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Posts for Tag: Technology

Beat Down Blood Pressure Video Challenge

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) in partnership with Million Hearts, an HHS initiative to prevent a million heart attacks and strokes in five years, and the American Heart Association announces the Beat Down Blood Pressure Video Challenge (#HealthIT4UBP).  We invite the general public to create short (<2 min long), compelling videos sharing how they use health IT or consumer e-health tools to manage high blood pressure. Videos will demonstrate how health IT is used to support blood pressure control through activities such as routine monitoring of blood pressure, taking blood pressure medications as prescribed, and maintaining a healthy lifestyle that helps lower blood pressure.  High blood pressure (aka “hypertension”) affects one in three adults in the U.S. and is sometimes referred to as the “silent killer” because it damages the brain, heart, eyes, and kidneys while causing no symptoms.  If left untreated, high blood pressure can result in strokes, heart attacks, and kidney failure. Fortunately there are steps that each of us can take to prevent or manage high blood pressure and change our future health for the better.
via bloodpressure.challenge.gov

Thrilled to see that there's a national coordinator for health information technology and that there's a contest to find out how people are using technology to manage blood pressure. I can't wait to see the entries and the prizewinners. I don't think (oh, call a spade a spade—I know) I'm not doing anything prizeworthy. Still, I wonder if I could use this as my justification to buy a video camera?

Metrics for Self-knowledge

So I finished a round of rehab, spent a few minutes yesterday looking for a Just Do It t-shirt and a few minutes this morning looking for a pedometer app for my iPhone so I could monitor my activity (I was overwhelmed by the choices), and then I stumbled across this video. Talk about reinforcement!

Doctors Distracted by iPads?

CultofMac calls attention to the adoption and use of iPads by doctors

Since then, Dr. Halamka has been raising awareness about the dangers of distracted doctors. His efforts included an interview with NPR that ran earlier this week. In that story, NPR’s David Greene also interviewed Dr. Henry Feldman (also from Beth Israel in Boston) who is a such a big proponent of mobile technology and iOS devices in medicine that his collegueas have dubbed him the iDoctor. He points out the advantage sof the iPad, including during patient consultations and notes that he can easily switch off distracting devices.

This story  raises the question of whether iPhones and iPads can be too distracting to doctors. A report that coincided with the NPR story from Kaiser Health News cites multiple studies about thedangers of distracted doctoring over the past two years including incidents that occurred during surgery. At the same time, a recent study from the University of Chicago illustrated that iPads made residents more efficient and effective.

I've seen concerns like this raised at least once before, but I've posted before about the advantages of iPads on medicine and my frustration when technology isn't applied to a patient's advantage. I think I like the common-sense solution CultofMac points out.

In the end, as with other distracted driving, the crux of the issue really isn’t about the mobile devices themselves, it’s about how doctors and other healthcare workers choose to use them. As Dr. Feldman points out, anyone can turn a distracting device off – or at least turn off notifications from potentially distracting apps. Setting policies around that idea is actually the approach that Beth Israel Medical Center has adopted to prevent such incidents.

Jay Parkinson, and lots of others I hope, are looking for ways to use technology to serve patients better and make the most of their time.