Senators Michael Bennet (D-CO) www.bennet.senate.gov and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) www.hatch.senate.gov have reintroduced a bill to cut red tape at FDA to help boost innovation in health IT. The legislation called the “Medical Electronic Data Technology Enhancement for Consumers Health” (MEDTECH) Act (S 1101) would exempt low-risk medical software and mobile apps from FDA regulation and provide greater certainty on what software will be regulated by the agency to protect consumers. (more…)
Doing Business in Africa
The President’s Advisory Council on Doing Business in Africa (PAC-DBIA) advises the President of the U.S through the Secretary of Commerce on how to strengthen commercial engagement between the U.S. and Africa. A Recommendation Report www.trade.gov/pac-dbia/docs/PAC-DBIA-Report_Final.pdf dated April 2015 has been published by PAC-DBIA. (more…)
Broadband Council Seeks Comments
The President’s interagency Broadband Opportunity Council (BOC) seeks public comments on how federal agencies can promote broadband deployment, adoption, and competition. The USDA www.rd.usda.gov and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) www.ntia.doc.gov within the Department of Commerce are co-chairing the BOC. The agencies are asking the public for input to help identify regulations and other barriers hampering the deployment of broadband. (more…)
Helping State Medicaid Recipients
More than 250,000 Medicaid recipients with chronic health conditions have access to better care coordination and other services with the expansion of the Alabama Health Home Program http://medicaid.alabama.gov. (more…)
Developing Next Generation mHealth
Partners HealthCare http://connectedhealth.partners.org announced a new partnership with Samsung Electronics www.samsung.com to develop the next generation of personalized digital and mobile solutions for health and wellness. The first phase of the collaboration will include software development and clinical research to deliver tools to improve chronic disease management. (more…)
Growing Role of Retail Clinics
A new report authored by Manatt Health www.manatt.com funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) www.rwjf.org offers unique insight into the growing role of retail clinics within the healthcare system including the opportunities and challenges they face concerning information exchange and EHRs. (more…)
Workshop on Wireless Test Beds
FDA www.fda.gov and FCC www.fcc.gov cohosted a workshop on March 31, 2015 to examine the challenges and benefits of using what are called wireless test beds. A wireless test bed enables medical devices to be evaluated across a range of potential interference scenarios seen in healthcare and home environments. (more…)