Back in 2010, I had a vision to build an information system that would advance the pace of delivering quality healthcare and challenge the perception that public institutions are slow moving.

The challenges posed by Europe’s ageing population are pushing policymakers to act quickly before the health systems become unsustainable. This drive for improved efficiency and cost effectiveness in healthcare systems is increasingly encouraging stakeholders to embrace technology-based health solutions.

This event has taken place. You can read our post-event summary here. Microsoft is hosting its 3rd annual eHealth event that examines how ICT can enable advanced patient-centric healthcare in Europe.

There has been a lot of buzz going around since Google announced it is retiring Google Health. They had built a service based on the idea that “with more and better information, people can make smarter choices.” This is why we have worked with Google to enable people using the Google Health service, scheduled to be discontinued on 1 January 2012, to easily transfer their personal health...

In this case study, you can read about how Partners HealthCare has enabled increased accessibility of healthcare by making health data and communication between patients and providers possible virtually through cloud computing. Partners HealthCare is a large, integrated healthcare system in the Boston region, in the U.S., which provides patient care and employs about 50,000 people, including 6,000...

“Every human being is author of his own health or disease,” the Buddha said. Some 2,500 years later, technology is allowing patients to truly take control of their own well-being in what may be the biggest medical revolution in decades: the computerisation of personal health records (PHRs).

This week I had the pleasure of participating in the eHealth Conference as part of the CIEN (Crossroads for the Electronics and Digital Industry) in Paris. The event was very stimulating, having identified some key challenges in the adoption of eHealth in France as well as the rest of Europe. It brought together representatives from industry, academia, and government.

How do you offer ICT services to mobile health workers?

Meander needed to convert its timesheet and leave request system from paper to digital. By using a cloud-based set of messaging and collaboration solutions, rather than running its own servers, it achieved cost savings of over 60%.

It feels like the past two days in Budapest, Hungary, have gone by in the blink of an eye; in this case a somewhat droopy, red and tired pair of eyes. Let me start with a gigantic thank you to the many customers, partners, clinicians, EU officials, press and others who engaged with me and my Microsoft colleagues during the World of Health IT (WoHIT).

“European healthcare establishments will be faced with substantial challenges over the next decade, such as significant demographic changes and reduced human resources, forcing European leaders to re-design the European Healthcare landscape.” So reads the introduction to eHealth Week 2011, a co-location of the European Commission's High Level Ministerial Conference and the World of Health IT...

Health records are becoming increasingly used by citizens and health professionals to aggregate data that comes from many different sources. At the EuroRec Institute, we promote the use of high-quality health record systems by focusing on the users—their needs and how they interact with health information.

Healthcare is one of the top priorities for Europe surpassing such segments as education, household. But it is also one of the most complex areas of development due to the variety of interests involved. To share best practices in implementation of eHealth projects as well as to address issues preventing their success, Microsoft in cooperation with Center of eGovernment Development South...

In this case study, you can read about how the shift to cloud computing has enabled up to 60% cost savings in Italy’s largest paediatric research and treatment centre, freeing up more resources to be invested in research. Founded in 1869 within the walls of Vatican City, Bambino Gesù Hospital is one of Italy’s largest pediatric research and treatment centers. It has 880 beds and...

Can cloud computing put patients in control of their own health information? How can innovations in cloud technology help improve general standards of care across Europe? What are the benefits for healthcare organisations that have adopted the cloud as part of their operational structure? What are the benefits for the users?

Did your organization ever face the same problems? Stretched deadlines, missing the right IT infrastructure for launching a highly visible collaboration project, sharing documents with many internal and external stakeholders across various regions.

The Belgian Federal Public Service of Health, Food Chain Safety and Environment used a cloud-based storage and collaboration environment to ensure that its own staff as well as external users could jointly manage the European Presidency.

The European Commission-funded 'eHealth Strategies study' has published an overview report that traces European countries’ progress along the goals set out in the eHealth Action Plan.

Microsoft Poland has launched a charitable initiative in collaboration with the Iskierka Foundation intended to equip all 17 children’s oncology wards in Poland with an Xbox 360 console, a Kinect sensor, an LCD television set and games. The technology can provide children with an attractive form of motion rehabilitation, assist them in overcoming the stress accompanying their illness and fill long...

Microsoft and athenahealth, a leading provider of web-based practice management, electronic health record (EHR), and patient communication services to medical groups, have aligned to launch an electronic health solution that will improve the connectivity and communication between hospitals, physicians and patients.

