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Archive for the ‘Anesthesiology Apps’ Category

Anesthesia Residents See Benefits of Tablet Devices

07 Dec

Technology is a wonderful thing. It creates all kinds of conveniences in our daily lives. When it can be integrated into such important aspects of our society such as the medical industry, it’s truly a marvel.

Last July, 100 anesthesiology residents and fellows at Mount Sinai School of Medicine  went from traditional textbooks to the use of Apple iPads. The idea was suggested by Adam Levine, MD, director of the anesthesiology residency training program at Mount Sinai. As he says, “it took exactly two seconds” to win the approval of the anesthesiology department chair.

While the department paid $700 per iPad, which included a protective cover and warranty, residents now are able to access electronic medical records and a library of e-textbooks, medical journals and guidelines at the point of care.

“This one device has multiple functions at every stage of the perioperative process, and it’s something residents can use both for their education and for patient care,” said Levine.

Here are some of the benefits they have reported:

– Anesthesiology resident Daniel Katz, MD says he uses the iPad to not only read through textbooks and guidelines, but also as a reference tool in the operating room. He also said the iPad has helped him make more informed decisions at the patient’s bedside and that accessing electronic medical records at the point of care is an improvement over paper records, due in part to potentially missing information or bad handwriting.

– Dr. Levin reports better information flow in the hospital after iPads began to be used.

– Residents can conduct video conferences anywhere in the hospital.

– With an iPad or iPhone, faculty can look into an operating room remotely.

– The University of Chicago Medical Center has also distributed iPads to its residents. Dr. Bhakti Patel, a fellow in the Section of Pulmonary Critical Care, says being able to access medical records, radiology reports and images, and placing electronic orders from the patient’s bedside significantly increase the residents’ efficiency.

– Dr. Katz and his fellow residents are putting together a video library of anesthesia procedures, along with a procedure simulator designed for the unique attributes and features of the iPad.

The use of iPads or other tablets is a growing trend in the medical industry. According to C. Peter Waegemann, president of mHealth Initiative, which examines how technology is adopted in the health care industry, there are as many as 7,000 health care iPad applications with hundreds being released every month.

 

Apps for Anesthesia, Anesthesiologists

04 Oct

Last week, the Stanford Anesthesia Informatics and Media Lab (AIM) released StanMed, their new iPad application that was designed as an educational tool in the critical care student clerkship at the School of Medicine. This is how the app is described at the iTunes preview page:

StanMed is an iPad app designed to be used by Stanford medical students, residents, fellows and faculty. We intend StanMed to be used in the classroom and at the bedside. StanMed will provide clinically useful educational modules, tutorials, videos, podcasts and cognitive aids to help facilitate learning at the point of care.

While the application is free, at the moment it’s only available to Stanford University affiliates with valid SUNet IDs. However, exceptions can be made if you are an educator or member of the press. If you’re interested in learning more about the app, you can email them with your request to access the application at help@stanfordanesthesia.org.

The Principal Investigator of AIM is Larry Chu, MD., Assistant Professor of Anesthesia, Stanford University School of Medicine.

There are other anesthesia apps to choose from as well. One example is iAnesthesia: Case Logs. This app was designed for easy caseload tracking. Here are some of the touted features:

– The iPhone automatically syncs case data to the secure CaseLog Database

– Stores all of your anesthesia case log data in one convenient and organized location

– Even if you forget your iPhone, you can enter anesthesia case log data online quickly and easily

– You have 24-hour access to your data.

And then there is the popular Epocrates for the iPhone. Epocrates is the most popular mobile drug reference resource used by healthcare providers at the point of care. According to the description in the Apple Store, “physicians choose Epocrates 3 to 1 as their point of care drug reference of choice.”

In a recent press release, MBA Medical Business Associates announced an increased focus and capital investment in services and technology to support anesthesiologists. In an effort to improve the efficiency of anesthesia billing and the availability of information for anesthesiologists MBA  developed a custom designed practice management system which includes a smart phone application, an internet portal, and a computer-based program.

This practice management solution for anesthesia was designed around the ability to import patient and case information from the hospital while also offering an interface for physicians to enter additional case information independent from the hospital system.  The equally-important second objective of this initiative was to provide physicians remote access to all pertinent information about their cases through the physician interface. Aside from providing valuable reporting capability, this would also allow providers to confirm that their services have been billed correctly and ultimately get paid correctly.