WirelessDoc

Voice (speech) recognition is the killer app for mobiles

And, it's a workable solution now, based on my experience with Google's Voice Search on the Android platform that I blogged about yesterday.

Once you can reliably use speech recognition on a mobile, the issues of small keyboard and small screen, even on a netpad computer, vanish.

The most important aspect of this is that it changes how you think about finding information. I was lying in bed, and for some reason I was thinking about my sister's wired haired terrier, and I remembered that her vet said the dog may have a form of Cushing's Syndrome. At that moment the term "canine cushing's syndrome" popped into my head. I did the voice search on the HTC Hero, and sure enough the first hit did come up with a Web page devoted to this subject. I quickly looked it over, and it seemed to be well research, so I chose to send the link to my sister via e-mail. All this was done within minutes.

If I had to type this search term using the Hero's virtual keypad, I wouldn't have done the search.

Besides performing Web searches, this potentially could be used by patients to record symptoms, or ask questions that could be sent via e-mail. Of course, you still have the issues of privacy and confidentiality, but encrypted e-mail is already available.

Another aspect of this is that more Web sites will have alternative mobile sites that render well on small screens. This is long overdue, perhaps because it limits the number of ads that can appear on the page.

Adobe Flash is another problem for the mobile Web. Eventually it will be universally supported, but here you run into the problem of overloaded cellular networks by power users watching videos.

I think all this points to the fact that soon smart phones will look and act very differently in the near future, as well as changing how people approach information management and communication.

Medical search using Google Voice Search on the Android HTC Hero

I stumbled upon Google Voice Search when I was testing the Sprint Navigation app on the HTC Hero smart phone. In order to chart a course from your present location, you have the option of speaking the address of the destination, then Google finds on the map and shares it with the navigation app, giving you turn-by-turn navigation.

Then I noticed that the voice search was a standalone Android app. I tested it with a medical term search as I mentioned in a previous post. Now, here's the video:

Here's some screen shots of the app in action:

IMS slate allows patients to view consent forms wirelessly

The is a slate tablet computer from International Medical Solutions meant to be used for patient education and other apps.

From their press release:

Using IMS' Mobile Patient Communicator™(MPC) platform with wireless 10- or 12-inch touch-screens, clinicians and administrators have access to illustrated, animated and video-enhanced content to explain medical procedures. After presenting medical alternatives, administrators can review paperless, easy-to-read consent forms with patients and family, plus instantly record and file all documentation at the point of care. The consent files can quickly and easily be appended to the provider's practice management and electronic medical record system(s).

I don't know if this will make consent forms easier to read by the patient, or if the patient could annotate, and send a copy via e-mail so they could keep a copy or send to someone else to evaluate it.

From their PDF explaing the medical consent form app: "...the MPC helps doctors explain procedural risks and
complications...." It looks like this means that there will be a consent form customized for each procedure so that procedural risks and possible complications are listed for that procedure. This I'll need to confirm.

MIT program looks at ways to change the world using cellphones - The Boston Globe

It’s an unlikely medical device: a sleek smartphone more suited to a nightclub than a rural health clinic. But it’s loaded with software that allows health workers in the remote northernmost Philippines province of Batanes to dramatically reduce the time it takes to get X-rays to a radiologist - and to get a diagnosis for a patient being tested for tuberculosis.

via www.boston.com

Unbound Medicine's Medline mobile Web site on Sprint's Android HTC Hero

OK, so I said portrait when I meant landscape.

This demo shows how you can use the Unbound Medicine's mobile site for Medline to do a quick, filtered journal article search on the Android platform. In this case, I followed the link to the NEJM Web site, logged onto my account, and then view the abstract as well as downloading the full text PDF of the article, which I was also able to view on the HTC Hero, all within 4 minutes.

It would be great to have the option of selecting just the review articles, but with the simplicity and convenience of this site, it's a resource that I would use often.

