I realize it's been quite a while since I taught - or was in school myself - but I'm distressed…
Morning Headlines 2/20/17
HIMSS17 kicks off as white coat hacker Kevin Mitnick takes the stage to discuss emerging cybersecurity threats and how to detect and defend against them.
Touted IBM supercomputer project at MD Anderson on hold after audit finds spending issues
Auditors find that MD Anderson Cancer Center’s now stalled effort to employ IBM Watson in the fight against cancer was paid for with funds that were secured by hospital executives that intentionally sidestepped purchasing rules.
$5.5 million HIPAA settlement shines light on the importance of audit controls
Memorial Healthcare Systems (FL) pays $5.5 million to settle HIPAA violations after discovering that a former employee continued to use his login credentials to access more than 80,000 patient records without permission.
Forbes World’s Most Admired Companies
Cerner, CVS Health, St. Jude Medical Abbott Laboratories, and Aetna are named to Forbes Most Admired Companies list.
RE: MD Anderson & IBM Watson – Another $60M out the door for another IT project, this time IBM Watson…comes on the heels of a $405M drop in net income attributed to Epic. A publicly available audit report says Watson couldn’t work with Epic. Maybe Epic isn’t as ‘Open’ as Judy claims.
The UT audit says OEA wasn’t updated to integrate with Epic, not that it can’t.
The University of Texas audit is instructive. File this one under Innovation Management 101. The IBM Watson project is highly experimental and should not be governed like a traditional project. Risks should have been clearly articulated upfront. Kudos for an attempt to break new ground. Always expect set backs, that’s what innovation is all about. However, is MD Anderson the only party at risk ($$$$)? The onus is on MD Anderson to broker a win-win deal. Did the others have skin in the game, or did they just sell a bunch of h/w, s/w and services like a traditional project? Someone made quota on this deal, but to what end? Dream big, but plan SMALL.
RE — Watson & Nant: Not a great two weeks for the leading Cancer Moonshot vendors. Last week Slate takes apart Nant Health, this week Forbes finds that IBM is completely ineffective at MD Anderson and being scrapped after a $60M investment, with MD Anderson going back to bid. Sounds like vaporware working at its best.