November 2002
INTRODUCTION
Board Membership
At the Board meeting held on 13 November 2002, Peter Range was appointed Development
Director. Also, Carrie Armstrong of the NHS Information Authority was co-opted
as a non-Executive Board member.
The composition of the current Board is:
Ricky Richardson – Chair
Mike McCurry – Treasurer and Membership Secretary
Peter Range – Development Director
Richard Taylor
Alasdair Liddell
Carrie ArmstrongStephen Ronaldson – Company Secretary
The next Board meeting will be held on 16 December; please let me know, by 14 December 2002, of any matters you wish to be raised on your behalf.
Subscriptions
As Treasurer, my principal task is to ensure that membership subscriptions
are notified and received. I should be grateful if you would ensure that I
am made aware of any changes that affect the invoicing process. On a number
of occasions, I have been informed that the person to whom the invoice was
sent is no longer responsible, in post or has moved address.
Our Banking arrangements are being changed and I will let you have the new details in due course.
AGM and members meeting 9 January 2003
Polycom will host the next Members meeting, at their offices in Slough
on 9 January 2003. The AGM will be held on that day, and the official Notice
and the documentation will be despatched by 18th December 2002.
Mike McCurry
treasurer@ukeha.org.uk
Labour MP for Doncaster North, Kevin Hughes visited teleHealth and telecare specialists Tunstall on Friday 8 November 2002, viewing its extensive range of personal and home reassurance solutions and response centre systems. As well as being Chair of the Labour Backbench Health Committee, Mr Hughes was Chair of Doncaster Council Social Services Committee for several years, and so was keen to learn more about the local company which has contributed a great deal to the health and social care industry. Tunstall was specifically recommended in the House of Commons Health Select Committee report which stated that teleHealth has a major contribution to make in developing alternatives to hospitalisation and that the Department of Health should establish a national strategy to develop telecare solutions as part of a spectrum of home care, accompanied by pilot schemes to demonstrate the benefits that teleHealth technology can deliver. kate@contextpr.co.uk / craig@contextpr.co.uk
From October 2002 all babies born in England and Wales will be issued with an NHS number at birth, helping to ensure that personal records are consistent and universally available to relevant NHS staff from day one. The NHS number will be issued by midwives though a new computerised Central Issue System (CIS), developed and supported by BT's systems integration arm Syntegra in a deal worth around £2m over eight years. The system is accessed using the NHSnet secure wide area network. NHS Numbers for Babies (NN4B) was set up and implemented by the NHS Information Authority (NHS IA), the body responsible for delivering high quality electronic information throughout the NHS.
TeleMedic Systems Ltd has announced their strategic alliance with India's Apollo Hospital Group, the seventh largest private hospital group in the world, and the largest outside of the USA. The Apollo Hospital Group will provide enhanced telemedicine support to remote communities in India using Telemedic Systems’ VitalLink Rural Health Solution. This VitalLink solution is currently being used by medical staff in rural communities in the USA to monitor patients and transmit their vital signs data to a medical facility via a standard telephone line. The VitalLink unit will also utilise cellular or satellite communications where rural infrastructures are not developed. www.telemedicsystems.com
The government plans to publish the full version of its procurement strategy for the NHS IT programme by December 2002, according to answers given to parliamentary questions by health minister Hazel Blears. http://www.e-health-media.com/news/item.cfm?ID=292
The yellow card scheme for reporting suspected adverse drug reactions is now online at the Medicines Control Agency (MCA) website. The new facility saves time by storing professionals' names and other details for use in subsequent reports. The scheme has also been extended to nurses. Pilots will start in 2003 to enable patients to report adverse drug reactions via NHS Direct and NHS Direct Online. http://www.mca.gov.uk
Ayrshire and Arran Acute Hospitals NHS Trust is leading the development of hospital e-prescribing in the Scottish NHS. Over the past month they have been testing a robust new tablet-style PC called the Toughbook, designed to withstand the rigours of a busy hospital environment. The Toughbook comes with a GPRS connection enabling it to be linked into the hospital IT network, enabling information to be easily added or called up from the hospital's clinical and patient administration systems. http://www.e-health-media.com/news/item.cfm?ID=303
The Guild of Healthcare Pharmacists (GHP), in association with First DataBank Europe have announced the launch of the First DataBank Guild of Healthcare Pharmacists Information Technology Award. The new annual award aims to encourage, support and promote information technology initiatives and ‘Best Practice’ in the use of IT in the pharmacy. In particular, initiatives are sought where IT has made a positive difference to the provision of pharmaceutical services or resulted in direct benefit to patients or staff. The award, aimed at pharmacy departments and individuals, will be for £2,500. www.ghp.org.uk/
The British Medical Journal has launched a scheme to make medical books available in electronic format from the journal's website. Initially, only titles published by BMJ Books will be available but e-books from other publishers are expected soon. http://www.bmjbookshop.com
Lectureships (2 posts) in Healthcare Simulation Reference
No. B161/1
The Department of Information Systems and Computing at Brunel University is
seeking to appoint two lecturers with appropriate backgrounds in simulation
modelling. Informal enquiries can be made to Professor Terry Young, tel: 01895
816287 email: terry.young@brunel.ac.uk
or Professor Martin Buxton, tel 01895 203331, e-mail: martin.buxton@brunel.ac.uk
For further particulars and an application form tel: 01753 240187 or email
brunel@barkers.co.uk quoting the Vacancy Reference number. Details are also
available on the web with a downloadable application form through www.brunel.ac.uk/news/40posts.
