|
|
 |
June 29th, 2010
 By Stephen Murphy, Senior Vice President, Digital Strategy and Innovation
The cause celebre today is the emergence of the electronic health record (EHR), an online site where doctors can place everything they know about a patient’s medical history, and patients can log on to check their health records. The leading edge of this innovation is the personal health record (PHR), a health-management tool that people are using to access (and control) their own health information. Good-bye, paper records-eventually.
Not many people have PHRs yet, but the rate of adoption is accelerating through services like Google Health and Microsoft HealthVault. A recent report from the California HealthCare Foundation shows that 1 in 14 Americans has used a personal health record, twice the number of users from the previous year. The new research reveals that people with PHRs “know more about their health, ask more questions, and take better care of themselves.” One-third of respondents say they use their PHRs as a vehicle for taking specific action to improve their health.
Health data can drive positive change when people who are engaged with their PHRs start taking better care of themselves. Plenty of health mobile apps are emerging that support personal interaction with one’s health data, and that’s a great step forward for the individual. But as a society, and within Government, we could be doing a much better job of sharing our health data resources. We need to fully integrate our data in a social sense to realize its full value.
Today’s Government websites contain massive amounts of information about grants, publications, and research resources. They’re built on an underlying infrastructure of data and information technology (IT). But the purpose of creating these systems is not to inform audiences about data and IT. The goal is to connect, tell a story, educate, and effect change-not easy tasks when the data are floating on disconnected islands. If I put up a website about nutrition, I want people to read my material and look for ways that they can adapt it to their lifestyle and needs. I want to pursue new opportunities to create positive behavioral change for a healthier America.
Six Ideas To Make Data Social
1. What if you could coordinate a communications plan, an outreach plan, a mobile plan, and an evaluation plan at the same time that you design your EHR system or website?
2. What if, at the outset, you built a solution that could feed a mobile application, an EHR record, a grantee website, and your Facebook and Twitter feeds so others could create their own mashups from your data?
3. What if you consider how the data you house could inform the EHR record of a health provider and build a data link to make it happen? Wouldn’t links to research data or evidence-based best practices provide a richer data set than just a blood test?
4. What if you could harness the data warehouse, the taxonomy that classifies your publications, and product description data to fuel a story bank of short-form messages for social media?
5. What if you could build in extensible data architecture that provides output information that can be meshed with Google maps to show publication shipments by mapped ZIP codes? What if you could overlay that information with data on disease prevalence, drug use, and homelessness?
6. What if your data architecture was designed to support a mashup of data to grantees that could help them write their next grant application or allow them to embed a shopping cart for your agency products on their site?
A Killer App
John Donne is famous for saying, “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent.” He also said, “Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” Donne was referring to the custom of ringing a bell to inform the community when someone in the village died.
So imagine if John Donne, Steve Jobs, and Kathleen Sebelius, the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, met to update Donne’s communications approach for our data-driven time. My guess is that they would come up with a mobile app that would inform you every time a useful piece of health information is produced that affects you. This message may be worth remembering the next time we’re tempted to invest more health dollars in another data island.
Tags: California HealthCare Foundation, data, data architecture, data warehouse, EHR, electronic health record, Google Health, Health Data, health records, information technology, John Donne, Kathleen Sebelius, Microsoft Health Vault, Mobile, personal health record, PHR, social data, Steve Jobs
Posted in Insights, Mobile, eHealth and Health IT | 2 Comments »
June 18th, 2010
By Natalia Barolin, Health Communications Manager
 I recently attended the AllHealth Public Relations panel discussion, “Reaching Top Health Blogs in the New Media Environment,” at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, featuring four leading health bloggers. The event promised an opportunity to learn how to connect with health bloggers and online journalists and how to share our clients’ missions and initiatives to those who share similar interests.
In February 2007, a Zogby poll found that nearly 60% of Americans consider bloggers important to the future of American journalism. A March 2010 Pew survey found that the Internet is now the third most popular news platform, behind local and national television news. So, if you want to be relevant online, you need to understand the power of engaging health bloggers.
What I learned is that, while blogs allow health media a new and more responsive way to cover health news, the strategies for pitching to bloggers and online journalists are similiar to those for pitching traditional reporters. Here are some key insights gained:
1. Take the time to get to know your audience. Every blogger on the panel emphasized this fact. Some of their suggestions included: clicking and reading through the blog’s content, reading the blog’s “About” page, following the blogger on Twitter, commenting on the blog, and connecting with the blogger even when you’re not pitching. And, when it comes time to pitch, only send content and ideas that are relevant to the blog’s identity and readers. By doing so, you are more likely to be taken seriously and considered a trusted and reliable source. Otherwise, don’t waste your time and your clients’ resources.
