Puerto Rico

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Open Source to the Rescue in Puerto Rico

Darius Tahir and Arthur Allen | Politico | October 16, 2017

This week, a collaboration of private sector companies, the government, and not-for-profits hopes to deliver an EHR system to help Puerto Rico recover from Hurricane Maria, project leader Luis Belen told Morning eHealth's Darius Tahir. Belen, CEO of the non-profit, D.C-based National Health IT Collaborative for the Underserved, has been personally touched by the disaster: two of his aunts died because of the storm. The organization is coordinating with teams from HHS to bring a package of satellite phones, pre-loaded laptops, Amazon cloud storage, and an open-source software, OpenEMR+.

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OpenEMR Community Releases Major Upgrade to their Open Source EHR

Press Release | OpenEMR | April 24, 2018

OpenEMR, the most popular open source electronic health records (EHR) and medical practice management solution, has announced today that OpenEMR version 5.0.1 has been released. A community of more than 50 OpenEMR contributors produced a staggering amount of new features and improvements for OpenEMR 5.0.1. "The amount of new features and improvements in this new release of OpenEMR is simply astounding and showcases the strengths, diversity, talents, commitment, productivity, and good will of the thriving OpenEMR community," said Dr. Brady Miller, an OpenEMR project administrator, and physician. 

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OpenEMR Launches Multiple Turn-Key Solution Options Through Amazon's Cloud Services

Press Release | OpenEMR | May 30, 2018

OpenEMR, the most popular open-source electronic health record and medical practice management solution, now offers a full panel of easy to install packages on Amazon's Cloud Services. In 2017, OpenEMR released its first Amazon Cloud Services offering, OpenEMR Cloud Full Stack, with the goal of enabling Enterprise use of OpenEMR.  However many clinics and academic settings did not require the complexities of a large-scale full cloud offering and/or HIPAA eligibility.  The OpenEMR community realized that a one size fits all Amazon cloud service approach could not address the vast range of different requirements and workflows in modern-day clinical and academic settings.

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OpenEMR Stands Up To Hurricane Maria's Fury in Puerto Rico

Press Release | HITECH Compliance, OpenEMR | November 15, 2017

Throughout both Hurricane Maria's initial impact and the rebuilding efforts, Puerto Rico has suffered tremendous infrastructure damage leaving the majority of the islands some 3.4 million people without power, water, communications, and internet access. Despite these challenges, OpenEMR would prove to be vital at multiple healthcare facilities as the island begins the process of rebuilding. During and immediately following the hurricane's devastating wind and rain, the following healthcare providers noted OpenEMR as an essential tool in receiving and assisting a large volume of patients...

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Puerto Rico’s Double Whammy: Irma and Hedge Funds

David Dayen | The American Prospect | September 8, 2017

Irma, the largest Atlantic hurricane in recorded history, has proven cruelly fickle as it surges through the Caribbean. The Category Five storm “hit like a bomb” on the small islands of Barbuda and St. Martin, destroying up to 95 percent of the structures and rendering the areas “barely habitable.” But Irma stayed north of Puerto Rico, sparing the island from the worst. That’s not to say that Puerto Rico didn’t sustain damage...

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Puerto Rico’s Health-Care Crisis Threatens the Mainland

Mattie Quinn | Governing | March 1, 2016

Just a few years ago, New York had a health-care crisis on its hands. The state was spending $50 billion a year on Medicaid in 2011 -- more than any other state in the country. Health-care officials in New York worked together to bring down spending, and last year the state introduced an $8 billion plan to repurpose its whole program, with a focus on outpatient care and community health. But now the state is facing another threat to its health-care system: Puerto Rico. America’s biggest territory continues to find itself in serious financial trouble, with a current debt of $72 billion, which the territory’s governor has declared "not payable"...

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SOS: Puerto Rico Is Losing Doctors, Leaving Patients Stranded

Greg Allen | NPR | March 12, 2016

Puerto Rico is losing people. Due to a decade-long recession, more than 50,000 residents leave the U.S. territory each year—most for jobs and new lives on the mainland. This issue is especially affecting healthcare, where it's estimated that at least one doctor leaves Puerto Rico every day. The mass exodus of doctors is creating vacancies that are hard to fill and waiting lists for patient care. Dr. Antonio Peraza is among those doctors who recently left for the mainland. He specializes in internal medicine and for nearly 14 years, had a private practice in Bayamon, Puerto Rico...

