The Real Story of Cloud-Based Health Record Security Breaches. A report by Software Advice found extremely few security breaches involving Web-based EHRs, and suggested that they offer advantages over client-server models in that no patient data is stored locally and subject to theft.

PopCap Games To Be Acquired For $1 Billion+. The company behind hits like Plants vs Zombies and Bejeweled is in the process of being acquired, Techcrunch has reported. Among the potential suitors are Zynga, Electronic Arts and several Asian gaming companies.

SMART Health App Challenge Crowns $5,000 Winner. A developer challenge issued this spring by researchers at Children’s Hospital Boston and Harvard Medical School, aimed at inspiring innovation in health IT applications, has awarded its prize to a multilingual EMR interface.

Supreme Court Overturns Ban on Drug Data Mining. The US Supreme Court, on a 6-3 vote, struck down as unconstitutional a 2007 Vermont law that prohibited the collection and sale of physicians’ prescription data without consent.

Guidelines for Cancer Surgery Not Always Followed. Surgical oncologists got a mixed review for adherence to clinical guidelines, including high grades for adjuvant therapy but low marks for nodal management, according to the results of retrospective study.

Surge in EHR Purchases Predicted. Half of more than 1,300 physician group practices said they expect to buy an electronic health records system during 2011, according to a survey by CapSite.

FDA Finds Silicone Breast Implants Safe, But Prone To Fail With Age. Although they are safe when used as intended and do not cause autoimmune disease, breast cancer or reproductive problems, as some previous reports had suggested, women frequently have problems with them, the FDA said. Oftentimes these problems require  removal or replacement of the implants.

Coffee May Protect Against Alzheimer’s Disease, Study Finds. Scientists at University of South Florida are reporting that a mystery ingredient in coffee protected mice that had been bred specifically to develop symptoms consistent with the memory-robbing disease.

Vendor To Oversee VA’s Open-Source EHR Efforts. The Department of Veterans Affairs has awarded a $5 million contract to the Informatics Applications Group to act as a custodial agent for an open-source software development community aimed at modernizing VistA.

Potato Chips a Top Culprit in Gradual Weight Gain. Roughly half of the average 3.35 pounds a healthy, nonobese American gains over 4 years can be attributed to eating potato chips, researhers at  Brigham and Women’s Hospital said.

Olive Oil Protects Against Stroke. Consuming copious amounts of olive oil may dramatically reduce stroke risk for older adults, according to a population-based study.

New Study Adds to Confusing Debate over Cell Phones and Cancer. A new study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology found that cell phone radiation generally cannot reach the cells where most brain tumors are located (Pizaazz will comment on this study this Wednesday).

HHS Announces Initiative to Stimulate Adoption of EHRs in Minority Communities. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Minority Health and Quest Diagnostics have announced a program in which Quest will donate electronic health record  software and services to physicians in small practices serving minority populations in Houston.

US Births Fall Again on Weak Economy. The United States birth rate apparently fell for a third year in a row, but the declines may have hit bottom, the CDC said.

Restrict Imaging Studies, MedPAC Says. The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission has called on Congress to place restrictions on doctors who order substantially more diagnostic imaging services than their peers.

Insured Consumers Caught in Fights Over Ambulance Bills. When you’re calling for an ambulance, chances are good that you won’t think to ask for one that’s in your health plan’s provider network. You probably wouldn’t have much control over it anyway. That could leave you with hassles and extra charges for an out-of-network ride.

Apple iCloud: Intriguing Options for mHealth. Steve Jobs’ ideas for a cloud-based storage network are generating some buzz about its possible effects on healthcare technology, as clinicians continue to adopt iPhones, iPods and iPads in droves.

SDI Offers Grants for New Approaches to Health Care Research. SDI, a provider of de-identified patient-level data analytics, has announced an program to offer academic grants that promote innovative health data research.

Sanofi-Aventis Data Design Challenge to Take Submissions July 1. Winners of the competition will receive over $200k in prize money, industry-leading mentorship and public recognition.

