Stanford stepped in just before Christmas when they distributed their COVID vaccine supply according to a homemade algorithm. When the vaccine algorithm was unleashed it invited non-patient facing personnel and only one resident as part of the vaccine’s first phase. It apparently failed because residents as institutional nomads had no ‘home base’ or address that ... Continue Reading about Stanford’s COVID Vaccine Algorithm – What We Can Learn
The Vaccine Selfie – Another View on Medicine’s Moment
The current moment in medicine is defined by the vaccine selfie. Pictures on Twitter and Instagram have marked a turning point in the COVID pandemic where desperate health professionals have begun to show defiance. Dr. Wendy Sue Swanson has another take on the vaccine selfie. She posted a wonderful thread suggesting that the vaccine selfie could have some ... Continue Reading about The Vaccine Selfie – Another View on Medicine’s Moment
Telemedicine and Our Transitional Moment
In 2020 with the nearly overnight adoption of telemedicine we experienced a variant what 20th century media theorist Marshall McLuhan called the transitional moment. It basically suggests that when we are faced with a new media we tend to use it in a way that reiterates the old media. The early use of YouTube, for example, mimicked television. It took years before ... Continue Reading about Telemedicine and Our Transitional Moment
Anorexia in the Clinic Note – Should it be Removed?
We're over a month into the Cures Act Final Rule and doctors are adjusting to the idea of sharing their notes with patients. Patients are adjusting to reading clinic notes. This case of misunderstanding of the term anorexia shows some of the challenges that arise from the new law. For the uninformed, the Cures Act Final Rule on Interoperability & Information ... Continue Reading about Anorexia in the Clinic Note – Should it be Removed?
Google Health Studies – Connecting Research with People
Let’s face it, if you’re doing a clinical study recruiting research subjects is a bear. To make it easier, Google today introduced Google Health Studies, a tool to match the potential study participants with researchers. Their new (Android) app provides a platform for researchers to reach a large population for recruitment while giving the public the chance to ... Continue Reading about Google Health Studies – Connecting Research with People
AlphaFold and the Future of Physicians
DeepMind’s deep-learning system AlphaFold last week cracked one of biology’s critical challenges: predicting the shape of proteins. As background for the less chemically inclined, a protein is made from a chain of amino acids that folds itself up in a tangled mass. The nooks and crannies of the 3-dimensional structure determines what the protein does and how it ... Continue Reading about AlphaFold and the Future of Physicians