Sometimes, government can get it right.

If you were in need of hospital-based diabetes care and needed to choose a hospital in your area, how would you choose? Especially if there are a dozen choices close to your home?

The U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services has a Web-based service called Hospital Compare. It is a database of questionnaire responses based on Medicare patient experiences, comprising scorecards on medical centers across the U.S. You can compare aggregate patient responses covering basic diagnostic categories of adult diabetes, heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, chest pain and chronic lung disease. You can get data in chart or graph form, and can compare hospital results side by side for any group of hospitals you choose.

I chose three hospitals in my area to see what resulted. The numbers, in general, were not miles apart, but there were several care categories in which one hospital might be 9 or 10 points higher or lower than its peer hospitals. That could make a difference in decision making.

My only question is, how come we can't assemble this data for all patient experiences, not just Medicare patients?

Anyway, kudos to the feds for building this valuable information source. As health care reform moves forward (hopefully) we'll need more of this actionable data.

Microfinance - An innovator brings "microcapital" to developing-nation entrepreneurs

What if you were a talented, enterprising goat farmer in sub-Saharan Africa who could produce enough meat and milk to feed only your family. And what if, with a little capital infusion, you could acquire several more goats for breeding stock and be able to expand your herd in order to sell extra meat and milk in a nearby city market. And with that extra revenue, you might be able to pay for one or two employees to help build your capacity and expand your goat product market even further. And, eventually, you've built a business that not only sustains your family, but can also help your kids get inexpensive computers, attain a much better education than they might normally, and, ultimately, build a higher quality of life.

Kiva is the outgrowth of a single idea by a TiVO programmer, who, several years ago, set his mind on creating a "microlending" system to do this very thing. Kiva uses a very robust web platform to assemble individual investors around the world who provide seed capital used in very small increments--$75 to a few hundred--to help a farmer acquire a few animals, a textile merchant acquire a loom, or a village pharmacist provide new medicines to patients. Lenders, people like you and me, can communicate directly with those receiving the funds.

It is one of the kuhlest concepts I've come across. And one that is changing the world.