IBMers and Friends on Networked, Patient-Centric Healthcare:
Electronic Health Records, Health Information Exchange, Clinical Transformation, Biobanking, etc.
Janet Marchibroda is the chief health care officer of IBM
"As President Obama and Congress take on what the president
in his American Medical Association speech called the "ticking time
bomb" of health care costs, they need to know that they can't succeed
without harnessing the massive data generated by modern medicine.
Getting the best information into the hands of doctors and patients,
while protecting patient privacy, is not just a desire but an
overriding need if we are to get a handle on spiraling costs and also
improve care. "(read the rest @ There Can Be No Health Care Reform Without An Information Revolution - Forbes.com)
In addition to the Smarter Healthcare widget seen here in the right column, we've developed other widgets on key Smarter Planet topics that you are welcome to add to your site, page, or blog, or share with your contacts and network. Simply copy and paste the embedding code that works for your site.
We've also made these widgets available as Facebook applications. Please feel free to put these to work and enable our community to function as a social media catalyst.
This week, Smarter Planet moves to the pressing issue of healthcare. As the "op-ad" thought leadership story for this vital topic notes:
"The problems with our healthcare system are well known and well documented and endlessly debated. What's not so apparent is that many of them arise because our healthcare system isn't, in fact, a system."
Adam Christensen's post on the Building a Smarter Planet blog picks up on how of all aspects of smarter planet, healthcare is understandably one that is both deeply personal, as well as a societal front that we all have a vested interest in.
Crucial breakthroughs in the treatment of many common diseases such as
diabetes and Parkinson's could be achieved by harnessing a powerful
scientific approach called systems biology, according to leading scientists from across Europe. Systems biology is a rapidly advancing field that combines empirical, mathematical and computational techniques to gain understanding of complex biological and physiological phenomena. (via Key to future medical breakthroughs is systems biology)
I've been busy working on the launch of IBM's Smarter Planet mega-strategy, which seeks to help the world build the next generation of intelligent infrastructure for everything from transportation and energy grids to supply chains and complex systems such as healthcare.
To that end I've set up A Smart Planet on Tumblr (which I like as a more spontaneous and multimedia approach to blogging) and just wanted to share a couple of examples of how this smarter planet meme, which intersects with fronts such as wireless sensor systems, ubiquitous and wearable computing, as well as the promise of marrying this new "Web Wide World" to powerful supercomputing, presumably delivered via cloud-based services.
I just added to examples of how the "Internet of Things" -- trillions of devices, sensors and smart objects -- relates to healthcare innovation.
For example, Bodymedia has developed different wearable products to help people manage their weight and overall health. Similarly, Intel just announced a laptop-style device for connecting patients and caregivers electronically.
Of course, these are only representative of the deeper meaning of how Smarter Planet can address healthcare challenges with new computing and innovation models across many different fronts, such as using social networks for biosurvelliance, or mobile phones for natural disaster alerting and response.
In fact,it's pretty clear that the future of healthcare is deeply connected to a blend of technological and intellectual innovation, and I will try to rededicate and refocus Healthnex to reflect this direction.
I watch Frontline's Sick Around the World documentary last night and really recommend it to all as a sober examination of the healthcare issues that are such a high priority in America today.
What I found most insightful about T.R. Reid's reporting was the clear and practical way he looked at the pros and cons of the national health systems in the U.K., Japan, Germany and Switzerland. Even more impressive was learning how Taiwan went about reinventing their healthcare system by drawing on the best elements of programs around the world.
I certainly hope we can follow such a practical process to turn around the fragmented U.S. healthcare situation, which the Harvard-trained architect of the Taiwan program noted is not a system, but rather a market.
Finally, I know that the politics of healthcare is a hot-button issue, and that many Americans are very wary about the role of government in healthcare (even though we are already a quasi-nationalized system via the Veterans Administration and Medicare/Medicaid).
What I liked most about this investigation is its positive and constructive tone: what can we learn from the rest of the world, and how can we be smart about the evolution that most Americans hunger for?
Dr. Shreeve's effort at defining Healthcare 2.0 is just about a year old, but it's a very worthy effort. I'm reblogging it here to advance the collective effort at building some consensus around the intersection of healthcare, social networking and Web innovations. There are excellent alternative sources for defining Health 2.0 on the Health2.0 blog Jack
"In that vein, I have attempted to capture, the quintessential characteristics of the emerging movement and body of companies that make up the Health 2.0 movement.
"The graphic is self-explanatory, but the narrative is helpful to see how the pieces build on each other and work together to bring the concept of Health 2.0 into focus. Here goes:
2. Realize that Health 2.0 is all about Patient Empowered (not the misnomer "Consumer Directed") Healthcare whereby patients have the information they need to be able to make rational healthcare decisions (transparency of information) based on value (outcomes over price). In the Health 2.0 paradigm, everyone in the healthcare process is focused on increasing value for the patient.
