Revolutionary Humber River Hospital Opens Doors

The first robot operated hospital in North America opened its doors to the public last week. Considered to be the first fully digital hospital in North America, the Humber River Hospital in Toronto, CA looks to revolutionize how healthcare is provided.

The new hospital unveiled the $1.7 billion investment to the public on October 18. Humber River Hospital features the most advanced technologies available, including robots that man several areas of the facility. The radiology area, where they facilitate the X-Ray procedure, and the chemotherapy area, where they mix, prepare and monitor the drugs administered to the patients will both rely on the robots.

Before the drugs get to the patient’s hands, each package is examined and scanned thoroughly through an information management system to ensure that the patients gets the correct treatment. The robots will also assist the health care staff by carrying and delivering medical supplies as well as food for patients.

The hospital hopes to improve efficiency of the hospital and safety of the patients through the use of this new-age technology. The facility aims to be a model for the future, demonstrating how vital a role technology plays within our society and how it can improve all industries.

As for those who are skeptical about the use of robots to provide health care services, Chief Operating Officer Barb Ballins responds, “it’s safer to have an alarm telling me if (a patient) got out of bed and fell, than not knowing,” and “Robots are robots, but they still need monitoring.”

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Furthermore, the addition of robots has allowed the hospital to actually add jobs, not axe them. The hospital has actually hired 700 more employees to staff the hospital’s 656 rooms.

On the opening day, 351 patients were successfully transferred to the new facility in Toronto, CA. The patients were very excited about the moving to the new hospital and getting treatment in such a revolutionary place. Each room is equipped with a touchpad where they can see all of their medical records and charts, contact their loved ones, and even play games.

Check out this video below, which showcases more of the new technology available at the hospital.

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from Bjorn Koch | Healthcare http://ift.tt/1ORJ7mz

Yoga And Meditation Help To Reduce Stress, Healthcare Costs

Spending time alone, either practicing yoga or thoughtful meditation, can significantly help strengthen the body and actually reduce healthcare costs, according to a recent study.

Stress affects both the mind and body, therefore focusing on managing stress can help improve overall health and well-being. These practices can induce a deep physiological state of rest and can help a person’s heart rate, oxygen consumption and blood pressure.

Those who practice yoga, tai chi, prayer, rhythmic breathing or mindfulness meditation can reduce the need for health care services by around 43 percent.

In a recent study published in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers note that most health care costs are due to stress-related disorders, such as anxiety and depression. In 2012, the total expenditure amounted to $80 billion per year Furthermore, nearly 90% of people who suffer from stress-related disorders do seek health care services, and 80% of these patients show a lack of resiliency.

The study assessed information from patients who applied themselves at the Benson-Henry Institute (BHI) Relaxation Response Resiliency programs between 2006 and 2014. Medical data, from the over 4,4000 participants in the program, was compared to that of 13,150 patients who did not take the program. The study found that the program participants used significantly less health care services following the program compared to the year before.

Researchers state that mind-body intervention should be viewed as a preventative care, similar to a vaccination or driver education.

“We have shown in the past that it works in the laboratory and on the level of individual physiology, and now we can see that when you make people well, they do not want to use health care so much,” said James Stahl, lead researcher from Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Centre in New Hampshire.

These practices help participants learn how to identify and challenge day-to-day negative attitudes that undermine health. Having an optimistic outlook and a sense of connectedness, meaning, and purpose in your life contributes to resilience.

“Just like fluorinating your water or vaccinating yourself, these are ways of keeping you healthy with, from a public health perspective, minimal investment,” Stahl said.

from Bjorn Koch | Healthcare http://ift.tt/1NQUKKf

Healthcare Has Been Lacking Attention This Election Season

With the 2016 Presidential Race in full swing, one issue that has been largely absent from the political discourse is health care. As this recent Forbes article points out, throughout the first two GOP debates, there has been little discussion about candidates positions on health care issues.

Many of the Republican candidates have voiced their displeasure with Obamacare and have announced that they have plans to repeal and replace it. Jeb Bush revealed today that he would repeal and replace Barack Obama’s healthcare law. However, this has basically been the extent of the conversation.

The positions of the Democratic candidates have been even less clear. The first Democratic debate will take place tonight; this would be the perfect opportunity to open up the conversation to health care and the wide range of issues surrounding the industry.