Cardiology Groups Overhaul Quality Measures. Patient outcomes and achieving control are the major focus in new performance measures for coronary artery disease and hypertension issued by the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association.

Federal Panel Votes To Delay Stage 2 Meaningful Use by One Year. The Health IT Policy Committee, an advisory panel to the federal government, divided over the appropriate start date for implementing Stage 2 EHR meaningful use requirements, voted to delay Stage 2 from 2013 to 2014.

Startup Health Launched to Spur Innovation in Healthcare. Former Time Warner CEO Jerry Levin will be chairman of the new program that proposes to help health startups raise capital, offer long term mentorship, and bring other resources to bear.

Pfizer Clinical Drug Trial Implemented through Phone, Computer. Results of the trial of the overactive bladder drug Detrol will be compared with those from a previous, traditional trial of the same drug. A close correlation might eventually help reduce the cost of commercializing other drugs.

CMS Extends Deadlines for Medicare ACO Demonstration Program. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has extended its deadline for letters of intent and applications to participate in Medicare’s Pioneer Accountable Care Organization Model demonstration program for at least 5 years

Healthy Vision with Dr. Val Jones, Now Available on iTunes. The engaging, free program covers the importance of regular eye exams, contact lens care and UV protection for eyes. Jones is CEO of the popular health blog aggregator Better Health.

Regional Patient ID Pilot Could Presage a National Rollout . The idea of a national patient identifier has gone nowhere, but a regional health information organization in LA has begun testing a regional patient ID system with financial help from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Practice Fusion’s Electronic Health Record System Achieves Complete Meaningful Use Certification. The largest EHR community in the US is now ONC-certified. Practice Fusion’s national network of small medical practices has the potential to earn over $1 billion in incentives.

iCloud, Cloud Computing Services Promise To Change the Way We Use Computers. Apple has announced a free service that allows consumers to store vast amounts of music, video, photos and documents on the Web, one of several emerging offerings that reduce the need for a computer.

Computerized Communication Breakdowns Common Between PCPs, Specialists. A new study investigates the challenges posed by pen and paper workarounds and computerized communication breakdowns associated with electronic health records. Understanding the challenges can help improve coordination of care.

Blumenthal To Chair Commonwealth Fund Commission. David Blumenthal, the former head of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology at HHS, has been named chairman of the Commonwealth Fund’s Commission on a High Performance Health System.

The appalling lack of women chief executives in today’s Health IT companies has been linked to a paucity of women in IT generally and the scarcity of female mentors and venture capitalists that could support them. Social norms regarding gender identity and child rearing also drive the disparity. In this post, I’ll briefly review these norms and some promising efforts to reduce the disparity.

Social Norms, Women and Tech
Many people believe social norms and expectations regarding women are the most important reason why there are so few female IT leaders out there today. As the father of 3 girls who are succeeding in tech, I don’t necessarily agree with this (I think the phenomenon is driven by these factors).

Still, there are some indisputable facts that have to be mentioned.

It is fact for example, that many parents don’t encourage their girls to pursue science and math—especially when they reach high school. These disciplines build analytic and quantitative skills that can be critically important to success for an entrepreneur. Similarly, many parents don’t encourage certain behaviors in girls—like risk taking, independent thinking and competitiveness—to the extent they do in boys. In so doing, parents unwittingly impede the development of self-confidence in their daughters, a trait that can be decisively important when it comes to managing a board or a big customer.

And of course child-bearing and child care remain largely female-specific responsibilities to this day. These responsibilities peak at the same stage in life when many of today’s successful tech entrepreneurs started their companies.

All tech CEOs face difficult challenges, but only female CEOs deal with questions about their commitment to the company when they miss work because of morning sickness or a child’s appointment with the doctor.

What is being Done?
Thankfully, many organizations have formed in recent years to address the gender disparity in tech leadership. They address most or all the barriers mentioned above (and in my previous post on the subject). These efforts seem likely to shake IT leadership to its core for decades to come. Here are some of the most important efforts in this regard: (more…)

The Health Tech 2011 Conference, held earlier this month in Boston, featured presentations from startup CEOs in the health and wellness space. The conference had nothing to do with gender issues or leadership per se. Yet the Twitter feed from the conference (#ciht11) contained this:

@ml_barnett By my count, only 3 of 27 speakers are women. RT @taracousphd: where are the female entrepreneurs? It’s healthcare!!!

taracousphd and @ml_barnett reminded us of a painful fact. There aren’t many female CEOs in Health IT. Why is this?