2. Find out how a blog generates its content. Some blogs, like the Health Affairs Blog, are open to submissions from potential guest bloggers and invite bloggers to participate. Sometimes, the editors of the journal Health Affairs may even ask authors of articles to submit their materials to the blog, instead of the journal. Rather than generate its own blog posts, Kaiser’s Health News Blog Watch aggregates blog content. It rounds up the more opinionated blogs, while the more “newsy” blogs with a traditional reporting style end up in the Kaiser Health News (KHN) Daily Health Policy Report. If you want your clients’ blogs included in the KHN roundup of relevant policy blogs, Kate Steadman is the person to pitch. But, remember, focus on the relationship, not the pitch.
3. Know how to connect. Scott Hensley, of NPR’s Health News Blog, “Shots,” doesn’t accept guest posts, but is open to being pitched with ideas for the blog. Hensley says email is best: like most online reporters and bloggers, he does not like getting calls. If you do call, be prepared to deliver a strong and concise pitch in less than 30 seconds-and to be blown off. It’s nothing personal, but if they are interested in covering your story, they’ll call you.
4. Be ready to respond. Some bloggers are open to receiving posts and ideas from PR professionals on behalf of clients, but they will want to connect with your client very quickly and get the conversation going. The turnaround of a blog post is much quicker than a journal article, so don’t hold them up. Be the bridge to your client, not to an intermediary.
5. Timing is crucial. The chance of getting your story covered in a blog, just like in traditional media, depends on pitching the right story at the right time. Keep monitoring health news in traditional media, online and the blogosphere. That way you can identify and quickly move on the right opportunities to connect others with your issue or client.
6. Use Twitter to your advantage. Jeffrey Young, former editor of The Hill’s “Blog Briefing Room,” uses Twitter to find fresh content and determine when a story has saturated the blogosphere. Leverage this resource to make sure you’re not pitching yesterday’s news.
The AllHealth PR panel delivered a concise overview on how to connect with health bloggers, but let’s go a step farther. What tips do you have on connecting with health bloggers and online journalists?
Posted in Blogging, Events, Media | 1 Comment »
May 24th, 2010
By David Tondreau, Chief Technology Officer
 Cloud computing technology makes heady promises of accessible and reliable IT solutions. It conjures up visions of ITopia: near-universal access to data and next-generation knowledge management systems to help solve our problems-available at costs in the thousands, not the millions. I can’t wait to see how these scenarios develop, and I’m working to realize the cloud’s potential for expanding the delivery of health care information, especially to traditionally underserved populations.
But as we scan this promising horizon, sometimes the cloud darkens. For example, last October, Microsoft and T-Mobile had to announce that for customers using Sidekick devices “contacts, stored photos, and other information are probably gone forever, due to a technical glitch with Microsoft’s servers.” This was obviously an unwelcome development for someone like me and millions of other people who’ve added integrated mobile technology to their way of life. I’m just glad the glitch wasn’t worse.
The Thunder Rolls…
Like a brief cloudburst, the Sidekick issue quickly faded from the news cycle, in part because actual losses of critically important information were relatively small. Life goes on without that cute picture of your Shih-Tsu as the background for your mobile phone display; many of us already routinely save our customers’ phone numbers in Outlook. But what if the next glitch costs you the electronic copies of your child’s immunization record? And what if that glitch happens just before you arrive at the emergency room to have your son or daughter treated for a nasty gash from a rusty, barbed wire fence?
With the use of mobile devices on the rise, we’re increasingly “out there” with our need for uninterrupted security on a frontier that can turn inhospitable overnight. If that makes you feel somewhat vulnerable, you’re not alone. It’s clear that in order to realize their enormous potential, cloud computing networks (and especially cloud solutions for health care) must be designed and built to provide continuity of service. This is a critical requirement for selecting both vendors and solutions. In the short term, since we’re dealing with an unreliable cloud, our options are limited:
- Back up important data.
- Get acquainted with the services that are available.
- Compare providers.
- Try to select the vendors who can protect your information during outages.