The Congressional Budget Office has projected that Medicare and Medicaid will make a substantial dent in federal spending over the next ten years. A dent so large, that it will amount to one-third of all spending by 2025. As the United States looks to get a handle on the national debt, Medicare and Medicaid is clearly an issue that needs to be examined and fixed now.

The conservative rhetoric has largely centered on allowing Medicare to compete with private insurance plans and give more responsibility for Medicaid to the states. The Democrats have not provided much insight into their plans besides implementing price controls on Medicare Part D.

The Affordable Care Act and drug price controls are another two issues that candidates will need to take a clear position on moving forward. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have both proposed top-down price controls to reduce drug prices for consumers, but more details are needed to distinguish their individual approaches. Furthermore, both candidates need to discuss how their plans will ensure that innovation within the pharmaceutical sector will remain unharmed.

As the election season wages on, moderators should begin to focus on forcing candidates to provide their stances on health care issues. These are issues that affect the wellbeing of all Americans, in terms of both health and financial stability.

We are still at a very early stage in the campaign season, but as we approach the third debate, it is time that the healthcare sector receives more attention. The debate tonight is the perfect opportunity to shift the conversation towards these pressing issues.

from Bjorn Koch | Healthcare http://ift.tt/1RFhbR7

Healthcare Organizations Adopt Cloud Services

Cloud technology has grown rapidly over the last several years, especially within corporations who are looking to become more nimble. The healthcare industry is now beginning to follow suit, as they continue to ditch their on-site infrastructure and tedious application management in favor of the cloud. I recently read this great article, which explains why healthcare organizations are now making the transition to cloud services and how this change may affect the industry moving forward.

As recently as 2012, almost no healthcare organization had information saved in the cloud. Healthcare organizations needed to ensure they were adhering to federal guidelines for protecting personal healthcare information. At this time, vendors were unwilling to sign business associate agreements (BAA) regarding personal healthcare information.

Cloud vendors were resistant to sign BAAs because it would have subjected themselves to audits by the Office for Civil Rights. This would have required them to explain in detail how they will report and respond to a data breach.

The resistance against BAAs began to change in late 2012, however, when Microsoft formally agreed to sign BAAs. Amazon Web Services and Google soon followed in 2013. Hospitals could now utilize cloud services and become more agile organizations in the process.

The move makes sense for both parties involved. Healthcare accounts for roughly 17 percent of the United States GDP, making it an important industry for cloud vendors to target. Hospitals remain under pressure to deliver better patient care at lower costs; utilizing modern technology can help hospitals meet these goals.

 

 

Chief Information Officers at hospitals are focused on implementing tools that will enhance employee productivity. This involves procuring more cloud infrastructure for storage and application services as well as utilizing group communication applications, such as Slack or HipChat. Hospitals are able to significantly reduce their infrastructure costs by moving from data centers to cloud technology, while becoming much more efficient in the process.

John Halamka, CIO of Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, believes that this shift to cloud technology will likely change the role of the modern CIO and the IT department as a whole. “In five years, the IT department will be replaced with the ‘Cloud Services’ department and the CIO will be the air traffic controller to identify and coordinate the services procured,” according to Halamka.

As more hospitals look to lower costs and become more efficient organizations, cloud technology has become a natural fit. As more organizations adopt cloud software, vendors will undoubtedly be more willing to sign BAAs as well.

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Challenging the Status-Quo

Healthcare is currently a highly contested topic within the United States and around the world. Governments, in both developed and developing areas, are searching for the most effective way to ensure the health of their citizens and prosperity of the country at large.

A recent report by the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that nearly 100 million people are “pushed into poverty” trying to access basic health care services. This healthcare crisis has resulted in 80 countries asking the WHO for technical assistance to shift toward Universal Health Coverage. There is currently a financial trap, as governments struggle to provide basic health services and private health care providers are simply to expensive for most to access. However, as Forbes points out in a recent article, there is a new health care innovation that is challenging the status quo of the healthcare industry.

Social enterprises are beginning to tap into underutilized resources, such as cheap technology, to improve both health care delivery and access. This technology has allowed health insurance companies to connect directly to people in need of care. For example, the growth of mobile phones in developing countries has allowed social enterprise companies to utilize technology that pairs mobile phone users with health insurance smart cards that allow them to access care at participating health center in the network.

Furthermore, other companies are focused on educating people to aid their own family members so that they have the tools to help patients recover at home instead of the hospital. The applications include videos, quizzes and interactive content that allows people to learn the necessary skills to effectively help family members recover from treatment. This not only helps provide a cheaper alternative to recovering in the hospital but also reduces the number of people admitted to the hospital because of poor care after leaving.

