It may be time to refocus job goals May 10, 2009

By Kristen Green, Globe Correspondent | May 10, 2009

At a time when it seems no one is safe from layoffs, can you find job security?

Perhaps lifetime employment is nonexistent in some traditional fields, but job placement experts say other careers hold more promise. The key, they say, is to identify growing and emerging industries, such as healthcare, life sciences, technology, alternative energy, and higher education in Massachusetts. Then, they say job seekers have to adapt their skills to fit the needs of those industries.

Marilyn Santiesteban, a career coach at Waltham recruiting and career coaching firm King & Bishop, suggests job seekers ask themselves: What exactly is it I do? Who needs that done? What are the skills I have called upon in another field?

“You want to move to industries that are in a growth mode, or at least flat, not shrinking,” said Santiesteban, who advises her clients to stop thinking about their job titles and focus on skills.

By not focusing on job title, Andrew Appler, 24, was able to transfer his skills to a completely different industry. Appler had worked as a financial analyst for a mutual fund company since he graduated from college in 2006. But with financial services hard hit by the recession and shedding thousands of jobs, he figured his chances of landing a new job with a financial company as he relocated to Somerville from Maryland weren’t good. So, he expanded his job search to other types of businesses, including a beer producer, insurance companies, and biotech firms.

After looking for three months, he landed a job doing business analysis at Boston Medical Center. The work is similar to what he was doing in financial services, but it still requires him to adjust a bit. He’s working on patient financial services, as opposed to doing revenue and expenses like he did at the financial company. And he’s learning the ins and outs of the healthcare industry.

“It will definitely be a new set of vocabulary,” he said. “I had to train myself to change from the term ‘client’ to ‘patient.’ “

As job seekers explore new industries, they also must adapt their search techniques, job placement specialists say. Kip Hollister, chief executive of Hollister Inc., a Boston staffing agency, said that a few years ago skilled workers could post their resumes on the job search website Monster.com, get 10 calls from employers, and land a job in no time. But not anymore.

“Now they post and nothing happens,” Hollister said. “The times have changed, and we’re in the new real. People need to adapt to the new real.”

Job seekers should keep in mind that jobs in emerging fields such as alternative energy tend to be “undercover,” meaning openings won’t be posted on job websites, Hollister said. So, people need to network: Hollister suggests using Twitter to engage the community in the target field, joining groups on LinkedIn, or networking with organizations like the Massachusetts Innovation & Technology Exchange, a regional professional organization for the Internet business and marketing industry.

In addition to networking, job seekers need to turn the gloom and doom of a layoff into a positive outlook, said Hollister. Rather than panicking, they should look at unemployment as a time of possibility.

“The people who are laid off and now reemployed say, ‘It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I wasn’t happy anyway. I am going to have a life change,’ ” Hollister said.

That’s where Jeff Cabral, 38, of Winchester finds himself after getting laid off from a technology company in September. Though he worked in the financing department as a pricing analyst for technology companies for years, it wasn’t a great career fit because he didn’t think the job took much ingenuity. He prefers to “get new ideas brewing.”

“I never felt really involved. I might have just been doing the day-to-day,” he said. “I never really felt passionate about it.”

He is now looking for work in alternative energy or a green business. He is an advocate for recycling and reduced energy consumption and is excited about the field. He already volunteers with Sustainable Winchester, a nonprofit in his town that educates and raises awareness about sustainability.

“I feel enthused,” Cabral said about volunteering for the nonprofit. “I feel needed and wanted.”

He is looking for a job in client services or as an account representative, either of which would be a good fit with his experience working as a conduit between departments. He has been going to conferences, seminars, and WIND networking events for New England professionals in transition. He’s also scheduled a few informational interviews.

Cabral said when he is networking, he feels good about his prospects, but sometimes being at home, when the phone’s not ringing, he gets down. Still, he believes he will find a job that is a good match.

