Jon Daily hits it dead on. All good humor is based on truth.
http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/r9nm2k/v-a--men--delays-of-future-past
Friday, July 18, 2014
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
What matters now
This post is not so much about health care technology as communication and interesting ideas, which are no less important in HIT than elsewhere.
I have been following Seth Godin in my RSS reader for a while. His posts tend to be interesting and he hits it almost every day. As my web has expanded, I have been reading several people that he may have originally pointed me to, or else it's just a small world in the blogosphere.
Seth just published an ebook: What Matters Now.
It's got 70 essays and it's worth reading. I love that it's free; so does the Harvard Review. I follow Penelope Trunk and Chris Anderson. I've read Dan Ariely's book and I listen to Dave Ramsey on occasion. I didn't know Merlin Man, but really like his essay, Enough (pg 73).
Try the download; I think you'll like it.
I have been following Seth Godin in my RSS reader for a while. His posts tend to be interesting and he hits it almost every day. As my web has expanded, I have been reading several people that he may have originally pointed me to, or else it's just a small world in the blogosphere.
Seth just published an ebook: What Matters Now.
It's got 70 essays and it's worth reading. I love that it's free; so does the Harvard Review. I follow Penelope Trunk and Chris Anderson. I've read Dan Ariely's book and I listen to Dave Ramsey on occasion. I didn't know Merlin Man, but really like his essay, Enough (pg 73).
Try the download; I think you'll like it.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Watch users stumble with Healthcare Technology
I saw this video on HIS Talk, so you may have seen it already, but it is worth sharing.
It's too easy to forget the end-user experience. If what we do doesn't make that experience work for the clinicians, we can't get the data we need.
It's too easy to forget the end-user experience. If what we do doesn't make that experience work for the clinicians, we can't get the data we need.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Making Health Care Better
This article in the New York Times earlier this month is long, but worth reading. If the ads are distracting, try Readability.
David Leonhardt writes about Dr. Brent James of Intermountain Heathcare and how he is using data to improve the practice of medicine. A number of things have to be done to make this useful. And meaningful.
1) You have to have good data which shows concrete improvement in outcomes based on specific changes in health practices.
2) You have to give the practitioners that data as part of their regular workflow, making the preferred action easy to accomplish.
3) You still have to allow doctors to do what they feel is best for a specific patient. Meaning #2 above is not required, but suggested.
4) You have to measure which clinicians are following the suggestions and what the outcomes are in a continuous feedback loop.
It's a lot of work and it's complicated, which is why most medicine is not done this way.
Unfortunately, we also still have a system that doesn't reward some of the quality improvements that can be achieved using data like this; that's a subject for another post. It is easy to see how health care costs keep rising when preventing exacerbations and adverse events can cost a health system money, however.
Forget all the hype about healthcare IT and read this article. The potential we have for improving patient care is tremendous.
David Leonhardt writes about Dr. Brent James of Intermountain Heathcare and how he is using data to improve the practice of medicine. A number of things have to be done to make this useful. And meaningful.
1) You have to have good data which shows concrete improvement in outcomes based on specific changes in health practices.
2) You have to give the practitioners that data as part of their regular workflow, making the preferred action easy to accomplish.
3) You still have to allow doctors to do what they feel is best for a specific patient. Meaning #2 above is not required, but suggested.
4) You have to measure which clinicians are following the suggestions and what the outcomes are in a continuous feedback loop.
It's a lot of work and it's complicated, which is why most medicine is not done this way.
Unfortunately, we also still have a system that doesn't reward some of the quality improvements that can be achieved using data like this; that's a subject for another post. It is easy to see how health care costs keep rising when preventing exacerbations and adverse events can cost a health system money, however.
Forget all the hype about healthcare IT and read this article. The potential we have for improving patient care is tremendous.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Speech by Dr. Robert Kolodner
The recent National Coordinator for Health Information Technology gave an interesting talk at Georgia Tech last Wednesday, 11/4/09. You can watch all 80 minutes here. Thanks to GA Tech and Emory and their Health Systems Institute for sponsoring the discussion.
