John Halamka, MD is the CIO of Caregroup Health System and Harvard Medical School and the Chair of the US Healthcare Information Technology Standards Panel. He gave a Keynote speech today about “Connecting Patients, Payers, and Providers.”

He reviewed the latest efforts to create regional and national health data exchanges using interoperable standards and generally tried to “give [us] and idea of what this will look like in the Obama Administration.”

He also discussed the new Personal Health Records products from Google and Microsoft, and how they will one day interact with eCW. (With eCW’s portal, it’s closer then you think.)

I bounced around the rooms the rest of the afternoon spending some time learning about a new Voice Reminder option from a company called Veeda Software. I attended an overview of Version 8.0 and the Patient Portal 3.0 by Girish, mostly for the nostalgia of watching Girish in the demo role again. He is unflappable with the laptop open in front of him and can fly through the features. EWith the new version out, it’s definitely time for me to reconsider actively using the portal in my practice! Lastly, Laura led a breakout group regarding “Clinito,” the nickname for the new Smart Phone Browser product. Watching it on iPhone screenshots was a little like watching a Steve Jobs Keynote speech at MacWorld.

The evening ended with a nice dinner under the tents outside, adjacent to the golf courses.