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The Internet of Things is set to explode. Forecasters expect more than 6 billion objects connected to the Internet this year and some expect 50 billion by 2020. But with connectivity comes risk. For healthcare providers trying to leverage what is emerging as the IoT for healthcare – that growing universe of wearable sensors, networked devices and home monitoring systems deployed to collect medical data and even treat patients – ineffective cybersecurity can have potentially dangerous consequences. See all of our HIMSS16 previews “The Internet of Things is different from the Internet of Things for healthcare in terms of risk,” said Eric Miller, senior director of IT at Ascension Information Services. Miller pointed to a recent initiative in which white hat hackers working with the Mayo Clinic were easily able to hack into numerous connected medical devices, including an infusion pump that delivers drugs and fluids into patients. One of the hired hackers, in fact, was able to connect an infusion pump to his computer network and manipulate the dosage remotely. Miller and Paul Unbehagan, chief architect of Avaya, will discuss technologies that enable the security of connected devices and how providers can recognize and mitigate these cyber security risks during a HIMSS16 session on March 1, 2016. [Poll: What topics will define HIMSS16?] “Our goal is to show how to reduce the risk from connected medical devices in a manageable way,” Miller added. “There’s a process side to it and a technology side, and we will discuss both,” Miller said. The session will cover how providers can get a handle on the number and types of Internet of Things for healthcare devices connected to their network; how to apply risk models to device classifications in order to clarify the threat level; how to implement automation to manage the security of the growing number of connected devices; how to evaluate inventory management options against existing technologies; and how to create an implementation plan. “We want attendees to leave this session with an understanding of how to improve their risk posture for the existing Internet of Things for healthcare as well as the connected devices to come,” he said. “The Internet of Healthcare Things” will be held Tuesday, March 1, from 1 - 2 p.m. PST in the Sands Expo Convention Center Human Nature Theater. Twitter: @HealthITNews This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

The second version of the device for inpatient settings features a camera, updated operating system, new carrying options and more.

HIMSS16 is shaping up to be the largest gathering of healthcare IT professionals ever assembled. It will build on a tradition that began in 1993 with just 4,000 attendees and continues to grow steadily. Last year’s conference drew more than 43,000 professionals to Chicago.  And even more are expected to attend this year’s conference in Las Vegas. As veteran conference-goers know, once the conference begins, sanity becomes a precious commodity. Schedules are difficult to maintain. Navigation between point A and point B suddenly becomes a challenge. The effort must be worth it. Veteran attendees continue to make it an annual pilgrimage. See all of our HIMSS16 previews So in the interest of keeping you sane while you pack as much networking and education into your allotted time, here are some tips to help you get the most from your time in Las Vegas. Tip One: The shuttle is free Las Vegas has plenty of taxi cabs but you don’t need to spend your expense account on car fare. HIMSS provides a free shuttle service from most hotels during regular conference hours. You’ll find the schedule here. There is even free transportation to the airport. Tip Two: Know the territory There will be more than 1,300 vendors exhibiting in the Sands Expo, spread out over 3 levels. The exhibit space will occupy over 1.3 million square feet of space. That’s equivalent to 22 NFL size football fields. Spend some time reviewing the Exhibit Hall map before you step off the shuttle bus and find yourself blinded by the sea of bright lights. Level One, which is also marked as Hall G of the Exhibit Hall, is the exhibit area you will encounter when you arrive at the main transportation outlet, which is where buses will stop. This exhibit hall contains the higher-numbered exhibits, Booths 9600 - 13999. Here you’ll find hundreds of exhibits and many specialty exhibit areas such as the Connected Health Experience, Cybersecurity Command Center, Federal Health Pavilion, HIMSS Interoperability Showcase, Intelligent Health Pavilion, Clinical & Business Intelligence, Population Health, Disaster Preparedness, Revenue Cycle and University Row.  [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] Level Two, up the escalators, is where you’ll find booths 100 – 8599 including many of the large Anchor Exhibitors, First Time Exhibitors and many HIMSS exhibits including:  HIMSS Analytics, HIMSS Bookstore, HIMSS Media, HIMSS Spot and the new HIMSS16 Living Room, a meeting space where you can relax and meet other members. Level Three is home to HX360 and exhibit space marked from 30001 – 38006. This level contains all HX360 programs and activities, including the Innovation Leaders Program, the Executive Program and the Innovation Pavilion, Start-up Showcase and the Venture+ Forum. If you’re lucky enough to have a ticket to the Executive Program, this is where you’ll find Former Utah Gov. Mitt Romney, who is scheduled to speak on Wednesday, March 2. Tip Three: Plan your education carefully The education begins first thing Monday, February 29 at 8 a.m. sharp. The Pre-Conference Symposia run throughout the day, organized around specific educational topics, but they all conclude by 5:30 p.m., in time for the opening keynote presentation, a joint session with Michael Dell, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Dell Inc. and Sylvia Mathews Burwell, Secretary of Health & Human Services. The exhibit hall is not open Monday, so you will be able to focus on educational sessions. But when the exhibit hall is open Tuesday through Thursday, the choices will be more difficult. Over 300 educational sessions take place in ballrooms located adjacent to the Exhibit Hall area; they are all listed here. In addition, there are over 80 educational sessions presented on the exhibit hall floor as part of the Knowledge Centers; you’ll find a guide here Tip Four: Expand your social circle The last “S” in HIMSS stands for “society” so don’t be anti-social. This is a prime opportunity to form new professional relationships. Everyone taking the shuttle bus or waiting for a session to start shares a common interest with you, so seize the opportunity to make a new friend. Gatherings take place every evening and they start on Monday. After the keynote ends Monday at 7 p.m., follow the very big crowd as everyone makes their way to the first party of HIMSS16: an Exhibit Hall opening reception from 7 to 8 p.m., open to all registered attendees. Wine and cheese will be served. For the official directory of networking opportunities, visit the HIMSS16 Conference website networking section. Tip Five: The HIMSS16 Mobile app knows where you’re going Advance preparation will get you only so far. Once you’re at the conference, you’ll still want help finding your way around. The HIMSS16 Mobile App provides the location of all exhibitors and educational sessions. Looking for food services? They’re listed. Need to find the luggage check? Ditto. Shuttle bus schedule, shipping services, re-charging stations, they’re all listed and easy to find. And the app also has a new way to network: an activity feed where attendees share updates and photos, and see what other people are up to. You’ll find the app in the iTunes store or Google Play by searching for HIMSS. Here are a few maps of the floorplan. Twitter: @GusVenditto This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Carla Smith, Executive Vice President at HIMSS, highlights the major themes at the upcoming HIMSS Annual Conference and Exhibition in Las Vegas, including the the value of health IT and cybersecurity. Watch more video coverage of HIMSS16

