December 19th, 2011 by Medgadget in Announcements, Research
Tags: algorithms, Alignment, Evolutionary, Game, Genetic Diseases, Genetics, Genomics, Heuristics, Mobile Devices, Mutation, Origins, Patterns, Phylo, Research, Sequences, Solutions, Video Game
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Over the past year our genetic understanding of diseases such as Alzheimer’s, diabetes and cancer has been accelerated by thousands of video gamers thanks to an online flash game called Phylo. Phylo is a video game created by Dr. Jérôme Waldispuhl of the McGill Centre for BioInformatics and collaborator Mathieu Blanchette. The game itself is a framework for solving the common problem of multiple sequence alignments in comparative genomics and leverages the visual problem solving skills of online gamers.
The Phylo website explains the background to game: Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*
December 17th, 2011 by AliKhanMD in Announcements
Tags: Afghanistan, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, CDC, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, EOC, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, Polio, Public Health, Response, UNICEF, Vaccination, WHO
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Polio is a crippling and potentially fatal infectious disease that is completely preventable. Since 1988, members of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), including CDC, the World Health Organization (WHO), Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Rotary, and UNICEF, have teamed up to eradicate polio world-wide through large scale vaccination efforts. Global polio cases are down more than 99% since GPEI began. We were able to completely eradicate the disease in the Americas by 1994 and protect our children. By 2006, polio was endemic in only four countries: Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Public Health Matters Blog*
December 2nd, 2011 by admin in Announcements, Health Tips
Tags: Age, Autumn, CDC, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, Chronic health condition, Elderly, Fall, February, Flu, Flu season, Infants, Influenza, January, Recommendations, Seasonal, Strain, symptoms, Vaccine, virus
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Getting a flu vaccine is on many “to do” lists in the fall, but for those who still haven’t checked it off their list, it’s not too late to get vaccinated. Many people don’t realize that flu activity usually peaks in the United States in January or February, and flu viruses can circulate as late as May. As long as there’s flu around, it isn’t too late to get vaccinated.
Getting a yearly flu vaccine is the first and most important step in protecting against the flu, and CDC recommends influenza vaccination for everyone age 6 months and older. We urge you and all health care professionals to get vaccinated yourselves and offer flu vaccine at every opportunity to every patient—except infants younger than 6 months and the very few people for whom flu vaccination is contraindicated.
Studies show that your recommendation makes the difference in your patients’ decision to get a flu vaccine. You should continue to emphasize the importance of flu vaccination for your patients. And, if you don’t already do so, consider offering flu vaccines to patients in your own practice, even if yours is a sub-specialty practice and you don’t see yourself as a vaccine provider. Even if you don’t offer flu vaccines, you can still recommend and emphasize the importance of flu vaccination as a way to keep your patients—and their families—protected throughout the season.
As promising as it is sounds that flu vaccination rates are increasing among children and healthcare personnel, Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Safe Healthcare*
November 28th, 2011 by Paul Auerbach, M.D. in Announcements
Tags: Cost, CVS, Increase, itch, Poison Ivy, Price, Retail Price, Sales Development, Skin Reaction, Walgreens, Wash, Zanfel
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I recently received a note mailed to health care providers from Steve Sisler, Vice President of Sales Development for Zanfel Laboratories, Inc. Zanfel is a product used to decrease the skin reaction attributable to poison ivy and similar plants (e.g., poison oak and sumac). Here is an edited part of the note that I received:
While attending the recent American Academy of Family Physicians trade show, numerous health care professionals stopped by the Zanfel Laboratories booth to ask questions and gain additional knowledge regarding the Zanfel product and the overall disease state of urushiol-induced allergic contact dermatitis. Additionally, a great many prescribers voiced concern over the recent price increases of Zanfel Poison Ivy Wash. The conversations were very specific in that the retail price for Zanfel had increased to $42.99, $44.99 and even as high as $48.99 plus tax. These prescribers are aware of the retail price increases because their patients are calling them back after visiting CVS and Walgreens pharmacies. Their patients are aware that Zanfel had previously been sold for approximately $39.99 plus tax. These patients are upset because they believe that Zanfel Laboratories has initiated a retail price increase.
Zanfel Poison Ivy Wash has not had a cost increase in over Read more »
This post, Product Used For Poison Ivy Skin Reaction Undergoes Price Increases, was originally published on
Healthine.com by Paul Auerbach, M.D..
November 5th, 2011 by Berci in Announcements
Tags: Competition, E-Patient, Empowered Patients, Facebook, Health, Health 2.0, Health Management, Medical Professionals, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Personal stories, Prizes, Social Media, Technology, Twitter, Web 2.0, YouTube
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There is a new social campaign being launched right now on Webicina.com that curates the medical resources of social media in 80 topics in 18 languages:
We receive hundreds of suggestions from empowered patients and medical professionals every week about which social media resources should be included in our selections, and we thought we must find a way to let them know how much we appreciate their help.
So now we kindly ask you to tell us your story about how social media helped you improve your health management or helped you get better in your specialty in order to win grand prizes.
As we curate resources in basically all the social media platforms, you can tell your story in any platforms from Twitter and Facebook to blogs and Youtube. Your submissions will be Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*
