonably good description of the basics behind Health care 2.0. It doesn’t really feature much in the way of actual Health2.0 players other than Revolutions, but it does interview...
April 17, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: AHRQ on eRx

The AHRQ’s report on its monitored eRx pilots is out. Here are the findings that I’ve extracted from their slightly longer list in the exec sum. In addition to testing the functionality of e-prescribing standards, pilot sites tracked various outcomes...
April 17, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PHYSICIANS: Sermo starting to kick-butt and take names

Sermo, the physician community site, seems to really be on a roll. I can now tell you what CEO Daniel Palestrand told me a few weeks back. 1) They've got 10,000 physicians registered--and there's a lot of use on the...
April 16, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

TECH: Things hotting up as Revolution's official launch coming up

The prospect of Revolution Health's official launch (it's actually up already but is relaunching this Thursday) has generated favorable press in the NY Times for Steve Case and crew. Milt Freudenheim's done his homework, mostly. He essentially says that the...
April 16, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (8)

TECH: Getting the eRx Plumbing Right Is Hard Work

I'm at Digital Healthcare & Productivity talking about the real progress being made (or not) in fixing the infrastructure needed for ePrescribing. It’s called Getting the eRx Plumbing Right Is Hard Work.
April 11, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Baffling press releases #397

This is why no one understands technology. I've interviewed the CEO of Click4Care Dave Blauer a while back and he managed to explain his business well enough. But honestly--read this press release and try to figure out who between these...
April 10, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (6)

TECH/CONSUMERS: JSK on banks moving into health care

Banks Morph Into Health IT Engines. Go read.
April 10, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PODCAST: RHIOs, physician messaging et al--the word from Axolotl's Ray Scott

Here's the transcript of last weeks podcast with Axolotl's CEO Ray Scott. Essential stuff if you care about health data and information exchange--which for some reason some people seem to think is important! Matthew Holt: It's Matthew Holt. I'm back...
April 9, 2007 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH: Interview with Fred Trotter

At EMRUpdate there's an interesting interview with Fred Trotter, a leading GPL/open source medical software/software freedom evangelist. Fred has made several appearances over here at THCB but this interview gives a very clear explanation of what GPL/open source software could...
April 5, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: More on the Pango-InnerWireless Merger

Over at Digital Healthcare and Productivity I have an article about the latest merger in the asset tracking world. It's called Pango-InnerWireless Merger Raises Hopes and Questions. I was relatively optimistic about it when I spoke to Pango’s (now InnerWireless...
April 3, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/PHYSICIANS: What's wrong with eRx?

Health Affairs has a study from HSC about ePrescribing. here's the press release. The team interviewed a bunch of practices using eRx and some not. About 2/3 were using it as part of an EMR, the rest were using a...
April 3, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH/PODCAST: RHIOs, physician messaging et al--the word from Axolotl's Ray Scott

Ray Scott is CEO of Axolotl. Ray is a British egghead (a math whiz) who somehow got himself dragged over to California in the mid-1990s. Since then, and quietly building on a great success in the oddball Northern California surfing...
April 3, 2007 in Podcasts, Technology | Permalink | Comments (0)

TECH/CONSUMERS: Health2.0 mashup site of the week

Who is Sick? User reported data about who is sick, where and when. The site thinks that it's likely to help people figure out whether they’re sick or whether they jsut have something that’s going around. I have zero idea...
April 3, 2007 in Consumers, Technology | Permalink | Comments (2)

TECH: In which Dmitriy challenges Health2.0, but reveals that he's challenged, and not just by the calendar

Over at Trusted MD Dmitriy “jumps on Health 2.0 Bandwagon”. Well actually he’s taking the piss, as we English say. The only problem is that today is April 2, not April 1. And Dmitriy doesn’t understand technology diffusion as opposed...
April 2, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (4)

TECH: Top Health IT innovators 2007

FierceHealthcare (which I have NOTHING to do with any more!!) is out with a list of Top Health IT innovators for 2007 . Funnily enough several companies I’ve featured here or in my talks are on the list, and #1...
April 2, 2007 in Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

PODCASTS/HEALTH PLANS/TECH: Interview with Stan Nowak, CEO of Silverlink

Stan Nowak is President and CEO of Silverlink which does automated phone calls on behalf of health plans. It's a lot more complex and much more interesting than you might think, and it really is closing the loop for those...
March 28, 2007 in Health Plans, Podcasts, Technology |