The most important issue that social enterprises are looking to solve is the reduction in need for services. Preventative medicine is key in reducing the cost of health care. Companies are actively implementing technology which helps discover conditions that signal for risks of harmful diseases.
There is an incredible demand for innovative technology in health care and a number of social enterprises who are rooted in helping aid those in need. These recent trends prove that when technology is in the right hands and companies co-create solutions that a great deal can be accomplished. If these recent trends are any indication, there is a lot more to look forward to.

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FDA Approves OxyCotin Use For Children

Pain medication has always been a dubious thing. Prescribed for the treatment of the most severe of cases, these pills have a sordid history of misuse, abuse and addiction. Its precisely this reason that the use of these intense pain medications were kept out of the hands of minors. However, recent advances in the way this drug is both administered and produced has enabled clinicians to prescribe it to children.

Adolescents between the ages of 11 to 16 are now able to receive treatment with Oxycontin. Restricted to the most extreme cases, only children in need of round-the-clock care or suffering from extensive physical trauma are eligible for treatment. While slow-release opioids are also being tested, reducing the maximum amount of daily doses by half, the effect of the drug remains considerably more powerful than its fellow treatments.

The decision to change the treatment parameters came after the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) requested the manufacturer of Oxycontin, Purdue Pharma, to reexamine its policy on the treatment of pediatric patients. Though the same warnings apply to child patients as adults, there are precautions in place for those looking to undergo the treatment. Children are ineligible to receive treatment unless a prior treatment of 20 mg/day of oxycodone has been administered. A hefty treatment for pain in its own right, the level of required prior medication necessary to warrant the Oxycontin is extreme.

With new advances in the way we treat patients, the best we can do is mitigate the tremendous pain these children are already suffering under. Though risks are involved in its use, the necessary precautions have been taken to prevent abuse of this substance. Only given to children in most dire of situations, we can only hope that the treatment continues to keep the pain at bay while they recover.

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Technology Creates Opportunities In Healthcare

As technology advances, so too must the systems reliant on them. The healthcare system, an industry so many depend on for their survival, is long overdue for an overhaul, and it would appear it’s getting the attention it deserves. With the digitization of patient files and the advent of remote data transfer, healthcare professionals have tools available to them that they’d never dreamt of. A shift from the traditional Break-Fix approach to healthcare, and the dawning of a Predict-and-Prevent model means a tremendous difference for us all.

Fusing future tech with modern medicine can introduce a world of preventative treatments to stave of the most threatening and costly diseases before they become a problem. While we are not strangers to wearable tech, pedometers having existed for years with the ability to measure our daily exercise, the future offers us more than the ability to count our steps. The recently released Apple Watch has some impressive features alongside being able to answer your phone from your wrist. The ability to track various health statistics, and build an entire profile of metrics can all be used alongside medical data to create a comprehensive health analysis.

Apps for mobile devices have also come a long way in their ability to aid in a healthy lifestyle. Programs with calorie counters, nutritional information and diet friendly recipes are becoming market norm. Guided meditation, sleep cycle and brain activity apps are all feasible ways to motivate personal health with the push of a button. However, this technology is now being utilized for the remote monitoring of chronic illnesses. Allowing a patient the comforts of home while maintaining a remote digital connection can drastically reduce the number of visits a patient must undergo for treatment.

The potential of this technology is limitless. When perfected, the ability to remotely connect with patients undergoing outpatient recovery can allow a person their freedom while healing from major surgery, without needing to confine them to a hospital bed. Technology in a mobile device wirelessly transmitting data to your physician, and should an emergency arise, the necessary arrangements would be taken the instant a warning sign presented itself. If this process is implemented, the time and money it would save doctors and patients will be staggering. .

 

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Lockheed Martin Launches New Healthcare Technologies Platform

Lockheed Martin is combining their wealth of resources with healthcare professionals in pursuit of launching their new healthcare technologies platform. Utilizing the greatest names of the IT field, Lockheed Martin’s mission is to bring about leaps in treatment technology and the manner in which it is utilized.