This week we had the pleasure of announcing strategic industry alliances in the United States with Dell and Royal Philips Electronics (Philips). Dell and Microsoft will collaborate to deliver a business intelligence solution to meet the needs of community hospitals. Philips and Microsoft will collaborate to streamline the workflow of radiologists as they seek to build and understand the complete...

I had the pleasure of opening the first European Summit of Microsoft’s Health Users Group this week in Brussels. The focus of the summit was on using cloud computing to create a “win-win” in the provisioning of wellbeing, that is, reducing costs while increasing the satisfaction of patients and health care providers.

Nearly 40% of all patients cured of cancer receive radiotherapy. Yet the methods used to target the radiations to the tumours are extremely time-consuming. New computer vision technologies could help save 4 million man hours globally.

Momentum is building around cloud scenarios applied to health and wellbeing. To offer clearer understanding of the possibilities offered by the cloud and to gain insight into the experiences of early adopters, we are hosting the Health Users Group European Summit in Brussels. It will take place on Monday and Tuesday, 29 and 30 November, and will bring together over 60 health customers and partners from 19...

I am proud to announce the launch in Germany of Assignio, a health platform powered by Microsoft HealthVault. The platform, which will be operated and marketed by Siemens IT Solutions, marks a change in the way individuals can approach their health and wellness and will steer the German health sector in a new direction.

Ten years after the presentation of the European Lisbon Strategy for growth and employment, which had resolved to make Europe the most competitive and knowledge-driven economy by 2010, a final judgement on success or failure of the overall strategy is difficult.

As we, the many stakeholders at regional and local level, work with the European Commission to help realise their health strategy Together for Health – a Strategy for the Europe 2020, I want to focus this post on some key challenges and opportunities arising from the availability and access to structural funds used in eHealth.

This Microsoft-hosted workshop will examine how the use of new technologies, especially cloud computing can ease the path toward e-Health. The workshop will gather together important leaders in the European Medical Community as well as Health organizations involved in innovative telemedicine projects. It is being held on November 11/12 in the Microsoft Executive Briefing Centre in Brussels.

This Microsoft-hosted workshop will examine how the use of new technologies, especially Cloud Computing can ease the path toward e-Health. The workshop will gather together important leaders in the European Medical Community as well as Health organizations involved in innovative telemedicine projects. It is being held on November 11/12 in the Microsoft Executive Briefing Centre in Brussels.

This Microsoft-hosted workshop will examine how the use of new technologies, especially Cloud Computing can ease the path toward e-Health. The workshop will gather together important leaders in the European Medical Community as well as Health organizations involved in innovative telemedicine projects. It is being held on November 11/12 in the Microsoft Executive Briefing Centre in Brussels.

A special ‘European file’ edition focusing on Telemedicine was recently published under the leadership of Gerard Comyn, Vice-President CATEL, and former Head of Unit ‘ICT for Health’, DG INFSO, European Commission.

June 2010 saw the EU Council agree on a Draft Directive on cross-border care. While this is not the final step for full adoption the positive vote of the EU Council is opening a new perspective on cross-border care and on the use of eHealth as a tool to facilitate the mobility of EU citizens.   

We attended the eHealth Strategies of European Countries Validation Workshop held on the 16 September 2010 in Brussels, hosted by the Belgium Presidency and organized jointly by the EC and Empirica.

Recently I was invited to speak about new business models of eHealth at a conference in Denmark. It was surprising that this eHealth conference, The New Age of Health IT, was in fact organized by the International Bar Association!

HealthVault – the Microsoft Personal Health Record platform – is now in Europe! While, in several posts on EMEA Health blog, I was discussing the potential benefits of such a platform in Europe, a first launch happened this June in the UK.

Today, we try to control just about every aspect of our lives. Technology, software, mobile devices and a culture of individual empowerment means we have greater choice over how, when and where we work and live.

Watch my colleague Niels Soelberg, Vice President Public Sector Sales, Microsoft speak about the need for sound collaboration between industry and government in the interest of better healthcare provision.

Personalised healthcare stands at the confluence of the most powerful technologies in the history of the life sciences.  

Thanks to technology and a robust broadband network in Belgium, we recently hosted our second ‘Transatlantic debate’ with ICT and health experts in the United States.

Europe and the US may have very different ways of funding health, but they have much in common, too. A new program is exploring what we might learn from each other.

There is one game-changer that can turn the promise of personalised healthcare into a reality. It is healthcare IT, says Alan Davies from GE Healthcare.

