Brilliant Tech Geniuses with Dreams to Change the World

By Barbara Ficarra, RN, BSN, MPA I’m super excited to write this post because it highlights amazing students who are passionate about changing the world for the better.  Students from around the globe with passion, brainpower and love of technology are utilizing their talents to make the world a better place.  They had the opportunity to compete in a world-wide technology competition, Imagine Cup 2012, made possible by Microsoft Corp. and Coca-Cola.  These students represent…

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Patient Engagement: The Pivotal Role of the Caregiver

This is a guest post by patient caregiver, Rob Harris, founder of Robcares.   He writes about how searching the Internet led to patient engagement and how it fostered a cohesive decision making process between health care providers, patient and caregiver.  Rob is a caregiver to his wife, Cindy, who is a two-time cancer survivor. “Patient engagement is more than patient satisfaction. It is patient involvement in every aspect…The patient engagement process consisted of my wife…

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Social Media: Are you engaged or do you ignore it?

By Barbara Ficarra, RN, BSN, MPA Can health care providers afford to ignore social media? Social Media Networking isn’t going to go away… …and trying to ignore won’t work… Social media is a powerful and phenomenal platform to disseminate valuable and trusted health information.  Are you engaged in social media networking or are you ignoring it? Social media allows health care silos the opportunity to engage with each other.  Health care conversations between the silos…

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Gaming for Better Health

By Barbara Ficarra, RN, BSN, MPA An epic win Parts 1 through 4 of the series “How is Gaming Changing the Landscape in Health Care,” clearly defined the importance of gaming in the health care arena. Games for Health Gaming utilizing smartphones and social networking are helping to transform health care. Jane McGonigal, Game Designer in her TED Talk from February 2010 said, “Right now we spend 3 billion hours a week playing online games.”…

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Telehealth, Remote Monitoring and Mobile Health

By Barbara Ficarra, RN, BSN, MPA Bill Crounse, MD, Senior Director, Worldwide Health, Worldwide Public Sector Microsoft Corporation shares his insights and describes four leading trends and technologies that will transform health and health care in 2012 and beyond. These leading technologies include:  cloud computing, health gaming, telehealth services and remote monitoring/mobile health. Telehealth, Remote Monitoring, Mobile Health I’d like to focus on telehealth and remote monitoring/mobile health since I feel telehealth is the nucleus…

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