Healthagen, the Lakewood, Colo.-based developer of the iTriage consumer healthcare platform, has inked a deal with Asklepios, the largest privately-held hospital system operating in Germany. Under terms of the deal, the two organizations will work to private label Healthagen’s content and decision support software while introducing Meine Klinik, a German language consumer-based medical technology. Read »

Most folks unfamiliar with the administrative healthcare space imagine the transactions are much more automated than is true of the current state of affairs. One would assume that if Medtronic CEO Bill Hawkins is talking about turning pacemakers, stents, and defibrillators into tiny mobile devices--each with their attendant messages zipping to and fro--and Matt Bowman can report about how CrowdFlower powered Haiti relief by crowdsourcing the translation of text messages, that the paper chase of the business side of healthcare must be a figment of some bygone era. One would assume wrong. Read »

You may have heard that the people of India have greater access to mobile phones than toilets. If you follow health IT, you’re probably well aware of the impact mobile technologies are having on healthcare in developing nations. Now, researchers at MIT are saying open-source mobile platforms are equally as important to closing the healthcare divide. Read »

When it comes to accessing the Internet, the smart money is betting on mobility. In the healthcare space, we’re seeing this trend taking shape in the way providers are reaching out to health care consumers, making information easier to grab on the go via their mobile devices. Read »

The California HealthCare Foundation released "How Smartphones Are Changing Health Care for Consumers and Providers" prepared by Jane Sarasohn-Kahn, M.A., M.H.S.A. Sarasohn-Kahn reviewed the demographics of mobile internet users, reviewed smartphone applications for clinicians and consumers, medical reference tools, continuing medical education, EHRs and PHRs, patient and health consumer support. She then recited barriers to adoption and some insights from early adoption. Read »

Things are looking up again for the Apple iPad's potential in the healthcare space. The Washington Post is back to saying it just may revolutionize healthcare, clinicians are expressing interest in buying the device, and now a major software developer is targeting docs and dentists with new iPad integration solutions. Read »

Add Mediware Information Systems to your list of vendors that are forming focused business units to address burgeoning demand for software products and services that cater to alternate site or in-home healthcare providers. The Lenexa, Kan.-based software company hopes to tap into what it believes will be a solid growth trend in the areas of home infusion, DME, home health nursing, specialty pharmacies and ambulatory infusion centers. Read »

More hospitals than ever are prioritizing their internal communications systems. Some wireless technology companies are responding with VoIP solutions. Take Ascom, for example. The company’s teleCARE IP solution has been tested in hospitals the world over, but now it’s adding VoIP capability. Read »

The ZigBee Alliance, an ecosystem of companies creating wireless solutions, has ratified ZigBee Health Care. The new global, open standard for interoperable, low-power wireless devices promises to enable secure monitoring and management of noncritical, low-acuity healthcare services targeted at chronic disease management, elderly care, wellness, in-patient and asset tracking. Read »

Management's perceived need to be co-located with their health workers when any kind of “real work” is to be done limits the advancement of eHealth and healthcare mobility. Technologies like Cisco's HealthPresence, applications like PatientKeeper, and remote disease monitoring are dead before they leave the starting blocks if this mind set persists. At the same time the media is all aflutter about the iPad and location services and the GPS potential of handhelds, the microscope is being put on an obvious yet unspoken truth—managers don't know how to manage employees in the distributed work space eHealth assumes. Enter "Results-Only Work Environment" (ROWE). Read »