Deep in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin is already undergoing the development of multiple healthcare innovations in the fields of treatment and information management. Their latest creation, the IoT (Internet of Things), is a gateway for the massive transmission of healthcare data without the need for human interference. This customer intelligence engine will measure the data gathered by hundreds of personal devices while they stream real-time information to the IoT. By doing so, insurers will be able to measure massive amounts of analytics processed through IoT’s powerful servers, and determine if greater contributing factors like climate and geographical location have an impact on the health of a population. Imagine a future where the device on your wrist can alert medical professionals the moment a heart attack strikes.

Lockheed’s partnership with Cisco, Cloudera, Illumina and Intel also looks to improve the manner data is transferred between healthcare professionals. By streamlining the entire process of sending and receiving files, the downtime between changing physicians or ascertaining pertinent medical information will be seamless. Shaving downtime and improving the speed in which professionals receive vital data will make the difference in saving a life.

In the medical industry, time is the most valuable resource. When a life hangs in the balance, a single second, the slightest misstep can rob you of everything. Lockheed Martin is addressing this issue head-on with their pioneering technology. Connecting healthcare professionals with the data necessary to do their job will undoubtedly save lives. Removing a delay will add precious seconds to a clock forever ticking down, and give hundreds a chance at life they would have otherwise missed.

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The Future Of Cancer Testing

If a simple blood test could determine if you’re a Cancer risk, would you take it? What if, should the results be negative, there was a treatment to prevent it before warning signs let you know it’s too late? Scientists are developing an early testing procedure to catch and treat Cancer before it ever becomes a problem. A revolutionary program with untold potential, the scientists developing this treatment are on the verge of arguably the greatest scientific advance ever.

Identifying which particular genes lead to a vulnerability to cancer cells, scientists have been developing a treatment to better identify this genetic imprint. Though treatment is currently being calibrated to find and stop the cause of Breast Cancer, doctors believe their identification process can be used to prevent colon, rectal, thyroid, and ovarian cancers within the decade.

What secret technology enables scientists to so specifically map the human genome? A major leap in genetic mapping technology is the answer to this age-old question. A newly developed software capable of identifying genetic signatures so advanced it can identify warning signs of impending cancers. Technology ripped straight from the pages of science fiction, and placed in the hands of modern miracle workers. Developed for the study of invertebrates’ survival in areas of extreme climate change, the breakthrough in technology came when scientists realized the same markers used to measure the changes in invertebrates, also applied to the human genome.

To map the human genome is to read the book of life. By identifying these markers, not only can scientists and clinicians better treat diseases, they can lessen the recovery time for patients. By clearly pinpointing the cause of such virulent cancers, we effectively remove the need to treat so aggressively. Current treatments for cancer can force the patient to endure hours of chemotherapy, leaving them weak and nauseated for long periods of time. Scientists hope that if the success of this breakthrough proves as effective in practice as it does on paper, cancer can be cut out before patients ever need to suffer chemo.

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The End of Alzheimer’s Disease

Alzheimer’s disease is more than an affliction, it’s a crime perpetrated on our loved ones. Too soon are we forced to watch memories of older family members slip away without the means to slow their mental degradation. It is precisely this reason that researches have redoubled their efforts to root out this terrible affliction, and see that Alzheimer’s disease is long forgotten. Recent breakthroughs in development have shown that potential treatments may not only work on Alzheimer’s, but also Parkinson’s and other brain disorders.

For years, the culprit of age-related mental ailments was thought to be a protein. Beta-amyloid, understood to accumulate in the brain with age, created blockages and damage resulting in many neurological disorders. This, says Mari Carrillo, may not be the answer. Chief science officer of the Alzheimer’s Association, Maria says “The one-target approach is probably not going to be the answer.”

Heeding her advice, several groups of scientists have begun a multi-pronged approach to treatment. Targeting a brain process that produces toxins inducing several damaging conditions with age, scientists are attempting new approaches to solve the same problem. Of these groups, biotech giant Treventis is working on one such treatment. Looking to contain their massive treatment to a daily supplement, Treventis hopes that a single pill can stop the progression of Alzheimer’s.

Continuous research has led to some startling revelations in how this disease works. As we age, brain cells can fold. This folding, or as scientist have dubbed “kink,” results in a damaging clump of toxic proteins as each warped brain cell links with others. Testing on laboratory mice has proved positive, as both mice afflicted with Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s made full recoveries after receiving treatment. Though tests are far from human trials, the future is bright. In a short time, the threat to memory loss may be a thing of the past.

 

from Bjorn Koch | Healthcare http://ift.tt/1Hlmbmb