From Apache to Health and Human Services

Apache co-founder Brian Behlendorf discusses the CONNECT health data project.

Brian Behlendorf, one of the founders of the Apache web server project and the CollabNet cooperative software development company, is contracting now with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on the CONNECT software project. CONNECT helps hospitals and agencies exchange medical data, which gives doctors critical information to improve patient care.

Behlendorf, along with project leader David Riley, will speak
at OSCON about the importance of CONNECT and the way they and their colleagues built a robust community of government staff, volunteers, and healthcare IT vendors around it.

Health IT at OSCON 2010Behlendorf discusses the following in this 18-minute podcast:

  • The role of health data in promoting quality care, in improving our knowledge of what works, and in reducing healthcare costs.
  • How HHS is trying to improve the exchange of patient data for hospitals and doctors, agencies monitoring quality of care, and eventually patients themselves.
  • How, with Behlendorf’s help, HHS opened up the CONNECT project, attracted both volunteers and vendors to improve it, and created a community with a sense of ownership.
tags: ,