Featuring posts written by the DoseSpot e-Prescribing Integration Team!

Got the sniffles? Tweet about it: The push to share illness data online

Posted: December 15th, 2014 | Author: | Filed under: Basics, In the News, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | No Comments »
Email, RSS Follow

The truth hurts. We’re currently in the throes of flu season with no reassuring end in sight. Whether it’s a fever, the chills, a runny nose or the ever-dreaded stomach bug, recent data trends show that sicklings across America like to share their not-so-pleasant illness narratives on the World Wide Web. According to Boston Children’s Hospital computational epidemiologist John Brownstein, a keynote speaker at this week’s mHealth Summit in DC, we should be thanking these individuals—they’re allowing digital public health companies to capture valuable data to create meaningful insights for users.

Brownstein highlighted several noteworthy collaborations and projects while at the Summit. Boston-based HealthMap currently deploys Google’s “Vaccine Finder,” enabling health consumers to search by location and vaccine type across the United States. In a pilot with UberHealth, HealthMap used Uber cars to help nurses deliver flu vaccines to individuals at work and at home in both New York City and Boston.

Brownstein, one of HealthMap’s chief architects, also highlighted the startup’s cooperation with Yelp to collect reports on food poisoning to track foodborne illnesses—which average about 10,000 cases per year. Through HealthMap’s Outbreaks Near Me app, iOS and Android users can report outbreaks of a variety of illnesses for identification and tracking.

So, to the tissue-hogging, fever-running, congested and unhappy folks out there—keep blogging, keep Tweeting, and keep Facebook posting. HealthMap and other soon-to-be digital public health companies seem to have you covered for now and for the future of illness outbreak tracking.

To hear more from John Brownstein, check out his interview from this week’s mHealth Summit here!

SOURCES: MEDCITY News

About DoseSpot 
DoseSpot is a Surescripts certified e-Prescribing platform specifically designed to integrate with electronic health record, electronic dental record, practice management and telehealth software. DoseSpot is certified to e-Prescribe controlled substances and has provided simple, affordable and integratable e-Prescribing solutions to healthcare IT companies since 2009. For more information, please visit www.DoseSpot.com.

Ebola on the Internet: The Digital Health Warning from Boston to West Africa

Posted: August 7th, 2014 | Author: | Filed under: Basics, In the News, Public Policy | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | No Comments »
Email, RSS Follow

With a 60% spike in reported cases over the past two weeks, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa continues to spread at a frightening rate. Physicians, disaster relief responders and the World Health Organization (WHO) alike remain unsure of how to stop the deadliest outbreak to date—but one Boston-bred digital health company could have predicted it was coming. HealthMap, a team of researchers, epidemiologists, and software developers at Boston Children’s Hospital, has been conducting online outbreak monitoring and real-time surveillance of emerging public health threats since its founding in 2006. According to a recent article published in TIME Magazine, HealthMap had already alerted key U.S. government agencies about West Africa’s Ebola outbreak days before the WHO first announced it.

Using its online program, HealthMap is able to deliver aggregated intelligence on a range of emerging infectious diseases. In creating this app, HealthMap scours social media, online news sources and eyewitness reports for early signs of disease outbreaks. In bringing these data together, HealthMap achieves a unified view of current infectious diseases, their effects on human health, and can share these views with the public via a mobile app called “Outbreaks Near Me.”

Regarding the Ebola outbreak, HealthMap accessed a Kenyan news report on 23 deaths due to hemorrhagic fever in March, and promptly notified U.S. officials. Although action was not taken after this initial report, it appears that online technology has improved the ability to detect and track outbreaks. As of now, most major U.S. government agencies subscribe to Healthmap.org’s daily email alerts and online postings.

Sources: TIME Magazine and NPR

Check out HealthMap’s website here for more information.

About DoseSpot

DoseSpot is a Surescripts™ certified e-Prescribing platform specifically designed to integrate with electronic health record, electronic dental record, practice management and telehealth software. DoseSpot has provided simple, affordable and integratable e-Prescribing solutions to healthcare IT companies since 2009. For more information, please visit www.DoseSpot.com.