3. Realize that Health 2.0 is absolutely reliant on interoperability of health information. Everything from the Personal Health Record (PHR), to the Clinic Health Record (CHR), to the Enterprise Health Record (EHR), to the National Health Record (NHR) must be based on standards, be seamlessly transitioned between environments per standardized security and privacy protocols, and be accessible anytime from anywhere.
5. As more information becomes available as a result of increased transparency, there will be a wave of innovation at all points along the full cycle of care (see slide 8-12), which includes phases where health care service providers Educate, Prevent, Diagnose, Prepare, Intervene, Recover, Monitor, and Manage the various disease states. Measuring someone's HgA1c or Ejection Fraction does not tell you how effective their diabetic or cardiovascular treatments have been. You need to factor in the care provided over the full cycle of care to appropriately determine value.
6. An increased amount of personal health and outcomes information will create an ongoing role for infomediaries and related services providers to add value at each stage of the full cycle of care. These value added Health Advisory Services (more later) will offered by hundreds of companies, in thousands of forms, to millions of people who are can benefit from the remixing of medically related information. It is easy to see how the new Web 2.0 framework, with its inherent social networking and collaboration tools, will make this "long tail" of medicine a "value"able venture.
These concepts are worthy of further discussion and debate, particularly since we are blazing new territory without any established rules, patterns, or procedures. Shooting my canonical representation of Heath 2.0 out into the ether is the proverbial "shot out of the canon" to stimulate the conversation."
As part of some research on IBM's efforts in collaborative innovation, I was checking out the new beta site for alphaWorks, IBM's public program for early adopters of new technologies and trends, and came across this very interesting new offering related to open-standards based exchange for healthcare data. Technologists can actually go in and try this system out. A bit out of my technical skill level (not sure what an "affinity domain" is), but would be interested to hear feedback on those who do try it out. As always, please spread the word:
PHIAD
creates the first on-demand system in the public health industry by
enabling the integration and sharing of data generated at clinical and
public health institutions across proprietary systems and political
boundaries.
The system is built upon international coding
systems, as well as the coordination between open-source technologies
and the 'Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise' (IHE) initiative in the
use of standards to allow multi-national public health reporting and
surveillance.
PHIAD supports hierarchical data flow across
different domains. Each regional PHIAD collects data from local
sources, such as doctors and veterinarians. The regional PHIAD then
forwards appropriate information to a national PHIAD, which is
administered by a disease control organization such as the Centers for
Disease Control (CDC). PHIAD can extend this hierarchy of data sharing
to international partnerships. At each level, different data-sharing
policies concerning person identification, location identification,
authorship, and results can be implemented.
One of my new year's resolutions is to cross-fertilize the myriad professional interests I've accrued in almost four years with IBM, including virtual worlds and 3D technologies, social computing and Web 2.0 trends, and of course, healthcare innovation via new technologies, models and practices.
So I hope I'm not wildly late in pointing folks to the very timely and important new initiative by Matthew Holt and Indu Subaiya, the Health 2.0 blog, Facebook group and wiki.
Here's an excerpt from the launch post in November, 2007:
"Welcome to The Health2.0 Blog
Since the Health 2.0 conference in September, the blogosphere has exploded
with hundreds of blog posts from people all over the country and world. Among
the myriad thought-provoking pieces on Health 2.0 have been contributions by
Esther Dyson at the Huffington Post, David Kibbe, Brian Klepper and
Jane Sarasohn Kahn defining Health2.0, Amy Tenderich on DiabetesMine, Scott
Shreeve on healthcare FICO scores, and many, many more. There’s been
posts in lots of countries and several languages. Plus the opening video has
been reposted and commented on in several places (usually with great
compliments, but not always!)
Given the bits and pieces of interesting conversation on the Facebook group,
the Health2.0 wiki, THCB and more, we decided to create a forum for our diverse
and emerging community to convene and deepen the conversation. So with great fanfare…."
I hope I can encourage my IBM colleagues involved in both healthcare and related fronts of networked collaboration efforts to become part of this critical conversation. And will definitely strive to focus HealthNex in 2008 in this direction.
It's quite amazing how fast new fronts like this emerge...it was only a year ago that John Sharp of eHealth had taken the initiative to produce an eSession for HIMSS 2007 on Web 2.0 implications for healthcare. I was so swamped with 2.0-related work that my own contribution to the presentation was meager.
In any event, congrats to Matthew and Indu, and in the spirit of leveraging mass collaboration, I hope that all interested in this front will contribute to the blog, join the FB group and be part of what should become a true innovation movement.
I was delighted to come across Dr. Paul's podcast, part of the package on IBM's new corporate responsibility report: Global Citizenship. I'm also excited to see how this new view of the kind of good that major global businesses can do in the world is taking root, and resonates with the Global Citizen's Portfolio program that I'm working on, with many other IBMers, including Kevin Thompson, who interviews Dr. Paul in this podcast.
Paul, IBM's director of healthcare technology and strategic initiatives, is also the kind of IBMers who exemplifies the way in which we can all contribute to making the world a better place.
IBM 2007 Corporate Responsibility Report
We are surrounded today by vast new possibilities. To achieve them, we
must come together in new ways, and assume new responsibilities.