Hackensack University Medical Center is tapping new technologies to achieve more effective medication adherence, according to Hackensack UMC’s director of pharmacy Nilesh Desai. Hackensack UMC has been an early adopter of technologies and processes to advance medication safety and nurse workflows, Desai explained, along with interoperability between automated dispensing cabinets and EHRs. [Also: 11 essential quotes from notable HIMSS keynotes] Nurses are responsible for interacting with the automated medication dispensing cabinets, and the time they spend at the cabinets can be reduced significantly via more interoperable systems, for instance. Desai will discuss the hospital's progress in this realm during a HIMSS16 session titled “Impact of an ADC System on Medication Administration.” See all of our HIMSS16 previews Medical administration systems must be able to address patient-specific medications and offer robust inventory and data management processes, Desai said. Hackensack UMC tapped Omnicell, a provider of medication and supply management solutions and analytics software for healthcare facilities, to deliver automated medication management solutions throughout the 775-bed hospital. Twitter: @HealthITNews This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

Nuance will unveil its Dragon Medical One Platform at HIMSS16, an evolution of its speech recognition and documentation tool that aims to redefine the relationship clinical users have with healthcare technology, the company says. According to Jonathon Dreyer, Nuance's director of cloud and mobile solutions marketing, increasing demands on physicians – not least the number of places they need to be and IT systems with which they're supposed to interact – has changed the equation, putting a premium on flexibility and mobility. Nuance touts its new cloud-based Dragon Medical One platform as a tool to offer physicians a unified speech recognition functionality – irrespective of care settings, workflows, devices or applications. The new version brings analytics functionality that keep tabs on the time spent documenting, helping health organizations track efficiency and productivity. Additionally, workflow enhancements such as Dragon Medical Advisor offer notes to help improve ICD-10 specificity, case mix index and more.  A pair of new features, PowerPack and PowerMic Mobile, enable users to tap into evidence-based content using a smartphone as a secure microphone to dictate, edit and navigate the EHR on any workstation. Whether they are dictating into EHRs or mobile messaging apps, the Dragon Medical One desktop app offers secure speech recognition wherever physicians need to document. With a unique Nuance Healthcare ID, doctors gain access to an ecosystem of personalized tools. [Like Healthcare IT News on Facebook] "We are always interested in technology that improves productivity, and cloud-based speech supports the ways physicians work and eases the effort of entering clinical documentation into patient records," said Don Fosen, director of IT at Naperville, Illinois-based Edward-Elmhurst Hospital, in a prepared statement, noting that the tools "have let us scale voice recognition in a way that we simply couldn't have done in any other way." Nuance’s Dreyer added that the vendor has been seeing a shift in doctors’ workflow.  "There's a general trend of physicians being in more places, having to interact with not just the EHR but with other technologies as part of their daily workflow," Dreyer said.  Twitter: @HealthITNews This story is part of our ongoing coverage of the HIMSS16 conference. Follow our live blog for real-time updates, and visit Destination HIMSS16 for a full rundown of our reporting from the show. For a selection of some of the best social media posts of the show, visit our Trending at #HIMSS16 hub.

