data security

The Future of Mobile Health

What does the future hold for mobile health?

That was the question posed by Rick Smith, Editor of the WRAL TechWire to some of the most innovative and visionary digital health companies in the Triangle. From individuals monitoring their daily steps via a wearable device to scientists gaining the ability to harness the power of big data on a massive scale, advances in mobile health are both exciting and a bit unnerving.

On September 27, 2016, WRAL TechWire invited senior executives of Axial Health, Valencell, Validic, MobileSmith, Medfusion and RelyMD the Executive Exchange to share their thoughts. During the second panel on data security and legal issues, we heard from executives from Parker Poe, MCNC, Wyrick Robbins and Duke Health.

I had the pleasure of live-Tweeting the program and also captured some audio from some of the speakers and attendees. Give a listen to the voice of The Future of Mobile Health.

Podcast Guests (in order of appearance):

WRAL TechWireBrent Anthony, Practimage

Kim Labow, Medfusion

Chris Beal,

Chris Edwards, Validic

Elizabeth Johnson, Wyrick Robbins

Rob Leandro, Parker Poe

Rick Smith, WRAL TechWire

 

 

Are We Paying Enough Attention to Data Security in Digital Health?

Get Social Health welcomes Digital Health Futurist Fard Johnmar as a guest blogger. We were pleased to have him as a guest on the podcast (Episode 10) and could not cover everything we wanted to discuss, particularly on the launch of his new program, Digital Health Illustrated. Congratulations to Fard and team on this new program. I know you’ll be interested in reading about it.

~ Janet Kennedy

social media for healthcareEarlier this year, health consumers, physicians, and others roundly criticized a program backed by the National Health Service to collect and centralize health data gathered by general practitioners from millions of patients across England. They were especially concerned that creating a centralized database of health records could put patients’ privacy at risk.

Are their concerns misplaced? Although data stewards take great care to secure electronic medical records, data breaches are common. In addition, we are collecting increasing amounts of sensitive health data from social media, mobile phones and now, wearable computers. Cybersecurity experts, writing in the New England Journal of Medicine and other publications warn that the health industry is woefully behind other sectors in terms of data security best practices.

In this installment of my new video blog series, Digital Health Illustrated, I focus on the dark side of the health data explosion and highlight consumers’ concerns about health data privacy and security. Click the image below to view.

Fard Johnmar is a digital health futurist and researcher focused on understanding how digital health technologies are used and perceived. He is also co-author of the global bestseller ePatient 2015: 15 Surprising Trends Changing Health Care.