In technology, we sometimes look for divine inspiration-answers from “those in the know” that will help us make all the right choices. NASA’s chief information officer, Linda Cureton, once defined the cloud as “part silver lining, part silver bullet, part bull.” The point she was driving home is that technology doesn’t just “happen.” It’s planned. Whether you want to develop cloud solutions or implement a social media strategy, the effort depends on multiple, coordinated components, not a silver bullet.
No one solution will solve our technological ills, anymore than a single treatment will cure all cancers. No single technology is a replacement for well-conceived, well-orchestrated, well-executed strategies to solve problems. In many ways, that makes people the most important asset in successful IT delivery. Cloud networks will advance when people with a proven track record for success, and equipped with the most modern technology, are inspired to explore multiple approaches. That’s ITopia.
Tags: Cloud Computing, data, information, IT, knowledge management, Linda Cureton, Sidekick, technology
Posted in Cloud Computing, eHealth and Health IT | 2 Comments »
May 4th, 2010
By Barrett Whitener, Senior Health Communications Manager
When it’s time to give a talk, many speakers get a little nervous. But anxiety can become a real problem if it distracts you from the task of communicating. Here are six tips to help you use fear to your advantage:
 Acknowledge that you feel nervous. This simple step can loosen its grip on you and make it easier to focus on giving the best presentation possible.
- Realize that it’s not about you. The audience’s attention is on the content of the talk, not on you personally. Direct your energy to the same place: prepare the talk carefully and rehearse it at least once in its entirety.
- Be cognizant of the clock. Limit your content to what an audience can comfortably absorb in the time allotted. Don’t spend more than about 2 minutes on each slide (e.g., 10 minutes on five slides). You’ll avoid the trap of having to rush through the talk in an attempt to “get everything in”-a strategy likely to elevate your anxiety and overwhelm your listeners.
- Limit the text on your slides. Use brief titles and bullet points (not full sentences). Limiting the text will allow you to make more eye contact with the audience and speak to them more than to the screen. Maintaining this connection is crucial to the talk-everyone, including you, will feel more engaged by the content.
- Train your focus on the entire audience. Think of the audience as one big lawn, and “water the entire lawn” with eye contact and vocal energy. This perspective makes it easier to overlook distracting actions by individual blades of grass (e.g., someone leaves the room, never looks up from the computer, or listens to you raptly) and to continue communicating with purpose.
- Consult your “inner critic.” This observant viewer wants to help you improve. Before the presentation, ask your inner critic to take notes on what works well in the talk and what you can do better next time-but not to share those notes with you until you ask for them, sometime after the talk. Be sure to follow through and ask; you’ll find the notes surprisingly kind and helpful.
By regarding nervousness as an ally-as a source of both energy and learning-you can use it to continually improve your talks.
Posted in Insights | 1 Comment »
April 2nd, 2010
By Stephen Murphy, Senior Vice President, Digital Strategy and Innovation
In an age of collaboration, crowd sourcing, and the rapid exchange of information, nothing is ever final. There is always something that another will be able to add. We must then ask what constitutes a final report, a final advert, a “final” anything. In a collaborative world, isn’t it presumptuous to talk about perfection?
Look at the way we interact with close friends. Our conversations have nothing to do with perfection, and there’s no expectation that anything said among friends has to be final. The friend model is relaxed, playful, and unself-conscious. There is no need for a plan. The idea is to enjoy the exchange, not to meet a standard. What friends say flows naturally, because each person wants to add something and keeps the conversation going. What friends do is support their relationship.
Consider brainstorming: The only rule is to invite all kinds of ideas. Getting outside the box means taking perfection off the table. Giving up control. Collaborating freely. Seeing where it goes. Isn’t that what Twitter is driving on a massive scale? the spinoff of ideas that generates more ideas, responses, and connections?
We all want to create outstanding processes and products, but the steps we take to get there don’t need to be perfect. Let’s accept that we’re taking risks and learning new ways of cooperating, collaborating, and elaborating in a world that has never moved so fast. Why not engage our clients in more open-ended conversations first, and worry about making it “final” later? So, next time you think about final, ask yourself: “Did I really tap the team as I could have in order to improve this product? Could I have crowd-sourced a solution? Could I have taken a risk along the way in order to build a better mousetrap?”
Perhaps there is no “final” anymore because knowledge is infinite. So, why do we think we can still package knowledge in a finite form? Let’s think, instead, of knowledge as extensible and infinite. Let’s deliver it in ways that others can benefit from it. Operating in a world set on perfection shuts off this continual stream of knowledge building. “Final” says, “I don’t want to hear anymore. You have nothing else to add. I don’t value your knowledge.”
