Future Health Bulletin - Care connection

Future Health Bulletin - Care connection

Todays issue of Future Health Bulletin (issue 35 Dec 04) carries an item (reproduced below with permission), describing an electronic record system for allied health professionals which has been implemented in Leicestershire and Rutland. It raises some important questions about the future use of "niche" systems which need to be made complient with the National Spine.

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Therapist system shows positive results

A wireless administration and record system for 'allied health
professionals' - occupational therapists, physiotherapists,
podiatrists, dietitians, and speech and language therapists - is
delivering measurable benefits, according to its developers.

Leicestershire Health Informatics, which provides non-acute IT
to six primary care trusts in Leicestershire and Rutland, credits
the Tiara9 (http://www.ethitec.co.uk/tiara.html) system for
better follow-up care and a halving of some waiting-list times.
An offline system is now being tried by home visitors.

“The system holds information on whether you clipped
someone’s toenails, how many first and follow-up visits, how
many bunions – no more thumbing through your diary to figure
out what you did that month,” said Ian Wakeford head of
Leicestershire Health Informatics.

Implementation in Leicestershire began in 2001, before the
government started on its attempt to create a single solution as
part of the National Programme for IT (NPfIT).“The national
programme offers plenty for GPs, acute care and hospitals but
will have nothing to offer adult therapy until the back end of
phase two or beginning of phase three.

But what will happen to Tiara9 if the NPfIT delivers? “We are
not planning to take away a niche system that meets therapists’
day-to-day clinical needs just to put them on a generic system,”
Wakeford said. To be sure this option is available, he says, Tiara
will become a spine-compliant legacy system.

The Leicestershire Tiara9 implementation is the biggest, but the
systems has also been adopted by primary care trusts in
Derbyshire, Scotland, Northampton and Warwickshire.

METRO-the creation of a taxonomy for medical education - Health Information & Libraries J, Vol 21, Issue 4, pp. 211-219 (Abstract)

METRO-the creation of a taxonomy for medical education - Health Information & Libraries J, Vol 21, Issue 4, pp. 211-219 (Abstract)

This paper by Alex Haig, Rachel Ellaway, Marshall Dozier, Don Liu§ & Jean McKendree addresses an important area for medical (& all healthcare) education and describes the approach their team took to the development of and agreement on a shared vocabulary to enable the finding and sharing of resources.

Policy Research Programme - The Role Of Technology In Supporting Chronic Disease Management, Self Care, And Healthy Living

Policy Research Programme - The Role Of Technology In Supporting Chronic Disease Management, Self Care, And Healthy Living

This looks like a very interesting call for research proposals "aimed at evaluating the various alternative organisational infrastructures and the impact of technology in supporting chronic disease management, self care and healthy living".

If anyone might be interested in some form of collaboration on this please get in touch.

NHS broadband plans thrown into confusion

NHS broadband plans thrown into confusion

This report from E Health Insider about problems with the way in which Broadband connection are supposed to be provided to the NHS could potentially be a major problem for the NPfIT, especially for bandwidth hungry applications such as PACS.

Patient Safety: Is the Evidence Strong Enough That Information Technology Can Help?

Patient Safety: Is the Evidence Strong Enough That Information Technology Can Help?

This paper in The Informatics Review by Denis Protti responds to a previous paper and tries to move the arguments about Electronic Health Records from a financial Return on Investment (ROI) case to one which focuses on patient safety.