International health IT week in review: February 21

Germany’s elektronische Patientenakte, year of the QR code, Bahrain vaccine passport, no-cost ransomware service, IBM’s blockchain passport, Apple’s passport plans, AI for anonymised data, Microsoft’s vaccine booking software, COVID risk prediction, EMRs track ED presentations, Cerner’s mass vaccination solution, India’s ‘glitchy’ biometrics
New German digital project paves the way for online access to personal electronic health records
BMJ ~ Marion Grote-Westrick ~ 18/02/2021
On 1 January 2021, the largest digitization project in the German healthcare system—the electronic patient health record (elektronische Patientenakte – ePA)—was launched after sixteen years of preparation.
2021: the year of the QR code for digital health apps
InfoSecurity Magazine ~ Adam Palmer ~ 18/02/2021
First created in 1994 by the Japanese car company Toyota, Quick Response (QR) codes are commonly used to represent data in a pictorial form and contain a lot more data than barcodes.
Bahrain launches digital COVID-19 'vaccine passport'
MobiHealthNews ~ Rachel McArthur ~ 18/02/2021
The Kingdom’s BeAware app will be able to confirm an individual’s immunity status via a green shield and digital certificate that can be verified by officials at any given time.
CIS launches no-cost ransomware service for U.S. hospitals
Healthcare IT News ~ Kat Jercich ~ 18/02/2021
The Center for Internet Security's service uses software from the cybersecurity vendor Akamai aimed at proactively identifying, blocking and mitigating threats.
Making the case for COVID-19 vaccine passports: A shift to data democracy
ZDNet ~ Charlie Osborne ~ 17/02/2021
IBM has outlined how a blockchain-based digital health "passport" could allow society to reopen without the need to expose our private medical data.
Apple requires COVID-19 vaccine passport developers to work with public health authorities
MobiHealthNews ~ Laura Lovett ~ 17/02/2021
Apple is tightening up its policy on COVID-19 vaccine passes, requiring developers to work with “entities recognized by public health authorities” before submitting to Apple.
Leading health systems form Truveta to aggregate and sell anonymized patient data
Healthcare Finance ~ Mallory Hackett ~ 17/02/2021
Fourteen of the nation's leading health systems are joining forces to use artificial intelligence to compile de-identified patient data and then sell it to other health systems and researchers to create better patient outcomes through population health.
PACS flaws put data at risk for 18 months
Information Security Media Group ~ Marianne Kolbasuk McGee ~ 17/02/2021
A California medical imaging group practice says vulnerabilities in its picture archiving and communications system left patient data at risk of unauthorized access for more than a year.
Microsoft system blamed for N.J. vaccine-booking glitches
Bloomberg ~ Elise Young and Dina Bass ~ 15/02/2021
Five weeks of stumbles by Microsoft on New Jersey’s Covid-19 vaccine-booking software have left the state pushing for daily fixes on almost every part of the system and doubting it will ever operate as intended.
New groups which could be at high risk from Covid-19 identified with tech
Digital Health News ~ Hannah Crouch ~ 16/02/2021
The risk assessment uses the model to predict on a population basis whether adults with a combination of risk factors may be at more serious risk from Covid-19, enabling them to be flagged to clinicians for priority access to vaccination, alongside appropriate advice and support.
Report: Fewer, but sicker, patients came to the ED during the pandemic
MedCity News ~ Anuja Vaidya ~ 15/02/2021
A recent report from the Epic Health Research Network shows that amid a steep drop in emergency department visits during the Covid-19 pandemic, there was an increase in the number of ED patients who needed to be hospitalized.
Epic, Cerner offer updates on COVID-19 vaccine rollout efforts
Healthcare IT News ~ Kat Jercich ~ 15/02/2021
Cerner announced that 175 clients across 11 countries had installed its Mass Vaccination solution.
Facebook plans smartwatch with focus on messaging, health
The Information ~ Alex Heath and Wayne Ma ~ 12/02/2021
The watch will let wearers send messages using Facebook’s services and also offer health and fitness features.
India is betting on glitchy software to inoculate 300 million people by August
MIT Technology Review ~ Varsha Bansal ~ 10/02/2021
Instead of using its successful door-to-door approach, it's scaling up a new system linked to fingerprints and iris scans.
Posted in Australian eHealth