Hans Oh's eHealth Blog » news

Vignettes about using Google to find health information

Hans — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:51:33 +0000

On the Official Google Blog, there’s an interesting series of stories about how people are using Google in their lives. The one that piqued my attention was on using Google to find health information. A cynic would probably point to this series as propaganda and PR, but I think there’s something quite compelling about the [...]

“Aspire, Inspire, and Transform” – CPHA UW Alumni Lunch (2010-06-15)

Hans — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 18:15:47 +0000

Had an opportunity to attend an alumni event hosted by the University of Waterloo (UW). Apparently this is the first time event for Health Studies & Gerontology alumni. This event was taking place at the Sheraton Centre, Toronto during the Canadian Public Health Association’s (CPHA) Centennial Conference. It was great to catch-up with a mentor [...]

Introducing OHA Today

Hans — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 12:56:38 +0000

Just saw an email announcing the launch of OHAToday. According to the website, OHAToday is: your source for the latest, comprehensive health care news and information. This website — and the email updates you can sign up for — replaces other emails sent to the thousands of health care professionals that subscribe to our communications. [...]

Scientific American profiles 10 mobile health apps on the iPhone

Hans — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 14:19:46 +0000

Scientific American has a short video titled "Mobile Medicine" which highlights a few mobile apps on the iPhone. According to the video, medical apps are one of the fastest growing areas for development, with over 2000 applications and growing.

Health care is not immune from innovation making jobs obsolete

Hans — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 14:41:19 +0000

An interesting report from NPR.org, titled “The jobs of yesteryear: Obsolete occupations” got me thinking about what health care will look like in 10, 20, and 30 years from today. In the article/slideshow, several occupations are shown to be obsolete because they are no longer relevant due innovation. What all of these jobs had in [...]

Twitter is not a good source for health advice

Hans — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 12:30:54 +0000

A recent article published in the American Journal of Infection Control [1] titled “Dissemination of health information through social networks: Twitter and antibiotics” [link to abstract] demonstrates how social networks, specifically Twitter, is being used to share health information on the web. In this case, Twitter was a great conduit to share health information, but [...]

HBR: Turning doctors into leaders

Hans — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 17:30:53 +0000

A very interesting article from Harvard Business Review titled “Turning doctors into leaders” by Thomas H. Lee. Lee explains some of the challenges in health care and offers some potential solutions. I get the sense that the main thrust of the article is that for physicians to let go of the notion that leadership is [...]

Introducing bant – a diabetes management iPhone app

Hans — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 21:15:03 +0000

Just wanted to congratulate the folks at the Centre for Global eHealth Innovation for releasing bant, a diabetes management app for the iPhone. From the bant website: bant simplifies your diabetes management. Enter your readings with a single swipe. Store it instantly to your Google Health account. Share your experience with the diabetes community through [...]

eHealth is now officially mainstream

Hans — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 12:30:32 +0000

I guess that it had to happen eventually and now, I think ehealth can officially be considered “mainstream”. With the US government planning to spend $50 BILLION to push adoption of electronic health records by 2015, it was inevitable that the use information and communication technologies would be a major topic of discussion. Much to [...]

Securing health data – just another challenge in moving towards a modern health system

Hans — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 12:30:32 +0000

Not sure if this is news to people regularly involved in IT, but securing the increasing amounts of electronic health information will be a major issue as organizations move to adopt electronic health records (EHRs). The scary thing is that the perception is that health care organizations are behind the current best practices (yet again) [...]