The 'MEMO' project has launched a web portal providing articles, interviews, tutorials, links and downloads about the uses and technologies for medical mobile devices. The site will provide secure areas for technology partners to share project management information, alongside an open area carrying public information. MEMO also aims to develop shared technical and marketing evaluation methods for medical mobile devices. This will form part of a strategy to increase interoperability between mobile applications across Europe, for example with standards for the incorporation of medical semantics into speech recognition. http://www.med-mobile.org
The US-led 'SATELLIFE' project founded by Nobel peace prize winner Bernard Lown, has been awarded a prize for health technology innovation in this year’s Stockholm Challenge. The project aims to overcome the problem of poor quality local health survey data in the developing world by beaming it in via satellite and modem, and returning locally collected data to a reliable central database. Recent trials in Ghana showed that 30 volunteers could complete more than 2,400 immunisation surveys within five days. http://www.healthnet.org
The 'Infomed' project in Cuba, a national health information network which uses free and open source software, online training and collaborative working to create a low-cost support network for health professionals was also a winner in the health section of the Stockholm Challenge. For more about the Stockholm Challenge and a complete list of prize-winners see visit http://www.challenge.stockholm.se
The Medical Informatics and Technology Applications Consortium (MITAC) is part of the NASA Commercial Space Center (CSC) Program and was established to develop, evaluate, and promote information and medical technologies for space flight and ground applications. The basic premise of a CSC is to develop partnerships with industrial affiliates and other government agencies to benefit human space flight. The partners all have a commercial interest in products and technology related to telemedicine, medical informatics and medical technology. MITAC is now located on the Medical Campus of the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) http://www.federaltelemedicine.com/n110402.htm
The International Association of Physicians in AIDS Care - a non-profit organisation in Johannesburg has launched an appeal for information and assistance including electronic and e-learning materials relating to HIV/AIDS, to help develop a Southern African resource centre. It is seeking printed or electronic materials from individuals or institutions in the following areas: HIV/AIDS good practice; guidelines; policy and legislation; treatment; care and support materials and research results in Southern Africa. The resource centre supports IAPAC members; those affected by HIV/AIDS; researchers and health care workers. If you can provide assistance contact Shirley Kabwato shirley@iapac.org.za http://www.iapac.org/
2002/2003 UK Conferences
*Denotes a new addition to the list
TEHRE 2002 December, London www.medrecinst.com/conference/conferences.shtml
5th Annual Filmless Hospitals Conference. 4 December 2002 Hilton, Birmingham Metropole Hotel. Tel: 01932 821723 events@bjhcltd.demon.co.uk
*Making it happen within the NHS 22 January 2003, Lord’s Conference and Banqueting Centre, London Tel: 020 7923 5348 conference@laingbuisson.co.uk
TeleMed ’03 10th International Conference on Telemedicine and Telecare 29-30 January 2003 Royal Society of Medicine, London telemed@rsm.ac.uk www.rsm.ac.uk/telemedicine
HC2003 24 – 26 March 2003, Harrogate, Yorkshire Tel: 01886 833843 hc2003-judy@amiconf.demon.co.uk
UK Radiological Congress 15-17 June 2003, Birmingham www.ukrc.org.uk
2002/2003 Overseas Conferences
Seventh Annual World Conference on the Internet and Medicine - Mednet 2002. 4-7 December, 2002 - Amsterdam, The Netherlands http://www.mednet2002/org/
EUROREC 2002 – Electronic Health Records: Our Care 13-14 December 2002. Charite conference Centre, Berlin, Germany www.mshuge.org/events/eurorec/default.cfm str@medos.de
*Innovations in Telemental Health 15 January 2003 – 10.00am to noon PST www.teleHealthconference.org/teleHealthconference.htm
First PanArab Congress & Fair on I.T in Medicine in Collaboration with 1st International Congress on I.T in Medicine; 19-21 March 2003 at the Mena House Oberoi Hotel, Cairo – Egypt. http://www.arabitmed.com
2nd annual Telemedicine & Telecare International Trade Fair, 9-11 April 2003, Luxembourg, info@telemedicine.lu, www.telemedicine.lu
TEPR 2003 10-16 May 2003 San Antonio Convention Centre, San Antonio. www.medrecinst.com/conferences/tepr/index.shtml
8th World Conference on Nursing Informatics. EHealth for All: Designing the Nursing Agenda for the Future. 20-25 June 2003 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil www.ni2003.com
International Society of Technology Assessment in Health Care (ISTAHC) International conference, "Improving outcomes through health technology assessment" from 22 - 25 June 2003 Canada http://www.istahc2003.org/home.cfm.info@istahc2003.org
Please forward this e-mail to other colleagues who may find it of interest.
Monica Dennis
Britannia House
11 High Street
Cowbridge
Vale of Glamorgan CF71 7AD
Tel and fax: 01446 775189
Mobile: 07811 159800
Email: monica@denwales.freeserve.co.uk
www.ukeha.org.uk