(SPONSORED) IT in health systems is a collection of moving parts, often spread across facilities in multiple locations and, increasingly, dispersed to a growing number and type of devices.

Apple chief defies government demands to unlock the iPhone of one of the San Bernardino terrorists, creating a backdoor into the system’s software.

Calling the HIMSS Annual Conference a technology show hardly does it justice - especially given the wide range of topics presenters, vendors and guest speakers plan to focus on when the show kicks off in Las Vegas on Feb. 29. To help you keep track of the topics and for guidance on participting in the discussion sure to erupt in social media, here's our hashtag guide for the conference. Bookmark this page for quick reference. #RethinkRCM is the hashtag to use for revenue cycle management at HIMSS16. #WomenInHIT supports and empowers fellow women in IT. #PutData2Work is the official hashtag to follow trends and innovations for improved outcomes and efficiencies unveiled at HIMSS16. #Nurses4HIT is the HIMSS16 hashtag to keep up-to-date on care transformations making an impact on nursing. #IHeartHIT isn't just a declaration. Use this hashtag at HIMSS16 to share personal stories how HIT has effected you.  #HX360 is designated for topics fostering advances to new models of care.  #HITworks  helps you quantify the value of your HIT at HIMSS16. #HITventure is the official hashtag to learn how collaboration in HIT can contribute to tech-enabled solutions. #HITsecurity is the hashtag to follow to learn how the industry is proposing to solve cybersecurity problems in HIT.  #GenY4HIT follows the discussion at HIMSS16 on the new generation's impact on HIT.  #Engage4Health highlights the role empowered consumers play in their healthcare. #EmpowerHIT lets you follow how the push for interoperability is shaping up, according to the 40,000-plus attendees at HIMSS16.  #DrHIT hashtag highlights the issues that result when integrating clinicians and technology. #Connect2Health helps you discover the role of healthcare IT thanks to mobile technology. #Aim2Innovate explores the ways innovation and HIT are being pushed to improve outcomes.  Twitter: @HealthITNews

With more than 300 educational sessions and over 1,300 exhibiting companies, the annual HIMSS conference presents an extreme challenge even for the most physically fit attendees. It pays to know your way around the Sands Expo Center before you get off the shuttle bus in the morning. The HIMSS16 mobile app is the perfect solution for navigating the event. It provides a complete list of exhibitors with the locations of their booths, and provides a scalable version of the show floor map. You’ll find exhibitors listed with their booth numbers, a description of their services and contact information. See all of our HIMSS16 previews To help you manage your schedule while you’re at the conference, the app provides a personal agenda feature. You can quickly scroll through the schedule of educational sessions and save any that look interesting. You’ll find locations, descriptions of the sessions and bios for the speakers. The app can also help you network with other attendees. When you open the app, you’ll see an activity feed with updates posted by other attendees. Join in and participate or just scan the list to see what other people are doing now and planning to do later. To use other features, like the Agenda and Exhibitor list, tap the menu in the upper left corner. You’ll find plenty of helpful housekeeping features, including a directory of food services in the conference center, the shuttle schedule, locations of recharge cafes and even locations to get a massage. The app is free and available in Apple iOS and Andriod formats. You can download it directly from their app stores; just search for HIMSS16.  Or follow links from the HIMSS16 Conference Mobile App page. When you open the app, you need to login with your HIMSS membership email and password. If you’ve forgotten your member or conference registration account credentials, just reset them.  Twitter: @GusVenditto