According to this Red Herring article, IBM has kicked-off a health IT "gold rush" by announcing four major deals with hospitals it already had prior agreements with. The $19B in the stimulus bill is the obvious cause for this so-called "gold rush" in health IT but read on for more on RH's take on what's next for the "ultra-individualistic and IT tech-resistant health care industry."

A recent survey conducted by KLAS, found that 30 to 40 percent of 122 healthcare organizations surveyed indicated they expect to purchase real-time location system (RTLS) technology within the next one to two years. RTLS systems employ RFID tags based on Wi-Fi, ultra-wideband, ZigBee or others to keep track of medical devices or patients.

UK mHealth: A pilot of mobile devices in the East Midlands allowed community nurses to update EHRs remotely ended up saving each nurse 38 minutes a day. The nurses updated 95 percent of patient records in 48 hours, down from the six weeks it used to take before switching to mobile.

Life as a Healthcare CIO: John Halamka discovered that the iPod Touch has an app that makes for a fine replacement to his alarm clock. My guess is soon he'll wake up to the growing importance and utility of mHealth applications, too?