As the CIO for the rapidly growing storage vendor NetApp, Marina Levinson had to scale the IT organization quickly so that it could handle both current tasks and any other innovation that might be on the horizon. In this interview, Levinson explains how she has organized her team to work closely with the business in order to ensure that IT's investments match the organization's strategic priorities.
The Indianapolis-based outpatient imaging provider Center for Diagnostic Imaging will participate in the Indiana Network for Patient Care. The Network is a health information exchange and a statewide network focused on supporting clinical care with up-to-date, secure, immediately accessible patient information.
Days after the University of Utah Hospitals and Clinics announced the theft of 2.2 million patients' billing records containing a variety of personal information, a former patient claims Perpetual Storage Inc. negligently allowed the records to be stolen and exposed him to the risk of identity theft. The patient's attorney, Karra Porter, wants the storage company to fund any credit repair, legal counsel and technical support for patients whose identities are actually misused. Porter said her firm, Christensen & Jensen, also plans to sue the university on behalf of the patient.
The new LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans has the latest in simulation technology to give medical professionals an opportunity to build confidence, train, and practice before encountering actual patients. The technology is comparable to flight simulators used by airline pilots, and is a "pioneering, whole new way of training physicians," said Alan Levine, secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals.
A variety of companies are developing and launching sites, most of them free, that allow patients to keep personal health records. They can include everything from medical histories to test results, doctors' notes and prescriptions. Patients can input their records themselves or have them added by doctors' offices and other medical facilities that keep compatible electronic records online. But because the field is so new, standards and legislation still are under development and privacy advocates worry about sensitive records falling into the wrong hands.
Hospital and nursing home building projects would have to be environmentally friendly to win state approval under sweeping regulations proposed by Massachusetts health authorities. If the measure is endorsed by the state Public Health Council this fall, Massachusetts would become the first state to tie approval of healthcare construction to green standards increasingly adopted by office builders. Three of the biggest hospital expansions in New England have already embraced green construction standards, such as incorporating foliage on roofs and floors that eliminate the need for noxious cleaning solvents.