OStatic

Living with diabetes is difficult, but people can typically lead completely normal lives by managing their illness with medication and healthy lifestyle choices. Some diabetics suffer from chronic and severe low blood sugar, also known as brittle diabetes, that can be a little tougher to manage since blood glucose levels need to be carefully monitored literally around the clock.

Peter Semmelhack, founder and CEO of Bug Labs and self-proclaimed inveterate tinkerer is developing an open source device to alert diabetics when their blood sugar falls dangerously low, particularly while sleeping. Though still in its early stages, Semmelhack has already run a couple of preliminary experiments that indicate his personal project shows a lot of promise for helping diabetics manage their blood sugar and insulin levels.

Have you ever heard of EpiSurveyor? It's an open source tool designed to allow anyone in the world to create handheld data entry forms, use them to collect data on mobile devices, and transfer the data to other devices for analysis. Developed by Dr. Joel Selanikio (shown), it's widely used in public health efforts all around the world, for disease surveillance and collecting public health data. Today, the Lemelson-MIT Program has announced?that Selanikio is the recipient of its 2009 $100,000 Award for Sustainability for his contributions to public health. Here is what's significant about EpiSurveyor, and how there is room for open source apps like it.

Though the use of open source software in federal health care programs is being considered far more seriously than it has been in the past, ZDNet's Dana Blankenhorn reminds us that landing a government contract requires more than the sympathetic ears of legislators and administrators.

So far, Blankenhorn explains, Obama has committed to creating interoperability between health records kept by the military and Veterans Administration, but not to a completely open (in terms of code, or standards) health information technology platform. The Obama Administration seems willing to investigate open source solutions, but government contracting procedures could be a major roadblock to adopting an open platform. The open alternatives could be out-lawyered, out-lobbied, and minimized by an army of salesmen.

Public health workers are increasingly looking at open source solutions to aid in gathering data, analyzing trends, and publicizing and launching new health care initiatives worldwide.

IntraHealth's OPEN Initiative is taking a colorful approach to improving health services in developing nations -- by bringing together health workers and (not at all health care specific) open source projects to train and support doctors and nurses using open source software in these areas. Because funding is always an issue (in public health and open source, alas) IntraHealth has gotten some help from some legends in the music industry, who have put together a charity album to raise awareness for the Initiative's efforts, as well as offset program costs.

InformationWeek details the conception of House Resolution 6898. The bill's name is more cryptic than the shorthand on a prescription order, but could bolster both the US Health Care system, and perceptions of open source in both public and private sectors.

The Health-e Information Technology Act of 2008 offers incentives for health care providers to move to an open, shared platform for health records.