Mobile at CDC

CDC - Mobile at CDC.

This is the CDC Mobile Web site, and the H1N1 Flu Mobile Texting Pilot.

I like the idea of making important Web sites accessible on smartphones.

UPDATE: I signed up for the H1N1 texting updates, then received 3 more SMS messages asking for my sex, age and ZIP code. I wish they had told in advance that they wanted to do a survey. I could've given all the info in one SMS.

Hospitals becoming wireless hotbeds

Hospitals becoming wireless hotbeds.

Over the last several years, many hospitals have gone from being no-cellphone zones to wide-open wireless environments, with multiple types of wireless networks co-existing to provide anywhere communications and real-time delivery of medical testing data and telemetry. GE Healthcare, a division of GE (NYSE: GE), has been at the center of this trend, teaming with MobileAccess for wireless LAN capabilities in its GE Carescape Enterprise Access platform for managing patient data, and then with Sprint  (NYSE:S) to also offer in-building voice and data transmission.

I don't know if "wide-open wireless environments" is necessarily a good thing. Sure, this is an over-hyped story of the trend towards accepting wireless support in hospitals--who's to argue with the "hotbeds" pun?--but it does mean progress, if and only if security and patient privacy issues can be addressed and maintained.

Internat'l CTIA WIRELESS I.T. & Entertainment 2009 wireless health initiative

International CTIA WIRELESS I.T. & Entertainment 2009.

This is CTIA's Wireless Health Web page describing their "industry-wide wireless health initiative" which was launched at their April conference, and will be re-iterated at the upcoming Oct 7-9 conference in San Diego.

To see excerpts of Dr. Topol’s keynote at [the April] International CTIA WIRELESS 2009 please visithttp://daily.ctia.org/wireless2009/.

For the Oct. event, the keynoters include:

Dr. Irwin Jacobs and Dr. Paul Jacobsof QUALCOMM will discuss their work in the wireless health space and the strides they have made in fostering and growing the mHealth community.

The carrot and the stick | MassDevice - Blog entry

The carrot and the stick | MassDevice - Blog entry.

Integrating wireless technology into medical devices presents the industry with both a carrot and a stick: Stimulus cash (carrot) versus increasing demand for connective devices from hospitals (stick).

This is a blog post about the Inaugural Medical Device Connectivity Conference and Exhibition. David Spenciner gives a basic overview of ARRA, and comments about the attendess:

Interestingly, the conference audience was split about evenly between engineers and IT folk, but the number of clinicians was limited to one or two MDs and a small handful of RNs. Also, nearly half the attendees were from hospitals, while the other half were from vendor companies with a vested interest in the field. The remaining 10 percent was mainly comprised of consultants and academics.

He also mentions the lack of input from the FDA.

The Web is all abuzz about "mobile" or "connected" healthcare to the MEGO point. It's hard to promote your conference as THE event to attend. The dichotomy between the clinicians and the IT Dept. has to dissolve, so that not only are they equally represented, but there has to be an effort to provide cooperation between two very different cultures.

There will continue to be a pressing need for IT Docs and Nurses, with collaborative training with the IT pros, and the vendors should be listening when they develop their devices and services.

Delivering on the Promise of Connected Health: MassMEDIC and Cambridge Consultants to unveil survey findings, moderate debate | Reuters

Delivering on the Promise of Connected Health: MassMEDIC and Cambridge Consultants to unveil survey findings, moderate debate | Reuters .

This Friday at the Massachusetts Medical Soc. HQ, representatives of Partners Healthcare Center for Connected Health, Foley Hoag (business law firm), Philips Home Healthcare Solutions, Cambridge Consultants, and MassMEDIC.

The Massachusetts Medical Device Industry Council (MassMEDIC) is the voluntary grassroots association of medical device manufacturers and associated companies in the Commonwealth. MassMEDIC is the only organization in New England dedicated solely to promoting the unique interests of the medical device industry.