A lot of the talk was about health as opposed to health care. We tend to forget the accomplishments of public health in the last decade.
Dr. Kolodner spent several years at the VA before his time with the feds. As such, he understands what a good EMR can do for data collection and analysis. Late in the talk, he showed a graph of hypertensives and how well controlled their blood pressure was. With the VA patient population, there were several hundred thousand data points. The fascinating part was the discovery that BPs were better controlled in the fall than in the spring. What you can learn when you have the data...
Dr. K. quotes Peter Drucker as describing health systems. Drucker says they are "very complex". Dr K's un-named mentor always told him that "Beginning are messy". We need to at least be at the messy beginning of beginning to use the data we gather about this complex system which is US healthcare.
A lot of the talk was about health as opposed to health care. We tend to forget the accomplishments of public health in the last decade.
Dr. Kolodner spent several years at the VA before his time with the feds. As such, he understands what a good EMR can do for data collection and analysis. Late in the talk, he showed a graph of hypertensives and how well controlled their blood pressure was. With the VA patient population, there were several hundred thousand data points. The fascinating part was the discovery that BPs were better controlled in the fall than in the spring. What you can learn when you have the data...
Dr. K. quotes Peter Drucker as describing health systems. Drucker says they are "very complex". Dr K's un-named mentor always told him that "Beginning are messy". We need to at least be at the messy beginning of beginning to use the data we gather about this complex system which is US healthcare.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Social Media at work
I've been spending more time networking lately, and have been thinking about the use of social media sites. I've written a little about it here before, but the topic is far from exhausted.
One of the blogs I follow, Candid CIO, just posted a piece on Ministry's new policy regarding social media at work. Like everything thing else in the workplace, you'd like to think that a policy isn't necessary if everyone is working with the best interest of the institution at heart. Unfortunately, that isn't always the case. I'm sure Will had to work hard to get the policy they have, and it will certainly need to evolve over time.
A web developer buddy has a pretty strong Twitter presence, but he's paying someone to do it for him. The new UK basketball coach, John Calipari, clearly has a professional web site, tweets, blog, facebook, etc. It's overwhelming, yet an interesting way to access information.
It really is a process of building a persona, whether you're an SEC basketball coach, a healthcare CIO, or just a college student.
Time for me to go update my facebook page...
One of the blogs I follow, Candid CIO, just posted a piece on Ministry's new policy regarding social media at work. Like everything thing else in the workplace, you'd like to think that a policy isn't necessary if everyone is working with the best interest of the institution at heart. Unfortunately, that isn't always the case. I'm sure Will had to work hard to get the policy they have, and it will certainly need to evolve over time.
A web developer buddy has a pretty strong Twitter presence, but he's paying someone to do it for him. The new UK basketball coach, John Calipari, clearly has a professional web site, tweets, blog, facebook, etc. It's overwhelming, yet an interesting way to access information.
It really is a process of building a persona, whether you're an SEC basketball coach, a healthcare CIO, or just a college student.
Time for me to go update my facebook page...
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Low Hanging Fruit
The articles that always get me are ones that focus on getting the software RIGHT. If it works, and you follow up to get the information out of it, it can be a really great thing. If the software looks like programmers thought it up, it won't get the adoption it needs to be useful (or meaningful).
If you subscribe to the Archives of Internal Medicine, you can see the original. Otherwise, enjoy the abstract pointed to above.
With EMR system notifications, just as with email, you can't send a missive to a group and hope that one of them decides to act. All recipients, especially if they are busy doctors, will assume that someone else will do the responding.
The real lesson, post-implementation, be sure to circle back and see what is really being used and how effectively.
If you subscribe to the Archives of Internal Medicine, you can see the original. Otherwise, enjoy the abstract pointed to above.
With EMR system notifications, just as with email, you can't send a missive to a group and hope that one of them decides to act. All recipients, especially if they are busy doctors, will assume that someone else will do the responding.
The real lesson, post-implementation, be sure to circle back and see what is really being used and how effectively.
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