THCB Note: Alice Kreuger recently updated THCB about all the exciting things she's doing in Second Life on Virtual Ability Island. Here is a quick rundown. If you're unsure about second life, check out this video.
"Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation," said John McCain to a reporter in an interview in Contingencies magazine. The article is titled: "Better Care at Lower Cost for Every American."
This isn't a Photo-shopped, made-up comment. See page 30 of the publication, the last paragraph in the left hand-column which continues into the right side.
Travel and deadlines got in the way of me posting about the second day of the recent Medicine 2.0 Congress in Toronto, but I saved my notes.
Something super-cool I saw there: Medting.com, a "global" repository of medical images, developed in Spain and soon to branch out to the U.S. Is it another YouTube for medicine? Not exactly. Miguel Cabrer, president of the company, sees it as more like a Snomed for multimedia.
In Canada, they're getting interactive with physicians.
Public figures always were fashion legislators. Fans copy not only their manner to dress, but also hairdresses. Thus, singer Christina Aguilera and model Tyra Banks can be named authors of a new trend.
Recently Christina Aguilera surprised surrounding with a new hairdress. Photographers just could not disregard a star’s new style. The singer walked across Los Angeles with magnificent goffered hair.
Tyra Banks attended one of secular actions in New York with similar hairdress.
The Facebook/MySpace generation is now graduating from medical school, and their profiles along with much embarrassing personal information has been indexed in cyberworld for many to see.
The Associated Press wrote an interesting story about how researchers from the University of Florida combed through the social web sites and found embarrassing pictures of future doctors "grabbing their breasts and crotches or posing with a dead animal. They also found many photos of students drinking heavily."
I spent yesterday in Washington with Major General Elder Granger, Deputy Director in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs.
We discussed electronic health records, personal health records, decision support, and interoperability. Here's a brief overview of the electronic systems supporting our troops. Go here for additional details.
AHLTA-T is a PDA version of the Department of Defense Health Record running on Windows CE devices. The DOD tests all of its battlefield technology at Fort Detrick for ruggedness in battlefield conditions -- heat, sand, ice, water, and physical abuse. A shock resistant enclosure keeps the PDAs safe. The AHLTA-T record itself has an iPhone-like interface with radio buttons and touchable graphics to rapidly record a battlefield assessment. It generates a structured history and physical, then creates a care plan based on triage rules and best practice protocols. The user interface is designed to be easy to navigate in high stress conditions. Given the lack of WiFi and reliable cellular in battlefield conditions, cradle sync is used to transfer all the medical records to AHLTA system.