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Should Parents Track Their Child’s Developmental Milestones With An iPhone App?

baby computer

With our world becoming high tech, it’s not surprising that gizmos and programs or our computers, iPhones and Smartphones are emerging to help us track everything from our infant’s cry to our child’s development. But, are these necessary?

I was called by a reporter from Wired.com to weigh in on this with a colleague of mine. As members of the American Academy of Pediatrics Council of Communications and Media, and Spokespersons for the AAP, we had a few opinions on this very important topic that I want to share with you that you can find here.

Before you download or buy any computer program or cell phone application just ask yourself one question: Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Dr Gwenn Is In*

Dr. Google: Knowledge Versus Expertise

A recent article by NPR confirmed what many patients and doctors already know. The internet is leveling the playing field and allows individuals to access information easier and more quickly. Research by Pew Internet and American Life Project found:

  • 61 percent of adults say they look online for health information – known as e-patients
  • 20 percent of e-patients go to Internet and social-networking sites where they can talk to medical experts and other patients
  • 39 percent of e-patients already use a social-networking site like Facebook

Yet as individuals embrace new technology, the New England Journal of Medicine found earlier this year that only 17 percent of doctors use electronic medical records. To say doctors are conservative and slow in adapting to new ways of communicating and accessing information would be an understatement. An article in TIME magazine proclaimed “Email Your Doctor” which graced newsstands in 1998! Email communications with doctors is still the exception rather than the rule. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Saving Money and Surviving the Healthcare Crisis*

Best Science Visualization & Music Videos Of 2009

Wired Magazine always publishes some interesting videos dedicated to science and, let’s say, fun. Here are the entries and a few sample videos.

Best Science Visualization Videos of 2009

Volume rendering is a technique used to display two-dimensional data in three-dimensional space. ImageVis3D is a new volume-rendering program developed by the NIH/NCRR Center for Integrative Biomedical Computing, designed to be simpler, faster and more interactive than standard volume-rendering programs. This video demonstrates some of the key features of ImageVis3D and gives examples of the type of data it can render in three dimensions.

Top 10 Scientific Music Videos

*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*

Is Your Boss on Facebook?

There is not a big difference, even if a lot of people think there is. I’ve written many posts about online image building and reputation management but here is a practical example why everyone should be more cautious about what they say online (just like they’re cautious about what they say offline).

Somebody posted a message about her job on Facebook. But the boss was also there…

facebook

*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*

Army’s Historic Image Collection Going Online

The US Army’s National Museum of Health and Medicine stores a gigantic digitized archive of prints and photos from the Civil War to Vietnam. The head archivist of the museum now started a project to make the collection available to the general public through Flickr. The initial set so far contains about 800 images, but thousands more should be coming soon.

More from Wired Science blog…

Link @ Flickr

Images: Top: Base Hospital #33. Portsmouth, England. Patient with jaw bridgework. Dental laboratory. World War 1.

Side: Soldier and horse with gas mask. World War 1.

**This post was originally published at Medgadget.com**

Latest Interviews

IDEA Labs: Medical Students Take The Lead In Healthcare Innovation

It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…

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How To Be A Successful Patient: Young Doctors Offer Some Advice

I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…

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Latest Book Reviews

Book Review: Is Empathy Learned By Faking It Till It’s Real?

I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…

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The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You

When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…

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Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book

I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…

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