Rising Cost of Medical Care in the United States

Filed under: Global Economy, World Events

CNN is running a very interesting story on hospital billing practices and costs. Health care costs in the United States have skyrocketed in recent years to a point where a single major illness can bankrupt an entire family. In the past, malpractice lawsuits and medical errors have increased the cost of practicing medicine and these costs are passed onto patients. But the question of when is it all too much does arise at some point. There is a point where people can no longer afford to see a doctor over a simple illness that could be cured with a small dose of antibiotics. Instead, it develops into a more severe illness which requires a lengthier hospital visit.

The CNN article outlines some of the medical billing practices. When a person is in need for medical care, do they stop and ask how much it will cost for CAT scan or how much it costs for an X-ray? Instead, hospitals and medical offices around the US only state that patients will pay a negotiated rate between the provider and the insurance agency. It is only several weeks later when the final bill comes stating that the patient is responsible for several hundred or thousand dollars of charges. The next time you receive an “Explanation of Benefits” statement in the mail, take a close look at it to see what you are being charged for and how much you’re being charged. The costs can be pretty amazing.

Watch the CNN video at the link before for more amazing charges that medical billing advocates have seen.
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/health/2010/03/01/cohen.health.care.bills.cnn?hpt=C2

Happy Lunar New Year

Filed under: World Events

As many people celebrate Valentines Day, today is also a day to celebrate Chinese New Year.  Chinese new Year is one of the most important Chinese holiday which is also known as Spring Festival or Lunar New Year.  The festivities of this holiday typically last for a full week where people travel to see their families whom they may not have seen for the rest of the year.  Friends and family also visit each other and children are given red packets (with money enclosed) by married couples or relatives.

For all that celebrate the Lunar New Year.  Have a Happy and Prosperous Year of the Tiger!

Sametime 8.5 Planning and Deployment Open Mic

Filed under: IBM Software, Sametime

For anyone who did not see the Open Mic posting on the Sametime Support Blog, there is a recording of the open mic which IBM support and development held to address questions on how Sametime 8.5 should be implemented.

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=477&uid=swg21418099

It’s the end of the road for POTS/PSTN

Filed under: Technology

It may not seem like news to anyone now as many of us have already moved from PSTN/POTS services to VOIP and cellular telecommunication providers, but AT&T has stated that it is now time to cut the cord and allow this technological relic to finally rest in piece.  For many consumers, this will not affect anything.  So who does this change affect?  Most people most affected by this change will be those that live in rural areas where there are no broadband ISPs willing to provide service.  People in these types of situations may have to rely in satellite service which is most of the time cost-prohibitive.  Many security systems also rely on an active telephone service, however the good news is that there are a few companies out there that provide alarm services over a GSM connection and existing systems can be retrofitted at a cost. 

Before AT&T can cut the cord on POTS, it is my opinion that cellular service still has to improve significantly to ensure there is sufficient network capacity and coverage to make sure that in case of an emergency, a person can definitely reach that 911 dispatcher.  As the article states, there are some kinks to work out and hopefully a cost reduce for cell service will be in the plan as well.

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/185649/atandt_tells_fcc_its_time_to_cut_the_cord.html

What you need to know about Sametime 8.5

Filed under: Sametime, Technology

Sametime 8.5 marks a major turning point in the product platform from IBM Lotus Domino to the IBM Websphere and DB2 infrastructure.  As you plan out your environment, there are a couple key points to consider:

• Sametime Classic – Most of the promotional materials and discussions which have occurred over the past two years have shown screenshots of the new Sametime 8.5 meetings experience built on IBM WebSphere technology.  If you are not ready to make the jump, the older version of the Sametime Meeting server is still available.  This version is now referred to as Sametime Classic and contains both the Sametime Community and Meeting server.  The Sametime Classic Meeting server has not undergone any major enhancements, however does contain bug fixes.  Companies running Sametime Classic on AIX, Linux and Solaris will see major improvements in the stability of the Meeting Room client when application sharing.
• What type of directory should you use? – If you want to utilize many of the new features in Sametime 8.5, you will need to use an LDAP directory.  If you’re still using a Domino Directory, you will need to enable LDAP on a server not used for Sametime and connect the Sametime 8.5 infrastructure to it.  Sametime 8.5 is heavily based on WebSphere technology which connects to LDAP, but not native Domino.  The Sametime 8.5 environment will support most LDAP v3 complaint servers, however if anyone out there is running Microsoft Active Directory 2008 Lightweight Directory Services (AD LDS) you’re out of luck with this release. 
• IBM Domino Server version - The Sametime 8.5 Classic and Community server can be installed on Domino 8.0.x and 8.5 only.  There is no support for Domino 8.5.1 at this time but IBM is working on supporting this in the next releases
• What type of Load Balancing device to use? – Historically, the Sametime Mux, IP Sprayer or a round-robin DNS could be use to distribute traffic to a Sametime server.  These options are still available for a Sametime Classic or community only server, however not all of these solutions are valid for the newer components such as meetings, proxy and media manager.  These other components need to use either a load balancer or a WebSphere proxy.  A Sametime MUX can not be used with these new components.  Sametime 8.5 does include the WebSphere Edge components as part of the eAssembly package which is a great easy to setup load balancer once you get the hang of it.  It can be installed on a single machine and serve multiple host addresses.  The WebSphere proxy is a component on the WebSphere Application Server.  In testing the software, there were a few issues that cropped up around WebSphere proxy testing with the Sametime Proxy component so it can not be used in those scenarios yet.  Overall, it is always better to install a dedicated load balancer that performs IP-spraying in lieu of a round-robin DNS or using the WebSphere proxy server.