Women certainly aren’t short on content knowledge in health care. In fact, they dominate men in this area. More than 40% of all practicing physicians and 50% of all medical school graduates are women. Women earn nearly 3 times more PhDs in psychology (useful content knowledge for startups in the space covered by Health Tech 2011). Nearly 94% of nurses and 74% of physical therapists are women, and they rule the workforce in public health, social services and pharmacy  as well.

The problem–and it’s a big one–has to do with the ‘IT’ part of ‘Health IT.’ In 2008, only 6% of Fortune 500 technology companies had female CEOs and 13% had women corporate officers of any kind, according to the National Center for Women and Information Technology. Among tech startups that raised venture capital in 2009, only 4.3% were led by female chief executives. A recent Business Week list of the ‘best young entrepreneurs in tech’ included 45 people, only 3 of which were women.

Among the many explanations for the gender disparity among chief executives in IT, the 4 that make the most sense to me are these:

Women aren’t in tech, period-Although women hold 51% of all professional jobs in the US, they comprise only 26% of the IT workforce. The number of women in IT actually dropped by 76,000 between 2000 and 2008, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Then again, if the gender disparity in Health IT leadership was a simple workforce issue, we’d expect from the data presented above that about 26% of tech CEOs would be women. Clearly there is more to the story.

Women are undertrained in tech-In 2006, only 15% of the people who took the computer-science AP exam were women. That’s lower than any other AP test. Similarly, only 18% of college graduates with computer science degrees are women, and the percentage of female PhD computer scientists is lower still. The latter statistic is particularly galling since these individuals frequently become entrepreneurs and have grant-writing skills and professional networks that can help them succeed. (more…)

Data mining, EHRs Help Target Dangerous Drug Combo. Data mining and electronic health records helped researchers at some of the country’s most prestigious universities discover a dangerous side effect of a common drug combination.

FDA Signals Intent To Regulate Medical Apps. The agency’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health plans to issue guidance on mobile medical applications later this year.

HIV/AIDS Pandemic Hits 30-Year Mark. Thirty years ago this week, scientists were finalizing a landmark article for the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. The report was the first dispatch from the front lines in a new war against a previously unknown virus.

CMS Aligns eRX Incentive with Meaningful Use. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has issued a proposed rule that would alter the Electronic Prescribing Incentive Program so as to be consistent with the HITECH incentive program.

GE, Thomson Reuters Develop Clinical Analytics Tool Using EHR, Claims Data. The joint initiative will let providers and researchers review and analyze de-identified data from electronic health records along with claims data to help determine the impact of various medical treatments.

ONC Exams To Help Identify HIT Experts. The exams will allow individuals to demonstrate skills deemed essential for health IT professionals in the workforce. They can also be used by providers to assess the health IT competencies of their staffs.

Ford, Experts Research SYNC Health as a Tool For Chronic Disease Management. Leveraging Ford SYNC®, researchers developed glucose device connectivity and monitoring capability, location-based allergy and pollen reports and voice-controlled, cloud-based health management services.

Coronary CT Screening Does Not Impact Outcomes. Screening for atherosclerosis with coronary CT imaging in asymptomatic patients leads to more detection and treatment, but no significant change in outcomes, a study found.

Medicaid Officials Review States’ Plans To Block Abortion Funding. Federal officials are taking a hard look at a new Indiana law that withholds some public funding for Planned Parenthood, a development that could cost the state some of its Medicaid funding.

Johns Hopkins Releases Mobile Diabetes Guide. The POC-IT guide can be accessed on the iPad or iPhone. It is developed by Skyiscape in cooperation with clinicians at Johns Hopkins Medicine and is part of the POC-IT series, which includes antibiotic and HIV guides.