Latest News

Project Daniel and the World’s First 3D-Printing Prosthetics Lab

Last week, the 2014 International CES conference in Las Vegas unveiled a startling new project that has the health technology world buzzing with excitement. [...] Equipped with 3D printers and Ultrabooks, [Not Impossible LLC] has been supplying prosthetic arms and hands for amputees in the Nuba Mountains, a war-ridden area within South Sudan. Read More »

Court Prods FCC In Unexpected Direction In This Week’s Verizon Ruling

A court ruling this past Tuesday on FCC “network neutrality” regulation closes and opens a few paths in a three-way chess game that has been going on for years between the US District Court of Appeals, the FCC, and the major Internet server providers. [...] Read More »

28th VistA Community Meeting to Feature Top VistA Leaders

Former VA CIO Roger Baker, Oroville Hospital CEO Robert Wentz, and the VA's current CIO, Stephen Warren, will be addressing the 28th Vista Community Meeting (VCM) in Sacramento, CA in what promises to be one most important conferences of the VistA community to date. The conference, which takes place January 17-19 at the UC Davis School of Medicine campus in Sacramento, CA, will feature a stellar cast of Health IT leaders. In addition to Baker, Wentz, and Warren, keynote conference speakers include Dr. Seong Ki Mun, Chairman of OSEHRA, Howard Hays, CIO of the Indian Health Service (IHS), Theresa Cullen, Chief Medical Informatics Officer (CMIO) of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), Stephen Oxley, Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of the Central Regional Hospital in North Carolina, and Denise LeFevre, CIO of Oroville Hospital.

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Time to make the jump from Microsoft XP to Linux?

If you're running Microsoft XP on your personal computer (PC), after April 8, 2014 you are apparently on your own.  Actually you and 1/3 of all the PC owners in the world still running XP are on your own. So you have a lot of company - see Infographic. This is such an important issue to so many people around the globe, including many working in the healthcare industry, that OHNews decided this should be posted as a 'Hot News' item, rather than posting this as a blog. Read More »

Drones for Healthcare Powered by 'Open Source'

About a week after Typhoon Haiyan struck the Philippines, one of the Direct Relief partnering organizations called Team Rubicon sought to determine the operational status of the Carigara District Hospital, located northwest of the city of Tacloban. Travel along damaged roads was difficult and slow. Yet, the assessment team was able to provide local officials and aid groups with a rapid and highly accurate visual analysis of damage to the Carigara District Hospital by deploying the latest in close proximity aerial imaging technology, using a Huginn X1 unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or civil surveillance drone. 

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Board Certified Clinical Informaticists & 'Precision Medicine'

In January 2014, a select group of physicians are to receive the first national board certification in Clinical Informatics, including Seth Bokser, MD, medical director for information technology at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Benioff Children's Hospital.  Awarded by the American Board of Preventive Medicine, the certification recognizes the increasingly vital role that the science and practice of informatics plays in health care. Read More »

Happy Public Domain Day

Copyright is a time-limited, Government-awarded monopoly, given to individuals as an incentive for the creation of works of art, and their eventual dedication to the Public Domain. [...] Read More »

Precision Medicine, Genomics & 'Open Health'

Traditional medicine, integrative medicine, preventive medicine, predictive medicine, regenerative medicine – and now we have 'precision medicine'.

The purpose of this article is to provide a brief introduction and high level overview of 'Precision Medicine' to health information technology (IT) managers and analysts, along with pointers to key resources or sources of information they might want to explore if they decide to delve deeper into the topic. Read More »

The Role Of Big Data In Personalizing The Healthcare Experience: Mobile

Cheaper, faster, better technology is enabling nearly one in four people around the world to connect with each other anytime, anywhere, as online social networks have changed the way we live, work and play. In healthcare, the data generated by mobile phones and sensors can give us new information about ourselves, extend the reach of our healers and help to accelerate a societal shift towards greater personal engagement in healthcare. Read More »

Ekso GT Robotic 'Exoskeleton' System enters the Marketplace

Last week, Ekso Bionics announced the first delivery of Ekso GT, their latest robotic exoskeleton which enables individuals with lower extremity paralysis or weakness to stand and walk. The first Ekso GT was delivered to the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago. News about exoskeletons and the development of other human augmentation technologies continues to proliferate. Witness another recent story in the New York Post entitled "Paralyzed Veterans competing in race in exoskeleton suit". Many exoskeleton systems are making use of 'open source' technologies.

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