On the Patient Friendly Google Health Initiative

Posted on May 28, 2009 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

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Data Integrity and Health 2.0 Accuracy Concerns Linger

google3

[By Staff Reporters]

According to its’ website, and mission statement, Google Health aims to put patients in charge of their digital health information. It’s safe, secure, and free.

Triple Play of Benefits

Google Health purports to:

  • Organize health information all in one place.
  • Gather medical records from doctors, hospitals, and pharmacies.
  • Share information securely with family members doctors and caregivers, etc.

Google says members are always in control of how data is used. It will not sell information. Members decide what to share, and what to keep private.

Link: privacy policy

Blogsite

Google health was launched in the spring of 2008. Since then, it even maintains its own blog-site, which stated on 3/4/09.

 “We continue to learn a tremendous amount since launching Google Health in the spring of 2008. We’re listening to feedback from users every day about their needs, and one issue we hear regularly is that people want help coordinating their care and the care of loved ones. They want the ability to share their medical records and personal health information with trusted family members, friends, and doctors in their care network”

Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/google-health-helping-you-better.html

Good thing too!

A Cautionary Tale

However, privacy advocates worry about the vast amount of data that Google is redacting. Growing consumer market clout means the early-adopter patient who cares about digital records, and eHRs, may have fewer choices in the future. And, for medical professionals, what does this say about CCHIT, Allscripts and the Military, etc; or, the emerging Wal-Mart eMR initiative for doctors?

Assessment

For example, when one now [in]famous patient named Dave deBronkart – a tech-savvy kidney cancer survivor – tried to transfer his medical records from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center to Google Health, he was stunned at what he found.

Read this Link: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2009/04/13/electronic_health_records_raise_doubt

Is MSN’s Health Vault any better?

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Conclusion

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Wal-Mart’s Health Information Technolgy Game Plan

Posted on March 15, 2009 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

CCHIT Meet Sam Walton

By Darrell K. Pruitt; DDSpruitt3

Dana Blankenhorn posted an article recently on zdnet titled “Wal-Mart Selling Windows Health Records.”

Link: http://healthcare.zdnet.com/?p=1966

After reading it, I opened a good, cost-effective fortified breakfast wine and began hammering out my comment that I copied below, long before the sun came up.  Hope you enjoy it.  I’m going to get some sleep. 

Looks Like Rein

Coach Glen Tullman’s traditionally favored and tough Allscripts-Misys team originating in CCHIT meets Walton’s consumer-supported, nimble team from Arkansas in front of Sam’s home town crowd. As a sports fan and occasional off-color commentator standing on the sidelines, Dana, I think this ball game could get exciting. The weather is perfect for sloppy, poor conditions and heaven knows that these two ideologies share history.

Wal-Mart HIT 

Some odds-makers say Wal-mart’s success in selling healthcare IT at Sam’s Club prices and quality is likely to take off in their patented free-market style in the next few months. 

The big question is; could this threaten federally-favored Allscripts’ early advantage? 

For example; if things get competitive, and the value of MDRX starts to falter under natural pressure, will Trustee Tullman call on the reserve strength of his exclusive Club CCHIT to out-flank the quick and slippery Sam’s Club wide-ended attorneys?  Some say that if CCHIT suddenly selects surprising, deceptive and occasionally lame applications for certification requirements – that happen to already reflect Allscripts pre-determined game plan – it is a cinch to give Tullman’s team a head start around their strong side with a pulling guard or three from the right (weak side) to lead interference.

Assessment 

Will Sam protest such a rule? You bet. It could get messy. Snot could fly. 

Here is the question on this reporter’s mind. If close calls are occasionally ruled in the home team’s favor, will Tullman move on down the road? I like to watch the cheerleaders.

Conclusion

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Wal-Mart Health Care

Posted on May 30, 2008 by Dr. David Edward Marcinko MBA MEd CMP™

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Healthcare’s New [Old] Innovative Disruption

By Dr. David Edward Marcinko; MBA, CMP™

[Publisher-in-Chief]dem2

So, the American Medical Association [AMA] couldn’t or wouldn’t do it; nor could/would the American Osteopathic Association, American Podiatric Medical Association, American Dental Association or any combination thereof.

Neither could/would Hillary Clinton in 1992, nor the US Congress, US Senate, Insurance Association of America [“Big I”], AARP, or plethora of other national organizations, medical trade unions and/or policy-makers.

One is not even sure the current crop of presidential candidates can “do it.”

What it is?

So, what am I talking about?

Why, free-market driven, non-universal [government sponsored] healthcare competitive reform; of course!

And maybe; just maybe; Wal-Mart can do-it?

The Wal-Mart Way

Look, clinics in giant wholesale stores are not new. The optometrists have been there for decades, nobly triaging and providing basic eye-care, but with a certain disdain from “real-doctors” and some patients.

But, all that is fading with the dearth of family practitioners, and rise of on-site and walk-in retail clinics staffed with nurse practitioners, Doctor-Nurse Practitioners [DNPs] and the like. The movement is both gaining traction as well as gravitas. And, the medical kiosks are increasingly being staffed by physicians.

Moreover, with the economy flagging, cheap generic drugs available, convenient hours and locations in many stores, electronic medical records, consumer directed health plans with high-deductibles and private paying patients; Wal-Mart may just have the marketing power to provide some modicum of basic healthcare for many of our nation’s uninsured, or under-insured.

And, imbued with the belief that capitalism always finds a way to wring out marketplace excesses in any industry – albeit slowly – I call the initiative “a perfect-storm of market-place reform.”

Vilfredo Pareto – ReDeux

Perhaps, by being so huge, Wal-Mart understands Pareto’s Law and realizes that many patients get better because-of, or in spite-of, the doctor’s intervention. This was the original promise of managed care that went awry; differentiating and treating the trivial many ills – from the vital few serious diseases.

The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few and the principle of factor scarcity) states that, for many events, 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. Business management thinker Joseph M. Juran suggested the principle and named it after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed that 80% of income in Italy went to 20% of the population. It is a common benchmark in business; e.g., “80% of sales come from 20% of clients.”

Wal-Mart has studied the market and knows where the price and break-points are.

And, when 80% of healthcare expenditures are spent in the last 12 months of life, maybe there really is a better way; The Wal-Mart Way.    

Assessment

And Wal-Mart isn’t stopping here. In April, it opened the first of its walk-in health clinics in stores in Atlanta, Dallas and Little Rock, Ark. This joint venture with local hospitals will build up the almost 80 clinics already in place in Wal-Mart stores. The goal is 400 co-branded clinics by 2010.

Wouldn’t Sam, and I don’t mean “Uncle”, be proud of the above accomplishments?

Conclusion

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