By the way, this is not my final word. It’s simply the start of a conversation about new ways we can work in a new knowledge world, a world of sharing, where we add value to what others create. I would love to hear your thoughts about this–your “final” word.
Posted in Insights | 1 Comment »
January 22nd, 2010
By Kim Callinan, Senior Vice President, Communications and Social Marketing
The Kaiser Family Foundation released a study this week, “Generation M2: Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds,” showing that the average child aged 8 to 18 spends more than 7.5 hours a day on screens (smart phone, computer, television, handheld game system, or other electronic device.) I was delighted to be interviewed for a New York Times article on the report because this is a topic that I feel very passionately about.
I have two children–a 9-year old boy and a 7-year old girl. I have always had a screen time rule, but when they were younger I was more relaxed about it. I aimed for no more than 2 hours a day, although there were certainly days when we exceeded that. When my son was first born, I would put in a Baby Einstein video in the morning to take my shower and one in the evening as I got dinner prepared. As soon as the video started, his eyes would lock on the screen and I had a guaranteed 30 minutes of sanity. We graduated from those to educational computer games and other PBS television shows. I thought that as long as the quality of the programming they watched was good, that a few hours of screen time a day would be fine.
The older he got, the more concerned I became about “screens” and how they were impacting his health and development. By the time he was 8, it seemed like the only way that my son could engage in life was with a screen in front of him. If a play date came over, they were not able to “play” without a video game in their hands. When I tried to get him to go outside and play, he would moan and complain and it was a fight each and every time. And getting him to do his homework was a constant battle “because homework interfered with the fun stuff.” You know what the “fun” stuff was!
Now keep in mind that I had a screen time rule of two hours a day. Granted it wasn’t always enforced, but he certainly wasn’t spending seven hours a day watching television and playing video games! Despite this, he was headed down a path that did not look promising.
The wake-up call came when he announced that he didn’t want to sign up for any after school activities. Why? “Because by the time I get home from school, do my homework, and eat dinner, I have about two hours before bed time. That’s how much screen time you let me have during the week. If I sign up for an activity I will miss out on video games.” Since when was tae kwon do, swimming, chess club, or any other activity of his choice missing out!
I’m not sure what the formal definition of addiction is, but I was pretty certain he was heading in a very dangerous direction. Thus our revised screen time rule was born–No screen time during the week and an hour and a half on weekends.
I’ve seen many very positive changes in my son since implementing the new rule. When his friends come over, they are now playing Legos, running around outside, or even playing imagination games. He has joined fencing and tae kwon do and he is excited to go. And I rarely now hear him say, “I’m bored.” He somehow has learned how to entertain himself without a hand-held device! He also complains much less about homework than he used to and on most nights he independently completes his homework. The positive changes help give me the motivation and strength to continue enforcing the rules despite vehement protests from my children.
In looking back, I wish that I had followed the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommendation of no television time until kids were at least 2 years old (or that I had waited even longer). However, I can’t rewind the clock. So hopefully the changes that I have made happened soon enough to ensure that my son grows up to be well rounded, happy, and without a video game addiction.
For more on the impacts of media on young people, see the Shaping Youth Blog. In the meantime, if you have any tips for protecting your children from the media, please share them with me. I’d love to learn from your experiences.
Posted in Children's Health, Media | 20 Comments »
December 2nd, 2009
By Dan Johnson, Technical Assistant to the CEO
Roughly 61 percent of American adults say they search for health information online, usually to read about a particular disease or health condition, according to a report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project. But, about 20 percent of them are doing far more: They are having health-related conversations at social networking sites—sharing their symptoms, opinions, and questions with online communities that include friends, family, and fellow patients.
“People are accessing a much deeper level of information than they were 5 years ago,” according to Susannah Fox, Associate Director, Digital Strategy, Pew Internet. “They are part of the conversation. And that, I think, is an indicator of where we could be going in terms of the future of participatory medicine,” said Fox, in a recent interview on National Public Radio.
