Friday, May 30, 2008

ACP Position Paper on Increased Use of Technology

A recent position paper released by the American College of Physicians supports increased use of health information technology, but points out that physicians should be reimbursed for the required investment of time to review and maintain patient data as well as the cost of equipment...MORE

Internet Presents Opportunities for Healthcare

Multiple challenges and opportunities are seen as developers create new ways to gather and disseminate the complex knowledge required to practice health care today. This report from European website OBBeC evaluates some of the difficulties and presents some possible developments...MORE

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Wireless Technology Developments

Development of wireless technology and the need for remote health care will drive change in the near future, according to one expert...MORE

New Medical Uses for Cell Phones Proliferate

The Boston Globe recently reported on a wide variety of applications being devised for both researchers and consumers in healthcare. Examples include the use of cell phone cameras to aid diagnosis of diseases in remote locations, medication reminders, and streaming video to aid emergency response teams...MORE

Google Releases Personal Health Records Application

Google has joined companies like WebMD and Microsoft in creating a website where individuals can organize and store their personal health records, according to the New York Times....MORE

MLA 2008 - Unbound Medicine Review

Michelle Kraft's blog, "The Krafty Librarian," reported on mobile tools for clinicians in her notes from the Medical Library Association meeting in Chicago....MORE

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

IBM Targets Health for Mobile Phone Applications

IBM Research is developing applications for mobile phones, including one designed to supply information to aid people on the scene in medical emergencies. MORE...

Peruvian Physicians Use PDAs in Treatment of TB

A recent initiative launched by a doctoral student from MIT and Harvard Medical School worked with Socios en Salud (SES), a Lima-based health organization to provide PDAs to physicians working in the slums of Lima, Peru. Using these handheld devices, health workers could easily manage information they need to track, treat and support patients with multi-drug resistant tuberculosis. MORE...

Ontario Provides PDAs to Nurses

PDAs will be provided to as many as 2,000 nurses in Ontario, Canada. The goal of the provincial government is to support access to drug databases, disease information, and medical dictionaries at the patient's bedside. MORE....

Growth In Use of Wireless in US Hospitals

Wireless capability is increasingly seen in U.S. hospitals. Sales in wireless has been growing at an annual rate of 23% since 2005, with sales of $2.7 billion in 2007. Hospitals see wireless support for their mobile nurses and physicians as a way to make their staff more productive while reducing medical errors. MORE...

Thursday, May 08, 2008

Smartphones for Medical Imaging

Engineers at the University of California at Berkeley and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem have developed a way to transmit medical images using cellphones. This promising technique could make modern imaging modalities such as ultrasound, radiography, and MRI more affordable and accessible in the developing world. MORE...