I just made a presentation with 10 pictures that relate somehow to the impact of social media in medicine.
This was a “talk” that I did at the MGFamiliar.net Talks.
I’m just preparing an audio file, so that it can be more understandable.
Today, I’ve read the article “Long Live the Database State”, published in July 2009 at the Prospect, after a twit from @Richard56. Although this was published almost a year ago, its content is nowadays even more updated and relevant. This article mainly focus the limited access to the enormous amount of data that is generated everyday in the British National Health Service, data that has been kept away from providers and end-users, hence impairing the main core of the system to adapt to the needs and to evolve by itself.
Every time we interact with a public service we leave a record—a medical report, perhaps, or an exam result. Those records should be the lifeblood our public services. If shared and analysed—securely—they can help services to improve the quality of their performance. They can also help to prevent problems: identifying, for instance, those at risk from diabetes or even child abuse. And the economic downturn brings new urgency: if public services don’t improve productivity they will soon be unaffordable. (…)
If we want to have good public services, we are going to have to trust them with our data; and if our public services want us to pay for them, they will have to show us that they are using our data effectively and securely. But armed with the type of data created by Brian Jarman, and the tools built by Richard Webber, we can build safer, cheaper public services that know their users better.
Leaders and stakeholders all throughout the world should realize that data sharing and analyzing is the next step for the healthcare systems survival and sustainability, from global to local settings. More than never, we need an effective, statistical, secure and responsible interpretation of the information that is being collected by healthcare providers.
In summary, only knowledgeable healthcare systems are capable of becoming true complex adaptive systems. Only then, they will face effectively the increasing needs and demands of the future.
One of the most interesting TED talks of 2009 was given by Tim Berners-Lee regarding the “next Web” and the need for linked data.
Have a joyous holiday season.
Atchoo!
My post today congratulates the awarded “5 reasons” video, a portuguese production by Monomito Screenwriters for a prevention campaign.
More info:
Mayo Clinic is highly dedicated to the use of social media in health care.
This is a video from Tweetcamp II, a course that occurred in April 2009 focused on providing teaching and training for the staff on using Twitter on health care.
More information here
Delta Exchange is a social networking for primary care physicians created by TransforMED, an American Academy of Family Physicians subsidiary. Its main goal is to enhance the family physicians knowledge in the patient centered medical home model.
Transform to a medical home — with a little help from your friends
We learned from the National Demonstration Project (NDP) that transforming to a patient-centered medical home (PCMH) isn’t easy — it actually IS rocket science — and it requires meaningful change throughout all aspects of a practice.
We also learned that medical practices can be lonely places: physicians and staff often feel isolated. What they want and need are opportunities to communicate, collaborate, and learn with other practices in order to maintain the momentum of change.
And lastly, we also learned that some practice leaders have a DIY attitude (Do-It-Yourself). They were not interested in having a consultant or practice coach in the practice; they just wanted useful information, some accountability, and connections with other practices to learn best practices.
TransforMED’s Delta-Exchange provides all of that in an online, social networking platform.
With the cost of 30$/month per user, this is an interesting solution for knowledge sharing and collaborative virtual work among family physicians.
James Bateman on how virtual patients ‘bring more reality’ to simulation-based scenarios http://tinyurl.com/l7wf9p
This is an interesting video, makes me think about the possibility of using Virtual Reality for Medical Education in General Practice.
