Yesterday, the University of Minnesota’s School of Nursing celebrated the opening of a new, state-of-the art education center for nursing and other health professional students.

The Bentson Healthy Communities Innovation Center will provide students with new opportunities to engage in complex simulated health scenarios in interprofessional teams, use sophisticated telehealth technology and learn emerging health records technology.

The center is named to honor the lead gift made by the Bentson Foundation, which contributed $3.7 million to the $7.8 million dollar project. A $1 million gift from the United Health Foundation and other generous donations enabled rapid construction, which began in May 2012.

There’s been no bigger trend in health care over the past decade than the advancement of electronic medical records (EMRs) within clinics, hospitals and health care systems across the United States.

Now, some leading providers of EMR systems have partnered to establish a nonprofit alliance aimed at developing new and better ways to share data between systems that some critics have argued don’t share data in optimal ways.

According to Bloomberg’s Alex Nussbaum, the partnership known as the CommonWell Health Alliance will initially include Cerner Corp., McKesson Corp., Athenahealth Inc., Allscripts Healthcare Solutions, Inc., and Greenway Medical Technologies.  The group believes their partnership will help push innovation while helping the companies develop products that enhance – not detract from – physician coordination and patient care.

The largest EMR vendor in the country, Epic, is not currently included although the partnership said they’re committed to working with all vendors.

Head over to Bloomberg to read more, and click here to visit the CommonWell Health Alliance web page to read about their core aims of the partnership.

Thanks to technology at the University Minnesota’s College of Veterinary Medicine, a three-year-old Twin Cities dog survived a five-story fall and is walking again.

Last week, WCCO-TV covered the story of Gauge, a dog that Betsy Strachota, the owner, calls a “miracle.”

iPads, iPhones, laptop computers and more. No, this isn’t an electronics store; it’s an operating room (OR) at the University of Minnesota.

Today’s OR’s look a little bit different than what you might have seen in the past. The standard OR tools are still in use today, of course, but other technological advances are steadily making their way into practice.

Andrew Grande, M.D., an assistant professor within the Department of Neurosurgery – and an electronics and technology enthusiast – is finding new ways to use everyday gadgets to improve the most complicated and challenging neurosurgeries. In doing so, he’s also providing his patients with the best available treatment options.

Technology has provided a host of ways to get information into the hands of an end user. Specifically, cell phones have opened up new doors for passing along information via text message or specialized alerts.

Now, U of M researchers from the School of Social Work, Masonic Cancer Center and Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Women’s Health will receive $675,000 over three years from the Susan G. Komen Foundation to develop new ways to use cell phones to promote breast cancer screening to Korean women.