So far, the use of information technology by caregivers remains modest, as measured by the number of hospitals and doctors who report that they use computerized medical records, usually in the range of 15-17 percent. It is likely that these low numbers say more about the nature of change in bureaucracies than about the online interests of doctors. Like the implementation of health reform in general, the Government’s effort to make electronic health records (EHRs) part of a next-generation health care system is extraordinarily complex. In the meantime, it is no wonder that people who are used to having EHRs from veterinarians for their family pets are turning to “Google Health” and Microsoft’s “My Health Info” to create their own personal health records.
Doctors, however, are hardly clueless when it comes to social media and participatory medicine. Sixty percent of physicians say they have used or want to use social networking sites, according to health writer Judith Messina. In “Medicine Meets Social Networking” (crain’s new york business), Messina describes virtual communities of doctors who share experiences, offer problem-solving tools, and make recommendations for patient care. Two of their largest social networking sites, Sermo and Medscape Physician Connect, are physician-only platforms that have more than 100,000 members each.
It seems to me that concerns about privacy (for patients) and liability (for physicians) could, for the foreseeable future, dampen direct social engagement online between doctors and people seeking health information. Can anyone recommend a Web-based community where doctors and people with health questions have agreed to support an unrestricted, informal brand of participatory medicine?
In the meantime, participatory medicine may be due for significant change: Behavioral economists are researching ways to better understand the decision-making processes of an ever-larger body of people who look for health information online. Harvard economist Sendhil Mullainathan, for example, focuses on non-rational factors that fuel decisions, such as identity, self-control, risk aversion, and social desires. Mullainathan’s approach to behavior change—which entails extensive testing and evaluation—is aimed at motivating market forces to create new incentives to enable people to place a high value on the benefits of disease management. IQ Solutions is closely tracking the implications of behavior change science on our own evolving mechanisms for promoting wellness and disease prevention to the widest possible audience, including the traditionally underserved. For information about the work of Mullainathan and other experts, see the summary of the NIH Science of Behavior Change meeting in 2009.
Posted in eHealth and Health IT | 2 Comments »
November 11th, 2009
By Kim Callinan, Senior Vice President, Communications and Social Marketing
Last year’s election of a new President brought a new commitment to “reform government so that it is more efficient, more transparent, and more creative.” In the current climate, public information officers and administrators across the government have to think creatively about what this means for information centers and make prudent investments in emerging technologies. At the same time, one must balance the temptations to implement new features and technologies to “show we can do it” with a carefully thought out approach that keeps in mind the government’s mandate to deliver accurate, (and in the case of NIH, science-based) information to a diverse constituency base. Below are three ways to approach the challenges and opportunities that come with Web 2.0 and other technology-driven elements of open government.
- Maintain a customer-centric focus: The masses are diverse. Federal clearinghouse audiences for health information, for example, can include researchers, parents, medical and health professionals, patients, caregivers, advocacy groups, government agencies, and the media. A customer-centric focus that meets the needs of multiple audiences requires both vision and customer research that represents these audiences and the types of information they might want. One critical element to maintaining a customer-centric focus is making use of customer data. Investing in a data analytics package that provides near real-time information about your communications and information center activities will provide you with the tools to maintain your customer focus.
- Provide information resources anytime, anywhere, any way: Not only is the customer always right, but his or her expectations are rising. As more information is disseminated across a range of technologies, customers are becoming increasingly proactive about what they want, where they want it, and how they want to use it. One way to fulfill this need is to take a fresh look at your information. Instead of (or in addition to) publishing a lengthy report or brochure, try breaking up existing content into smaller pieces so it can be repurposed and provided to customers in whatever formats they want- email, text message, Twitter, RSS, etc.
- Engage diverse and underserved audiences: It is imperative for government clearinghouses to provide equal access to information and services. As we begin implementing the latest technologies, it’s important that we recognize which audiences the various tools will and will not reach. Effective approaches may include bridging the digital divide, hiring diverse individuals to staff call centers, developing culturally competent materials, and adopting cultural competency models in all aspects of service delivery.
The good news is that the new online communications tools that help to achieve President Obama’s vision of a collaborative and participatory government are also relatively inexpensive. In tough economic times, federal clearinghouses need to cultivate a healthy obsession with tech-driven efficiency as they adopt new ways of delivering information to the public. This obsession can result in greater reach, while achieving cost savings. At the same time, it is essential to also cultivate an informed perspective of ongoing change-to ensure that innovation leads to right-sized information and quality customer service.
Posted in Information Center | 2 Comments »
|
When the call went out to IQ Solutions staff to volunteer as reading tutors at a local school, I came up with a lot of excuses not to do it: