Caring for the Future

alton · Jan 26, 2010 · 07:56

Health care has led to major improvements in health with major system consequences. More people benefiting from more care presents a challenge to sustainability. Potential low-cost answers to this challenge are reported here.

"e-Harmony for Patients"

carlos · Oct 3, 2009 · 09:16

Healthcare Conversations - From the New York Times Health Blog

carlos · Dec 3, 2009 · 12:54

Jane's Voice: Cancer - Our Collective Autobiography

JaneLaMdeP · Jul 27, 2009 · 12:13

Cancer: Our Collective Autobiography?

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

There’s a book I’d been wanting to read for quite a while. I went to the bookstore to get it and picked it up. Then, I started wandering around and ended up buying a couple of books about beekeeping instead. Choices. Choices. Choices.

A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century by Barbara W. Tuchman, I understand, was all the rage when it came out in 1978.

E-patients, Cyberchondriacs, and Why We Should Stop Calling Names

alton · Sep 17, 2010 · 08:03

e-Patient

Carlos Rizo and Susannah Fox hosted a BlogTalkShow to on Wed. Sept. 1 to discuss the experiences around the evolution of terms such e-Patients and cyberchondriacs, and the phenomenon of using the internet to gather and share health information. Below is the archived show.

HealthCamp Toronto

carlos · Sep 8, 2009 · 08:22

Join us at HealthCamp Toronto on Sept. 16, 2009!

HealthCamp Toronto will use the “unconference” format to create a safe place for contrarians, free thinkers, change agents and idea entrepreneurs. It is the first healthcamp in Canada, modeled after the globally renowned healthcamp movement begun in San Francisco, Boston, and Philadelphia.

Challenge: Reducing Motor Vehicle Deaths

neil · Jan 5, 2009 · 17:46

By Neil Seeman

Do you have an idea for making our roads safer?

Imagine if we could end motor vehicle fatalities like the one that killed Niloufar Khanverdizadeh and Atena Arabsalmany on Halloween night. Young, beautiful minds, just 21 – crushed by blunt force trauma after their car lurched into the oncoming traffic lane at 10:30 p.m. in Richmond Hill, Ontario.

Power of "Buzz"

JaneLaMdeP · Aug 30, 2009 · 08:55

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

The Health Strategy Innovation Cell founded The Global Accelerator Award. It's an award for creating buzz and chatter on the web. Why is there an award for chatter? Didn’t we get in trouble for this at school? What’s the value of buzz? I wondered. I didn't get it.

Then, a giant lever began to squeak in my loner inclined brain. I could tell there was a great and powerful idea attempting to bust the rust on my gears. A great force was pulling against my pompous singular stasis. I squeezed my eyes shut as if my sinuses might suddenly clear, and puffer fish me up into a new awareness. The pressure changed in my head. Pop. Pop. Stop! I resisted.

Bring your ideas to HealthCamp

carlos · Sep 10, 2009 · 18:06

HealthCamp Toronto In Action

alton · Sep 17, 2009 · 11:39

healthcamp

Click through to see videos and the dynamism of the latest healthcamp -- Healthcamp Toronto -- making this offline and online movement the largest bottom-up, patient-led conference in the world. Healthcamp Toronto was hosted by IBM Canada, in partnership with the Health Strategy Innovation Cell and Longwoods Publishing.

My Rage Against the Machine (and What Healthcare can Learn from Steve Jobs)

neil · Jul 2, 2010 · 07:56

My Rage against the Machine (and what Healthcare can Learn from Steve Jobs)

By Neil Seeman

“If your computer’s noise level is still unbearable after you’ve re-installed a new fan, then it’s a freak of nature.” The gentle-voiced technician, a rare live voice from 24/7 customer service (on a Sunday!), told me “it would then be a one in a million machine” if the fan replacement failed. His name was Julius; he gave me his phone number. If he proved correct, I promised I would call to thank him. He said no one ever thanks him.

I didn’t call Julius back – mine was that one in a million machine.

Redefining Patienthood

carlos · Nov 23, 2009 · 10:43

This is a 1-2 minute survey that explores the 'patient' and 'ePatient' definitions in the current health care system. Our goal is to croud-source the definition for these terms.

This is an anonymous survey and the answers/data visualization will be available to all respondents at the end of the survey. We do not foresee any risks from completing this survey.

Ending Professional Snobbery

neil · May 27, 2009 · 07:02

humility

By Neil Seeman

Imagine if no prestige attached to professions. Nobody cared about old-world credentials…MD, PhD, JD, MBA, MPH, MHsC: the letters would mean nothing, zip, in this alternate world.

It’s not so far off. Welcome to 2015, the year the Facebook generation is married with kids. This is when Mark Zuckerberg, 24-year-old billionaire, Facebook founder and Harvard dropout, turns 30.

What Patients Need, Want, and Expect (Via Twitter)

carlos · Nov 21, 2009 · 02:46

Is the Personal Health Record just for the healthy and wealthy?

neil · Jan 7, 2009 · 10:07

By Neil Seeman

Is the PHR like the "executive physical"? Some have suggested that personal health records (PHRs) - a system whereby patients enjoy custodial rights to their secure health data anytime, anywhere - is a privilege that appeals just to the wealthy, healthy or "worried well."

Groupthink vs. Groupthank

JaneLaMdeP · Sep 18, 2009 · 06:30

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

Biting the hand that feeds you is considered an unwise act, unless you work with the Health Strategy Innovation Cell. I think us “Cellies” like it, at least we like a little nibbling, and so I want to roll over a few thoughts on the topic of Healthcamp Toronto. If I disappear like Deng Xiaoping you’ll know why.

Mind, Money, Momentum

JaneLaMdeP · Aug 5, 2009 · 07:44

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

The year is 1782. Night after night, and years after that, William and Caroline Herschel worked at their telescopes. Many of their discoveries were a surprise to them. Some came from a studied and methodical mapping of the skies, but the revelations themselves were not willed. They came from a lifetime of dedication and the building of expertise. They came from uncertainty and curiosity.

The Heidi Assumption

JaneLaMdeP · Aug 28, 2009 · 10:09

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

The turtles don’t seem to mind that I’m sharing the rock with them here at the top of the French River in Ontario, Canada. Clearly I’m still enough so as not to disturb them, dumbstruck as I am, here in the reptile warming sun.

I guess I know how they feel covered over with a carapace. I’ve recognized in my thinking some assumptions, and what are assumptions if not a desensitizing exoskeleton? I’ve just read Richard B. Wright’s October.

Jane's Voice: Innovation, Bounce and the Messy House

JaneLaMdeP · Jun 29, 2009 · 08:42

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

Ok, what is this faddish word “innovation” all about? Is it something different from “change”? Change can happen by accident. Can innovation happen by accident? Mutations are accidents and some of them have been monumental. Is there negative innovation? I don’t think so.

Jane's Voice: Healthcare and the Salons of France

JaneLaMdeP · Jul 6, 2009 · 06:22

By Jane La Mantia de Pencier

Sitting in my garden watching a squirrel flow over and under fences with no acknowledgement of a barrier, other than the navigational one, I’m thinking of that critter’s open source attitude. He seems to be of the mind that all’s available to him and it’s available for his use and sustenance. Looking at Simon Schama’s Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution, I’m thinking about how the salons of Paris in the late 1700s compare to the birth of the internet and even to the Innovation Cell of which I’m a part.

What is Our Voice?

The Innovation Cell’s Team will talk about your ideas, will issue innovation challenges, and will invite others to talk about the ideas they think can make change happen.