IfG.CC - The Institute for eGovernment

Most notably they should align with and support major change programs like ‘Shared Services Canada‘.

This imperative to drive hundreds of millions of dollars in cost savings will set out to transform the organization in line with this diagram – Shifting them right from decentralized in to the Shared Services sweet spot.

The problem of equitable access to high-speed Internet in Canada entered the election campaign on Wednesday, August 26, when Stephen Harper promised that a re-elected Conservative government would spend an additional $200 million to promote high-speed access in rural and remote communities. Although the promise is short on detail (what counts as high-speed Internet? Will the connection be affordable?), the recognition that digital access is central to the everyday lives of Canadians is welcome. But as I suggested in a previous post, digital access is about more than speed; it is also about a vision for digital inclusion that includes digital citizenship rights. One of the ways in which Canadians exercise these rights is through interaction with government agencies and services, and, according to Harper, this will increasingly be accomplished online.

The 10 British researchers found very little proof of better results for patients’ health or cost-effectiveness for health-care institutions. Such disappointing data appeared in all of the three areas considered: patient records, electronic prescribing and facilitating health care from a distance.

The partnership will offer members of the Canadian Automobile Association South Central Ontario a number of rewards and benefits and help promote cycling in the city.

Bike Share Toronto and the Canadian Automobile Association South Central Ontario (CAA SCO) have formed a multi-year partnership.

The new rules will apply starting in 2013 to individuals from Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Bangladesh, Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Laos, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, South Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Vietnam, Yemen and the Palestinian territory who are seeking to come to Canada as tourists or on study or work permits.

British Columbia ranks first overall for its eGovernment initiatives, specifically the provision of online services and information and online engagement of citizens, a Stratford Institute study released today reveals. In this first-ever national evaluation of provincial governments' online presence commissioned by the Stratford Institute and prepared by Brainmaven Research, Alberta takes second place, and Ontario ranks third overall.

IHealth, an electronic health record system, has been a decade in the making and will go online for the first time this June, building a central bank of patient information that health-care practitioners can eventually access at any Island Health facility.

Gatekeeper Systems Inc., a video and data solutions provider for public transportation and smart cities, has launched Gatekeeper Mobile Wi-Fi System, a new enhanced distant learning initiative that enables 4G and 5G broadband access for students. The Company has also received a purchase order of approximately C$560,000 from a school district to equip their fleet of school buses with the Mobile Wi-Fi System. The purchase order also includes a 12-month services contract that is renewable for up to five years.

The Mobile Wi-Fi System provides 4G or 5G internet connectivity for students and authorized users while the bus is transporting students or while the bus is parked in a neighborhood for the purpose of providing internet access to students who do not have suitable connectivity at home. Data is routed through the school’s content filters and network infrastructure to ensure that students are provided with a safe internet environment and that firewall-protected school content is accessible.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation has learned via whistleblowers that B.C. Emergency Health Services, which runs the B.C. Ambulance Service, has dumped its highly touted, $2.8 million Electronic Patient Care Record system – before it even went into use.

A posting on the BCEHS Intranet, obtained by the CTF, reports: “BCEHS has been working hard to develop an ePCR system our needs for reliability, quality and functionality and can integrate with existing systems in hospital emergency departments. Unfortunately, the vendor was unable to meet our business requirements.”

“It was a lot of work. We not only had to do our regular work of gathering information but, at the same time, use a new, time-consuming, often non-intuitive, mega-multi-step EMR system to get our work done,” he said. “But it lets us provide far better care, because we’re making decisions based on much better information than we used to have.”

So the Telehealth idea seems like a long time coming. Sure that is more involved than simple video conferencing. There is special equipment, scheduling and security to deal with, but the benefits to this system are obvious and plenty.

Falconer, a neurologist for more than 20 years, is the Foundations of Medicine director at UBC's Southern Medical Program. As the leading force behind the school's e-Health Research Office, he says new technology has changed the telehealth game considerably.

More than 200,000 patients in British Columbia have now registered for my ehealth to obtain their laboratory results directly via a secure patient portal: myehealth.ca. This is a major milestone since direct patient access to their personal health care information is a major shift in health care system management and a key component of the electronic health record vision for Canada.

Excelleris is leading this change in British Columbia, leveraging their established, standards compliant Health Care Information Distribution and Access platform to now offer a simple, secure, useful and clinically relevant service to health care consumers.

Telecardiology uses computers to link two digital stethoscopes together via a high-speed data network to conduct a virtual examination in real time from hundreds of kilometres away.

It's one of a growing range of uses for telehealth, a field which extends the reach of medical specialists who practise in heavily populated areas to more remote Island locations.

It recently became the first such program in B.C. to be recognized by Accreditation Canada. To date 5,000 Telehealth consultations have saved an estimated 1.5 million kilometres of travel.

Increasingly specialists use it to track patients' health in remote Island communities. Ease of use is one reason some specialists resist making the jump to on-line consultations.

Take two apps and call me in the morning.

Dr. Kendall Ho, an emergency room physician at Vancouver General Hospital and director of the University of B.C.'s eHealth strategy office, is turning to mobile apps as a way of helping patients help themselves.

More troubling still are the untapped possibilities in small and rural communities where many of these services are often moving, reducing services, or shutting down as they downsize and transition to online services. Indeed, if seniors fail to take advantage of these services on the Internet, they might be neglected by the very services on which they so vitally depend.

Genetic counselling is usually relatively easy, involving just a few brief consultations with a specialist. But Larade, 55, lives in Port Alice. That would mean a minimum 14 hours travelling to and from Victoria, at least a two-day trip.

Instead, Larade was one of the first in Port Alice to have a session with a genetics counsellor at the Vancouver Island Cancer Centre via a video link.

Here's the thing: the data already exists. The province has digital records of every prescription filled by a pharmacist, plus all doctor billings, hospital admissions and treatments since 1995. As well, the results of every blood test have been logged since 2002.

Falconer, a neurologist for more than 20 years, is the Foundations of Medicine director at UBC’s Southern Medical Program (SMP). As the leading force behind the school’s e-Health Research Office, he says new technology has changed the telehealth game considerably.

“Just about every one of our students has an electronic device in their hands all the time,” he says. “We’re now learning how to use those devices to connect with patients and doctors who simply can’t get to large communities for diagnostic care.”