“I’m sure it’s just meeting up with the right person,” he said.
© Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

New England Journal of Medicine fights flu panic May 9, 2009

May 8th, 2009

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 10:29 am
As the initial fear of H1N1 flu subsides, Internet resources are becoming key to both moderating the panic and maintaining a mounting concern.
The New England Journal of Medicine deserves special mention here. While frequently criticized for hiding articles behind firewalls to protect its business model, this flu has the Journal creating a special page linking every new article it gets on the subject, full-text.
What this means is that doctors and reporters can stay abreast of the latest research in the field as it is approved for use by the Journal’s editors.
As of today the U.S. has more cases, 1,639, of this influenza strain than Mexico, which has 1,364. The death count, however, has reached 45 there and still stands at 1 here.
Studies of past pandemics indicates why concern is still warranted, and why vaccines are already being developed. Flu outbreaks often happen in waves, with the risk of young, healthy people dieing from the disease rising in later waves.
One reason for the disparity might be because the new flu is displaying differently than common influenza. The Journal is now tracking when it started (in the 1990s) and when it began spreading (2005).
Not only has the Journal accepted the need for more services in front of its firewall with this pandemic, but other online monitoring tools are also now widespread. These may be the kindest words about the online world yet produced by the NEJM so savor them:
Though traditional official and media communication channels remain in place, Web-based mapping, search-term surveillance, “microblogging,” and online social networks have emerged as alternative forms of rapid dissemination of information.
The silver lining in this pandemic may be the emergence of a real alliance between old school journal-based medical publishing and the online world.

LINK: http://h1n1.nejm.org/

SOURCE: ZDNET

Kaiser Permanente offers up medical records on a USB drive April 27, 2009

The drive is encrypted and password-protected
Lucas Mearian

Click here to find out more!

April 24, 2009 Kaiser Permanente, a nonprofit health care system, is now offering about 3.3 million of its 8.6 million members a USB flash drive that contains their personal medical information.

The read-only drive, designed for use while a person is traveling or during a health emergency, is a sort of stopgap effort as the U.S. works to build a national electronic health records system that can provide easy access to patient health information anywhere.

The flash drive, which costs members $5, does not contain a patient’s entire health record, but it does hold emergency contacts, past hospitalizations (with the diagnoses and procedures performed), physicians and contact information, medical issues, immunization records, allergies, current medications, lab results for the past year, and readings and images from recent EKGs and chest X-rays.
KP’s USB flash drive that carries patient data for travel and emergencies
Kaiser Permanente’s USB flash drive

“Having a patient’s medical history, EKG and complete list of medications helps doctors provide superior medical care,” said Dr. Robert Pearl, CEO of The Permanente Medical Group. “This flash drive can be carried anywhere around the world, and it allows a person to receive more rapid medical treatment whether they are on vacation or traveling on business.”

The flash drive contains information also found on Kaiser’s My Health Manager Web site, which allows members to manage their health care online, including e-mailing physicians, ordering prescriptions, changing or canceling appointments, and viewing lab test results.

According to Kaiser, more than 3 million of its members now use My Health Manager, mainly for secure e-mailing of doctors and clinicians and lab results. The company said each month its members sends more than 600,000 secure e-mails to doctors and clinicians, and more than 1.6 million lab test results are viewed online.

Kaiser first piloted the USB drive project last summer. Nearly 600 flash drives were handed out to members at its Oakland, Calif., medical center. Kaiser is now expanding that service to all of its members in northern California.

The data on the drive is encrypted and password-protected, and the data on it cannot be modified by the patient or the doctor. Instead, the information must be updated through a free service.

The USB drives are available through Kaiser’s medical secretaries departments. When a member requests a USB drive, the medical data is downloaded to the drive from Kaiser’s Electronic Medical Record while the patient waits. The patient then enters a password as the final step, before the drive is removed from the computer. It’s all done while the patient is visiting a facility.

Kaiser is not the first company to use portable flash memory to store medical records. In 2004, Med-InfoChip LLC unveiled a mini USB thumb drive that could carry medical information for up to two patients in case of emergencies.

The MedicAlert Foundation, a nonprofit health care informatics organization, also offers its E-HealthKEY USB drive, which brings up critical medical data when plugged into a computer. It also allows users to carry a complete personal health record with them.

Report Tracks State Health I.T. Efforts April 23, 2009

HDM Breaking News, April 21, 2009

The National Association of State Chief Information Officers has published “Profiles of Progress 3: State Health IT Initiatives.” It is an updated summary of where each state stands with government led or designated efforts to implement health I.T. and interoperable health information exchanges.

The report, which also covers the role, if any, that state CIOs play in the efforts, was first published in November 2006. The latest version chronicles the “expeditious growth and adoption of health IT in just a few years as government leaders increasingly tout this as a means to improve patient care and reduce costs,” according to the Lexington, Ky.-based association.

The report is available at nascio.org/publications.

SOURCE: http://www.healthdatamanagement.com/news/states-28083-1.html?type=printer_friendly

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