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The Storm Has Passed, But Puerto Rico’s Health Faces Prolonged Recovery

Carmen Heredia Rodriguez and Rachel Bluth | Kaiser Health News | October 16, 2017

As President Donald Trump signals impatience to wind down emergency aid to Puerto Rico, the challenges wrought by Hurricane Maria to the health of Puerto Ricans and the island’s fragile health system are in many ways just beginning. Three weeks after that direct hit, nearly four dozen deaths are associated with the storm. But the true toll on Puerto Rico’s 3.4 million residents is likely to involve sickness and loss of life that will only become apparent in the coming months and in indirect ways...

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U.S. Trying to Find More Doctors to Send to Disaster Areas

Melanie Evans | The Wall Street Journal | October 14, 2017

A U.S. government program that sends doctors and nurses to disaster zones says it needs more health-care workers, as relief efforts during this hurricane season are near the end of a second month with no end in sight in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The National Disaster Medical System, which recently wrapped up big deployments to hurricane-ravaged areas in Texas and Florida, says it will start recruiting more medical professionals in the next few weeks...

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Using the Latest Advances in Data Science to Fight Infectious Diseases

One of the most dramatic shifts in recent years that is empowering epidemiologists to be more effective at their jobs is occurring due to improvements in data technologies. In the past, the old "relational" data model dictated that data had to be highly structured, and as a result treated in distinct silos. This made it difficult, if not impossible, to analyze data from multiple sources to find correlations. Epidemiologists would spend many minutes or even hours on each query they ran to get results back, which is unacceptable when you need to test dozens of hypotheses to try to understand and contain a fast-moving outbreak. (Imagine how you would feel if each one of your Google searches took 45 minutes to return!) By contrast, using newer technologies, the same queries on the same hardware can run in seconds. Read More »

VA's Hurricane Relief Efforts Extend Beyond Veterans

Johnathon Clinkscales | American Legion | October 5, 2017

The American Legion met with VA leadership on Sept. 29 to learn what humanitarian aid VA is, and has been, providing to hurricane victims in Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Florida and Texas..."There are 60 civilian hospitals in Puerto Rico, many of which are still inoperative, don't have power or have serious damage. There's only one hospital that is like the beacon in Puerto Rico and that is the VA medical center - seeing people, taking care of everybody we can and feeding everybody we can."..."We did a lot of preparing and started sending stuff down there before the hurricane. Now we're using these resources to take care of non-veterans and civilians until the hospitals - that are either damaged, incapable of operating or we don't know the condition of - come back into the system and then we'll transfer them. It is certainly necessary for a humanitarian effort like this," Loren said...

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Virus Crossing Oceans: Chikungunya In The Americas

Tobi Skotnes | The Disease Daily | September 29, 2014

While countries in Africa are battling the current Ebola outbreak, the Western Hemisphere is battling a chikungunya outbreak that has reached record numbers: 700,000 suspected cases in over 34 countries...

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What Puerto Rico’s Death Toll from Hurricane Maria Really Tells Us

Nicolette Louissaint | The Hill | September 7, 2018

The recently released report from the Milken Institute is perhaps the strongest rebuke to date on the impact of Hurricane Maria during the 2017 hurricane season. The report notes nearly 3,000 people have died in Puerto Rico because of the storm. These numbers provide a more accurate depiction of the devastation and lives lost in Puerto Rico. While sad and troubling, it is important to call out that these updated numbers do not even account for the death toll in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

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Disaster Crowdsourcing Exchange - FEMA's Disaster Hackathon

Event Details
Type: 
Conference
Date: 
October 21, 2017 - 10:00am - 5:00pm
Location: 
Federal Emergency Management Agency
500 C Street Southwest Conference Center
Washington, DC 20024
United States

Disasters like Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Maria and the California Wildfires have unprecedented impacts on our Nation, but digital volunteers can be a powerful force in helping with the disaster response and recovery efforts! Come participate in FEMA's Disaster Crowdsourcing Exchange on Saturday, October 21. Learn about FEMA's current crowdsourcing coordination efforts, participate in building new projects, experiment with new tools, and shape the future of crowdsourcing in emergency management.

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