The Northern California chapter of HIMSS (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society) has rushed to throw together an event (re: PR-blaster) about the "challenges" of deploying an EMR. The participants are a representative of Kaiser (Kate Christensen, who used to appear as a spokesmodel on Kaiser TV commercials before the Thrive campaign), Matthew Holt (consultant with a prominent health care blog, favorably disposed toward both Kaiser and the EMR), and the chair of the HIMSS Personal Health Record (i.e., EMR) committee. What a disgusting, one-sided, utterly staged, PR-mongering, FAUX EVENT! (And I can't believe Matthew is supporting this - this is basically letting Kaiser collar him as their preferred tame blogger.)
Update: Apart from the issue of whether this HIMSS event is a PR bonus for Kaiser or not, glancing through Matthew's blog reminded me of how decent he was to give me the benefit of the doubt during the whole Systems Diagrams Affair. I'm grateful for that, and I continue to respect Matthew's opinion on many health care issues. Thus, I certainly apologize for impugning his integrity in regard to the HIMSS event. I do remain concerned about the event itself - because even if it was planned long in advance, it seems to be an unfair opportunity for Kaiser to attract press to its version of the EMR story without any dissenters or challengers in the room.
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