Discussion on:

Wireless technology played a big role in my surgery

Best wishes for your recovery, Michael. If you want to learn more about healthcare applications, a very good starting point is Wireless Healthcare's news items on:

http://www.wirelesshealthcare.co.uk/wh/news.htm

My own site, Telecare Aware, takes a broader look at developments in health and care monitoring of people, particularly in their own homes.

http://www.telecareaware.com

Steve Hards

We use wireless printers as well so that specimens can be taken at the patients bedside. The EKG telemetry is a very nice feature. Was a real pain to get setup right and has its own network, but definitely a good thing. We are slowly implementing wireless in most of the hospital, but it is very costly. There are quite a few areas, especially in Radiology where the walls are designed to prevent signals from going through. Overall though, health care is definitely investing money in IT, or at least where I am at. We have also been named in the top 100 hospitals in the US 3 years in a row, so I hope that IT at least has a part in that.

I do hope you have a successful and speedy recovery.

I appreciate your article on wireless technology. As an EMT myself (aside from my "day job" that pays the bills - being an EMT doesn't pay much unfortunately), I utilize an interesting wireless component in my work. It is an EKG that attaches to my Treo smartphone via Bluetooth. This is the ActiveECG from ActiveCenter.com. The difference with this unit? It is slightly larger than my Treo. This is a "Lead II EKG", meaning only one view of the heart, unlike a 12-lead unit, but it gives us a very important tool at our disposal for helping to diagnose patients quickly in the field. No, I am not marketing this device. I feel strongly that this unit has a wonderful place in emergency medicine, and has not been promoted nearly enough.

Thank all of you for the regards, and especially thank you for the added information. I was in a bit of a fog most the time at the hospital, but being the wireless geek that I am I was noticing all sorts of amazing technology. I hope to continue my research in this area and present more articles.

Good timing on seeing your post as I just read a newspaper article stating that too many health care providers are not making use of technology to share information. My California GP was using a mini-laptop to record exam notes a year ago. Unfortunately my wife recently wound up in an urgent care unit of one of the biggest health care systems here in New Mexico. When she later went to her primary care physician - two blocks away and in the same system - they did not have any of the information from her original treatment. They had to make several phones calls to get a complete report FAXed to their office.

You pretty much can't be competitive out there without a strong wireless solution. We have the wireless EKG carts, some lab tests can be performed on a device right at the bedside with immediate results transmitted to the patient's chart. The current focus is on Smart Phone technology. Our providers can be in another country and as long as they have a signal on their smart phone, they can check the latest vitals, lab results, radiology reports, etc... and immediately update the nurse on the plan of care.

It is good to know that you are doing well after your surgery. I used to work as an EKG technician a few years ago and I can tell you that while the wireless technology for cardiac patients is great, it is also extremely expensive which might be why you don't see it implemented in some areas.

Also I am curious as to the security issues that wireless tech brings up.. hopefully no one but the authorized people are monitoring your vital stats...

Glad to hear that you're recovering, we've just implemented the Vocera 802.11 communications device and it's smartphone clients in our hospital. It's made it much easier to give our patients the care that they need when they need it.

Necrospamming.

Here I was thinking. "Oh, what an interesting article to be brought back up after so long." Silly me. Silly, silly me.

But, it lacks a certain...panache.

Let's you and I -- others, if they care -- work on this.

The usual suspects (necrophilia, necromancy, et ali), they just don't seem to work.

Let's put our deadened heads together.

Spamming of these such Blog replies could be considered as Necrophilia.

Words like 'Zombiefilth' are quite derogatory, which can be a good thing, but the fluency is lacking. It needs to roll outward and easily.

Keep it up.

to describe spamming on old threads is "necrophagy".

It means to feed on corpses.

Now I'm hungry.

Or raw...

depends on the corpse.

except for the vegetarians. I personally like my animal flesh to be dead before I start dining on it. I don't eat things that are still alive and kicking.

Rats don't put up much of a fight.