Dr. Portia Fernandez-Marcelo, NTHC director, welcomed the participants and encouraged them to delve on eHealth research in the country. According to her, eHealth research in the world is steering towards evaluation studies investigating on the impacts of eHealth. In her talk, Dr. Marcelo explained how eHealth could help the burdens of the health care system in the country. She reported that eHealth applications, projects, and researches, are enabling tool for people to create, share, and disseminate information on health which could be translated into relevant services for disadvantaged groups.

To have an in-depth discussion on eHealth, Dr. Allan Raymond Tenorio, NTHC Chief Medical Officer and Ana Maria Chupungco, explained Telemedicine and IT for Health, respectively. JR Gavino, NTHC eHealth nurse, shared his experience in deploying the RxBox. RxBox is a product of eHealth research project conducted by DOST’s Philippine Council on Health Research and Development (PCHRD) and developed by researchers at UP Diliman and Manila. It contains medical devices for taking a patient’s electrocardiogram or ECG, heart rate, blood, pulse rate and blood oxygenation.

Dr. Allan Raymond Tenorio, NTHC Chief Medical Officer, explains their experience with the NTHC eMedicine Team in implementing Telemedcine with DOH Doctors to the Barrios before faculty members of different colleges and universities.

Professor Ronald Po of the UP College of Engineering gave his insights on how engineers can improve health care systems through eHealth research. His talk came from experience of mentoring student research on health care systems.

The faculty who attended the PUReHealth Awards expressed their enthusiasm in participating on the competition as Dr. Adalyn Yao, NTHC’s Coordinator for the PUReHealth Awards, discussed the mechanics of the competition. “This crusade must be stirred among young brilliant minds. Hence, NTHC has come up with a venue to jumpstart or maybe appropriately, fortify this thrust,” added Dr. Yao.

The PUReHealth Awards have a series of activities for 2012-2013. Consultations, webinars, and fora will be conducted closely with thesis advisers and students in the duration of the competition. This February 2012 a series of webinars with students from participating universities and schools will be conducted. eHealth Research which will be submitted to the PUReHealth Awards will be judge according to:

• Contribution to new knowledge (20%)
• Potential impact of research findings (30%)
• Quality of research design and methodology (20%)
• Thoroughness and accuracy of results (15%)
• Presentation and clarity (15%)

By the end of the presentations, Dr. Alvin Marcelo, former director of NTHC had the opportunity to boost the faculty’s interest on eHealth to further achieve the competition’s goal of establishing a community of eHealth researchers in the country