Strengthening Health Information Systems

In partnership with

Hej, this is your weekly Data Doc Diaries

📒 In this week’s diary:

• 🔧 WHO Issues Updated Health Information System Guidance

• ❗️ DID YOU KNOW! ❓️

• ⌚️ Wearable devices: benefits and privacy concerns

• 🧠 The Rise of Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) Surgery

• 😂 MEME of the week

• 📰 In the news this week

  • New partnerships around AI, VBC, virtual care and more

  • Facial thermal imaging and AI can predict coronary artery disease.

  • Why cybercriminals target the healthcare?

• WHO/Europe released updated guidance for assessing and improving health information systems (HIS), providing a strategic framework for countries to enhance data accuracy and usage.

The guidance also highlights the importance of interoperability and data standardisation, addressing common issues like delays in data reception and integration difficulties. By leveraging advanced health informatics tools and techniques, countries can enhance their HIS to support evidence-based decision-making and policy formulation.

Why standardisation is important:

• Interoperability: Standardised HIS ensures that data from various sources can be integrated and compared accurately, facilitating better communication between different health systems and stakeholders. According to a HealthIT.gov report, 88% of hospitals engaged in electronically sending and obtaining patient health information in 2021, showcasing the critical need for interoperability standards.

• Data Quality and Consistency: Standardised protocols enhance data accuracy and reliability, essential for informed decision-making and policy development. Tools like HL7 and FHIR are crucial in this context. HL7 provides protocols and messaging standards that ensure healthcare data is consistently understood and interpreted, while FHIR offers a modern, adaptable approach for electronic healthcare data exchange, promoting simplified integration and standardised data formats.

The WHO’s support for external assessments and strategic development ensures that countries are not only equipped to collect and analyse health data but also to apply these insights effectively to improve health outcomes.

The advent of BCIs like the Stentrode represents a monumental leap in data management and patient care. The integration of BCIs requires robust systems capable of handling continuous streams of neural data, ensuring real-time processing and secure storage. This demands advanced analytics to interpret brain signals accurately and translate them into actionable commands, pushing the boundaries of current health informatics infrastructure.

The precision required in BCI surgery underscores the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration between neurosurgeons, data scientists, and engineers. Developing effective BCIs involves not only the physical implantation of devices but also the creation of sophisticated algorithms that can adapt to individual neural patterns. This collaboration aims to refine the algorithms for better accuracy and reliability, thereby enhancing patient outcomes. Moreover, the integration of these systems into electronic health records (EHRs) ensures comprehensive tracking of patient progress and the seamless updating of treatment protocols. As we move forward, health informatics will play a crucial role in the scalability and accessibility of BCI technology, paving the way for broader applications in treating various neurological disorders.

In a recent article, Luis Quintero, a Researcher in Data Science and Immersive Technologies at Stockholm University, explores the benefits and privacy concerns associated with wearable devices. He emphasises the significant advantages of wearables in health monitoring and personalised care, while also highlighting the urgent need for robust data protection measures and regulatory frameworks to safeguard user privacy.

For a comprehensive overview of these insights, you can read the full article ^_LINK

📰 In the news this week

• New partnerships around AI, VBC, virtual care and more ^_LINK

Collaborations and integrations aim to streamline access to patient medical histories via national networks, drive more proactive pediatric care, expand behavioral telehealth and pioneer more hospital automation.

• Facial thermal imaging and AI can accurately predict presence of coronary artery disease ^_LINK

Researchers have developed an AI-assisted facial thermal imaging model that accurately predicts coronary artery disease, offering a non-invasive and efficient diagnostic alternative.

• Why Cybercriminals Target the Healthcare ^_LINK

The article explains why cybercriminals increasingly target the healthcare industry, emphasising the high value of medical data and often weak cybersecurity defenses. It highlights common attack methods such as ransomware and phishing, and the significant financial and operational impacts of these breaches.