Happy New Year with OrthoWave in 2008 !

2 Jan 2008

Happy New Year!…

On behalf of the entire OrthoWave Staff, it is my pleasure to wish you a fantastic 2008… and naturally to wish each of you be “OrthoWaved” more and more as well!…

Since this novel V6 has been released, we have continuously worked to make sure that all proposed OrthoWave features would meet the expectations of all surgeons and researchers in Hip and Knee Arthroplasty matters, be they already enthusiastic users or future ones. In the light of the current trends here and there in our surgical specialty, evaluation will be (very, very) soon an absolute goal. Interestingly, OrthoWave can be seen so far as the “ultimate tool for evaluation in Arthroplasty”, and be sure we will do our best for staying at the cutting edge of this exciting challenge to better state on our own results in order to offer a better care to our patients.

Obviously, one major prerequisite for any shared database, especially on-line, regards privacy. In that matter, at each level of privacy, OrthoWave features a consistent answer:

– With respect to the “local” database, various passwords can be attributed by the Administrator, either “full rights”, or “read only”, or “read only anonymously”. In the latter case, any user of the database will be only able to inspect the forms without any private items displayed, being said in addition that each surgeon can only see his patients’ forms.

– At the level of scientific groups, surgeons who participate in multicenter studies would be happy to share, under anonymous mode, only the forms that concern the given study, while other potential implants belonging to the same patients have not to be displayed to Colleagues or Research Assistants. Our “ENS” OW databases afford an elegant solution, since only the selected forms (under anonymous mode) regarding the studied implant are virtually duplicated to a specific “scientific database” , reachable by authorized persons only. This formula is ideal for all kinds of scientific studies and publications.

– A third challenge arose concerning the hosting management. Our hosting company is an agreed one, located in France, with all requested saving procedures for data and guarantied privacy. However, we have often been told that Health Departments in lots of countries remained extremely reluctant for private health data to “cross frontiers”… We took these concerns into account, and this “absolute” privacy will be secured with OrthoWave as follows: So far, all data are encrypted under 3DES procedures while leaving the computer of any User, and decrypted at their arrival to the Server, and vice versa. In addition, in a close future, no private item will be stored into the database of the on-line server. In fact these specific private items (and namely name and address) will be encrypted on any distal computer unit, and will remain encrypted on the hosting server. The code to decrypt these private items will belong to the User unit to allow him, and only him, for the entire data to be displayed according to the allowed passwords. This “absolute” privacy will be audited by an independent specialized company which will provide all related official certificates.

These privacy matters obviously are of critical interest for the global ability for OrthoWave to fulfill basic requirements regarding modern on-line health databases… Moreover, some other exciting OrthoWave developments are currently in the pipe: in addition to (1) the Italian and Japanese versions, while waiting for other foreign languages, (2) future other modules as spine and shoulder in particular, and (3) links to National Joint Registries, two additional developments will come soon. Firstly a system of optical barcode reader wireless linked to the OW program, which will be able to scan (in the OR or anywhere else) the barcodes of any hip or knee component, thus allowing for a consistent traceability of prostheses through a global directory of implants. Secondly the development of a “light” version of OrthoWave, named OWL (L for light…) useable from any PDA through a simple connection to a specified website, including access to forms, statistics and x-rays. More to see… We will be soon able to “say hello to OrthoWave … on your iPhone”!!!…

The recent French SoFCOT congress last November in Paris and various meetings in the meantime provided us the opportunity to demonstrate the amazing abilities of OrthoWave. As a matter of fact, it is always a pleasure to share our views and thoughts about this awesome evaluation tool. In such a way, the European Hip Society meeting (EHS) next June in Madrid (Spain) will provide a fruitful opportunity to meet you directly, since we will participate in the Exhibition with our first OrthoWave booth. We thus will be extremely happy to demonstrate all most recent developments and improvements… “New Update. More features. Same OrthoWave!…”

Kindest regards from the Staff, and again … Be OrthoWaved !