Health gets personal in the cloud

Google Health Beta and Microsoft's My Health Info

by Brian Ahier | @ahier | comments: 14

Healthcare is one of the biggest industries in the world. The United States spends over 17% of its GDP on healthcare and the issue of the industry's future is being hotly debated in Congress. Whatever happens to other elements of health reform, health information technology will play a key role in moving us towards the goal of bending the cost curve and improving quality and clinical outcomes. A Personal Health Record (PHR) is one way that patients can have some control of their own health data, while providing an interoperable platform for sharing relevant clinical data between providers. Healthcare is changing rapidly and there are some important trends worth watching.

Healthcare in the near future will be quite different than it is today. Web enabled technology is already changing the way medicine is practiced. As the digital nation comes of age we will see new opportunities, and new challenges, bringing healthcare in America into the 21st century. Health consumers will come to expect they will have control over their own health data. Having secure, interoperable access to clinical data will allow patients to partner with their care providers in new ways incorporating Web 2.0 principles.

For example, Google announced at the Health 2.0 conference that they have entered into a partnership to provide telehealth services through their Google Health platform using MDLiveCare. With the integration of MDLiveCare technology, Google can provide a service that offers patients access to doctors from remote locations, via webcam or telephone, into its personal health record offering. This will be particularly valuable for those who are caring for their loved ones from far away. My family is scattered around the country and caring for our mother with advanced stage Alzheimer's was quite a challenge that would have benefited from this type of service. Here is a screenshot of Google Health:

"Patients remember less than 25% of what they're told when they consult with a doctor,” said Bob Smoley, CEO, MDLiveCare, in the statement. "By directly synchronizing the information that's shared…we're able to provide patients with a convenient solution to review their physician or therapist encounters."

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Following Lists

The Twitter Lists Feature is a Game Changer

by Brian Ahier | @ahier | comments: 5

Guest blogger Brian Ahier is a City Councilor in The Dalles, Oregon, and he works in Information Systems at Mid-Columbia Medical Center. He is passionate about healthcare reform, government 2.0 and health IT.

One of the interesting things about the new Lists feature is the expansion of the asymmetrical nature of relationships on Twitter. I use Twitter Lists to control the flow of the fire hose of my data streams into manageable list streams. But another important aspect is the ability to create lists composed of accounts I don't follow. This is radically changing relationships and the way we build communities on Twitter.

As Mark Drapeau pointed out it will become more important which lists you are on than who is following you. You could actually follow no one at all and have lists for each group of accounts you want to follow. You can create listreams to follow rather than following individual people. This is also going to add a new dimension to some of the social aspects of twitter. People will share lists, recommend lists, and get bent out of shape when they are not included on certain lists.

But you don't have to go out and find all the accounts to create great lists. You can subscribe to lists created by Twitter superstars such as Robert Scoble's fascinating lists, Tim O’Reilly's great resources, or Muck Rack’s list of journalists lists. A new service called Listorious will point you to some useful lists to follow. I have created some lists and my best so far contains most of the Twitter healthcare community. Companies will create lists of employees like the Twitter employees list and you can follow their tweets without having to follow every employee.

Twitter Lists also eventually means the death of the Suggested User List. At the Web 2.0 Summit Tim O'Reilly asked Ev Williams if it wasn't time to move past SUL. Tim admitted that he has benefited from being on the list, but implied that it did not reflect actual authority and suggested it may be time for it to die. Ev Williams said, "It has been time to retire suggested user lists for a while... once we get lists rolled out we can retire the Suggested User List and make that, as we like to say, much more Twittery and democratic." Since you can follow other people’s lists, others can follow yours, and you do not have to actually follow an account on your list, Twitter Lists is a game changer.

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