In this case study, you can read about how cloud computing helps Dutch orthopaedic centre help 30% more patients and scale up without worrying about continuously expanding or managing escalating IT expenses. Annatommie is an orthopaedic diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation centre in the Netherlands. With ambitious plans to open 14 offices, annatommie needed to automate manual processes to lower...

Patient empowerment is key to healthcare in the future. Patients themselves are demanding it, as they want more control of their health and wellbeing than might have been the case before.

Here is our short interview of Bruce Greenstein, World Wide Managing Director for Health at Microsoft– when he passed through Brussels after a full week at Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HiMSS) Atlanta and on his way to the World of Health and IT (WoHIT) and the eHealth high level Event in Barcelona. 

  In this case study, you can read about how cloud computing has enabled a Dutch hospital to switch to a cost-effective email solution to comply with changes in regulation in a quick and seamless manner. Ziekenhuis Amstelland (ZHA) is a hospital in Amstelveen with 1,200 employees. Due to changes in Dutch regulation requiring hospitals to implement a safety information system, the hospital...

Innovation is now the catch phrase for the European Commission but an important one to try and resolve issues facing the EU and the world. From climate change to healthcare society faces many ‘grand challenges’ that will demand the brightest minds in both government, academia and the private sector.

The eHealth landscape offers both opportunities and barriers to policy makers in the EU 27 member states which are not just about technical issues of interoperability and data security and confidentiality.

Last week I published a video interview I conducted with Craig Mundie, Microsoft’s Chief Research and Strategy Officer, where he explains his vision of cloud computing.

Microsoft, in partnership with European Voice and its sister publications in Washington DC, Roll Call and Congressional Quarterly, is hosting a high-level transatlantic dialogue on how technology can enable innovation and transformation in the field of health.

Views and commentaries from Europe’s ICT & eHealth thought leaders. Filmed during the Friends of Europe Summit in Brussels - December 2009.

I wanted to share with you the fact that we joined the COCIR.  We are delighted to be joining such a distinguished, well respected and professional organization.

Interoperability and building trust in the privacy and security of eHealth systems is the route to patient-centric healthcare

What developing countries need is a stable, sustainable, robust and low-cost means of delivering services and information.

Take an ancient town, a new university, Microsoft Research and a fresh approach to computational systems biology. Mix well. Then apply…

Peer Bork, who heads a team of bioinformatic researchers at the Heidelberg, Germany- based European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), has been recognised for his outstanding contributions to the field by winning the fourth annual Royal Society and Académie des Sciences Microsoft Award

Inspired by biology, Klaus-Peter Zauner is working on a radically new kind of computer.

eHealth is key to better patient care but health systems should work together i.e. be interoperable if widespread eHealth is to become a reality. Here are the basics, as described by a series of experts. Filmed at an event hosted by Microsoft Europe - interoperability and eHealth - in September 2009.

  Although most people will agree that eHealth is important, it remains a complex landscape which few grasp clearly. 

Dr Octavian Purcarea’s recent presentation on Innovation and Sustainable eHealth - at the Global Forum on Innovation in Bucharest - is available to view on YouTube. Octavian is Global Solution Manager of the Worldwide Health Team at Microsoft, which in layman's terms means that he is an eHealth expert!

What will be the future of healthcare? 

Microsoft Europe’s eHealth expert per excellence, Dr Octavian Purcarea (his real job title is Global Solution Manager, Worldwide Health Team) has written a post on the Microsoft EMEA Health Blog about the Ambient Assisted Living Forum which he recently attended in Vienna

eHealth is key to better patient care. Here are the basics, as described by a series of experts. Filmed at an event hosted by Microsoft Europe - Interoperability and eHealth - in September 2009.

In a recent Microsoft eHealth and Interoperability event, we asked various experts and thought leaders on the definition of eHealth.

Global Forum 2009 is now happening in Romania and Microsoft is glad to be part of the program. Four of Microsoft's officials will be speaking in this two day event. 

Interoperability and eHealth might at first glance appear as very different concepts – but the actual relationship between the two is extremely important. 

Healthcare is one of the biggest challenges facing our societies, economies and governments over the coming decades. At a personal level almost everyone has an experience, not only about healthcare, about healthcare innovation. At the organizational level, the private sector has a key opportunity to contribute to transform and innovate in the healthcare field.

Computing and communication technologies have already had a massive impact on today's healthcare system. Even so, there is great potential for these technologies to not only improve, but profoundly change healthcare in several ways.