For the next ten days or so THCB will be having a series of guest authors….please welcome them, and my thanks to them, and to all of you for reading!
If you have any THCB, Health2.0 or business questions for the next week or so please email John
Because I’m off getting married 🙂
I’m up at Spot-on trying to make sense of Giuliani on health care.
George W. Bush decided that the way to save his presidency from irrelevancy was to threaten a veto of a bipartisan extension of the Childrens Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). SCHIP was a program developed in bipartisan fashion between a Republican Congress and a Democratic President back in the halcyon 1990s. It’s been a relatively ineffective program in that there are still 8 million American kids uninsured at any one time. But, as Spot-on Christopher Brauchli said, it’s clearly better for those kids than nothing. And nothing has been the alternative offered since 2000.
The threatened veto must be driving any Republican running for election in 2008 berserk. "Republicans hate children" is shaping up to be the 2008 equivalent of 1988 "Democrats love criminals." You’d think that on health care, as with the rest of his disastrous policies, the Republican Presidential candidates would be running away from Bush as fast as they can. Instead we’re seeing the Republican front-runner, Rudy Giuliani, announce that the Democrats want to join Michael Moore in offering Cuban health care to Americans. Read it all
As many of you know, Matthew has punched his timecard, hung up his keyboard, and is blissfully away with his beloved on a well-deserved honeymoon. With consulting gigs, the daily demands of maintaining the best and most entertaining health care blog going, and responsibility for the ever-approaching (Sept. 20) Health 2.0 conference, it was a perfect time for Matthew and bride to slip away, unencumbered by the always-shifting sands of health care. We’ll miss him, but he’ll be back soon, and we’ll try to keep you enlightened and amused while he’s gone.
I’m Brian Klepper. For the last couple months, I’ve been posting over at The Doctor Weighs In, where I’m the only "fake doctor" – a PhD – among a stable of several very thoughtful and readable physicians who include caregivers, scientists, managers and analysts. Over the last several years, I’ve worked hard on a national health care reform effort – See how effective its been? – The Center for Practical Health Reform. But the peculiar nature of my work has also let me see a great deal of interesting programs that work, and many more that don’t. While I’m here, I’ll do my best to share some of that with you.
So here we go. Bear with me. I’m not Matthew of course – who is? – but there’s plenty to share with you that you’ll find interesting. While Matthew is encyclopedic, he tends to focus on the influence of health care IT. I do my best to be equally broad, but with more of a focus on insurance, benefits, the dynamics in the provider marketplace and the health care supply chain. If I’m lucky, I’ll be able to cover a good deal of that and generate one or two "Ahas!" as well.
Apparently, a guy who’s now a leading liberal blogger, Jerome Armstrong, was touting stocks online without revealing that he was paid to do so. He just paid a $30,000 fine to settle the case. And apparently his partner Markos Zunigas of DaliyKos fame was trying to get other liberal bloggers to cover it up, or at least not talk about it.
But beyond all the “the netroots are politics as usual” and “these guys are just like Tom Delay” comments, has anyone stopped to consider two things.
First, this happened in 2000 before Armstrong was a blogger, or at least before anyone had heard of blogging. So exactly what it has to do with him being a blogger I don’t know.
Second, wild claims about a stock on a message board called “Raging Bull” in 2000 at the height of stock mania? Well just imagine that! I mean I’m all for the SEC cleaning out its dirt laundry a few years later—although I’d be just as keen for them to keep looking into say Bill Frist (Investigation stopped) or his professional colleague who had the same result. But there was rather a lot of that going on back in the day (including a 15 year old who was way better at it than Armstrong), and frankly if you’re dumb enough to believe what you read on a stock message board, then that’s not the kind of government safety-net that I’m most in favor of!
But of course if anyone wants to pay me a fortune to tout their stock, and has the political connections to head off the subsequent SEC investigation, I’m all ears. In fact I’m surprised that no one has ever asked me!
I’m not exactly a huge Hillary Clinton fan, but this brief video of her responding to an idiot questioner calling universal medicine “socialized” is pretty funny! Almost more amusing is that there was a Republican in the audience of African-American journalists!
Brian Lapidus is a seasoned expert in security and risk mitigation who focuses on the increasing challenges faced by the public and private sectors in protecting sensitive data and personal information from loss, theft and fraud.
The chief architect of product development at Kroll’s Fraud Solutions group, Lapidus sets direction for the company’s continued success in identity theft discovery, investigation and restoration. Lapidus is particularly knowledgeable about the security gaps – physical, procedural and electronic – common to many U.S. companies and organizations, as well as the criminal landscape where stolen identities are bought, sold and used.
He is frequently quoted on the types of data breaches being experienced by thousands of organizations, and what steps can be taken to better protect confidential data and to recover should a data breach occur. He oversees a highly-skilled team that includes veteran licensed investigators who specialize in supporting breach victims and restoring individuals’ identities to pre-theft status.
The fact of the matter is that patients – and
the law – demand that healthcare companies protect highly sensitive information
from every possible threat. But in-house security options just can’t keep pace
with rapidly growing risks. After all, anti-virus software won’t stop someone
from taking medical records. A firewall can’t help retrieve a stolen
laptop. Below, I answer several questions that every healthcare
organization should know.
Q: Why are healthcare organizations particularly vulnerable to data breaches? A: There are several factors that make healthcare organizations particularly vulnerable to data breaches. Some of these factors include:
I. Sensitivity of data – The healthcare industry is responsible for maintaining its patients’ most sensitive Personal Health Information. PHI is a treasure-trove for identity thieves.
II. Immense Data flow (masses of data flowing in and out) – A primary reason healthcare data security breaches occur is because facilities do not know where all instances of their patients’ sensitive or confidential information resides within the network. Moreover, the danger does not stop at the hospital perimeter, but includes vendors that share or receive the data, as well as employees’ and contractors’ laptop computers and other portable storage devices.
III. Portability/Usage of EPHI (Electronic Protected Health Information) storage devices – Improvements in technology and the portability of patient data come at a cost to security. Devices used to store and access PHI include laptops; home-based personal computers; Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) and Smart Phones; USB Flash Drives and Memory Cards; floppy disks; CDs; DVDs; backup media; Email; Smart cards; and Remote Access; not to mention hotel, library or other public workstations and Wireless Access Points (WAPs).
From Emily Friedman at HHN. It’s called Happy Tails, Jake Leg, and the Food and Drug Administration and unusually for a mainstream publication it notes that Prohibition is stupid.
Consumer reports has a new report confirming what most of us suspected about uninsurance. About 30% of those with insurance don’t think that it’ll cover them and have delayed care as a result. Which in my view is why user fees at point of service are a bad idea.
Of course a bad idea that never dies is a Zombie.
In your Friday funny….
Police seek ‘professionals’ who removed St. Paul man’s testicles. Apparently this was consumer choice! They must have really hurt before and I’m sure they did afterwards.
Health Wonk Review: the party’s at Workers Comp Insider where Julie Ferguson has put together a great collection of wonkery.
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