I am a graduate student studying medicine at Northwestern University in Chicago. During the clinical years students are required to have PDAs but not so in the pre-clinical phase (which is where I am). If you’re trying to place what that means, think of the clumsy, nerdy medical students that J.D. and Elliot had to deal with on Scrubs--and then subtract a year.
There are many ways in which a visitor to the hospital can distinguish medical students from physicians. Aside from the way we fumble around while pretending to know what we’re doing and the short white coats we wear (so that anybody familiar with system knows to keep their distance from us), is the fact that the pockets of our lab coats are inevitably stuffed with books, charts, and index cards. Enter the PDA...
Few if any hardware innovations have revolutionized the practice of medicine as much as the PDA. On the educational side, the wealth of benefits offered by PDAs is tremendous. So as might be imagined, I’ve become a sort of PocketPC-Prosletyzer to my classmates. I’m actually quite surprised that so many of my classmates who are often tech-savvy and certainly open to innovation, have yet to discover just what an invaluable resource the PDA is.
I’m constantly scouring the various PPC sites out there looking for my "perfect" unit as my iPAQ is simply not equipped to handle all that I’m asking of it. When I saw Matt’s review I knew I had found it. I’ll try to explain why now.
Good screen: All of our lectures at school are recorded in MP3 format. In addition all lectures are made available to us as PowerPoint files which I view using Pocket SideShow. I am constantly reviewing lectures and looking up concepts on the lectures nearly all of which are stored on my CF card. In addition I use HandyMed’s HandyCards flashcards program for which I’ve created thousands of flashcards most of which have associated images. Thus the improved screen of the A716 would be an extremely nice thing to have.
I’ve also spent a fair amount of time converting my entire movie collection into MP3 format which I watch while working out on the stationary bike. The screen on my current PDA is certainly sufficient for that purpose, but I’ve been hankering for something better... Unfortunately I’m still losing my own personal Battle of the Bulge.
Sound: I confess that I am hardly an audiophile, but am very excited at the options on the A716. My preferred music leans toward classical where clarity and to a lesser degree, volume are very important. I also listen to music when doing weights. On the medical side, I am constantly listening to school-related things during the commute to school, work or the hospital. I review school lectures and am currently listening to board-review recordings.
I recently finished listening to tutorials of heart and lung sounds and found myself wishing for a unit that might have improved sound settings or at least some options to further modify them. Granted, I don’t anticipate listening to these files again until next year, it would be terrific to have the option then.
Power & Speed: This was one of the main features that prompted my desire to for an A716. I use many apps that need to be brought up and frequently switched between each other. Some of the apps that I bring up routinely (i.e.: upwards of 20 searches/day) include a medical dictionary, drug reference, diagnostic reference, lab reference, medical calculator, patient tracking software and several others. Unfortunately the situation on my current iPAQ (especially when I am demonstrating something to someone) usually goes like this:
"OK, let me look that up for you... Yikes, that Harrison’s is a mighty-large app, just give me a few seconds while it loads... OK here it is... Oops, no wait... just a sec... waiting on the hourglass... OK, let me shut down the other processes [shut down the dictionary and drug reference] ... Hang on while I soft-reset... [20 seconds passes]. Alright let’s just bring this up... And here’s your differential diagnosis... Oh, you want to know what the treatment is? Hang on... "
The fact of the matter is that you need
lots of power and oodles of memory to keep these references at your fingertips. These days I’ve had to map one of my buttons to the 'Running Programs’ applet since I’m constantly freezing the hourglass. (In spite of attempting to keep several megs of program memory free). I’ve also tried hard-resetting and reinstalling apps one by one, but to no avail.
The simple fact of the matter is that when you need to pull up data while the patient and/or attending is waiting for you, you need for that information to come up rather quickly. People tend to become impatient if they think you’re just playing with your toy.
Flying: Somewhere along the way I developed a love for bouncing around in tiny airplanes. This passion has had to take a backseat as I gave up a pretty good job to enter medschool making flying way beyond my budget. But I still go up from time to time. I purchased a Bluetooth GPS and Control Vision’s AnywhereMap software (
www.anywheremap.com). This combination is absolutely phenomenal in that it gives you the "glass cockpit" that general aviation pilots could have only dreamed of a few years back. (To give you an idea of how impressive the app is, many people go to buy the app which is secondarily bundled with a PDA!).
WiFi: Throughout the medical school, library and hospital there are numerous WiFi hotspots. These are extremely useful when looking up items only available through the medschool’s library portal. In addition many hospitals are rolling out wireless patient tracking systems. Finally, as much of my studying time is spent at Starbucks, I’ve subscribed to the Tmobile service. (Borders has Tmobile as well, but I’ve developed a distaste for the way medical and law students tend to monopolize those tables for entire evenings).
Bluetooth: I’ve already mentioned the GPS. In addition, over the last year I’ve put in a Bluetooth access point for the desktop computer in my house which I connect to with the PDA. My brother has said he will be buying me a Bluetooth phone for my birthday. (Not until September, but he’s promised not to make me wait that long!)
SOFTWARE:
Flashcards: In spite of the gamut of techie resources out there, flashcards remain a mainstay of learning. I currently use a simple but terrific app called HandyCards (
www.handymed.com). However there are a number of features and design considerations that I think could be improved upon. As a result I’ve begun a project to develop such a program of my own. I’ve recently begun working with a faculty member at DePaul University and some of his PhD advisees on developing such an app. We intend to distribute it to the pre-clinical students at Northwestern next year.
PDF files: El schedules (when I’m at the library studying until 2am I really don’t want to miss the train when the next one doesn’t show up for another 30 minutes); Many medical files are available only in PDF format including board review and clinical exam notes.
Microsoft Reader: I clearly remember the day I thought I’d experiment with "real" reading on my PDA. I decided to begin by downloading Dickens’ Great Expectations. I was skeptical as I am one of those who believes in the "aesthetic" of a book and its feel in your hand and lap. Well, those days have gone--supplanted yet again by the marvels of the handheld. I’m a zealot now in terms of PDA reading. I love never losing my page; having a dictionary handy; always having proper lighting; always having my book in my pocket; being able to take notes (although I’m disappointed at not being able to save them - an accidental hard reset or two has caused my interest in note taking of LIT format to wane somewhat); I’ve since read easily 20-30 novels on my PDA and one day when this medschool thing comes to a close I hope to pick up again...
English-Spanish Dictionary: Spending time on a medical mission to Nicaragua this summer impressed on me the limitations of my medical Spanish. I’ve since made extensive use of my Collins English-Spanish dictionary and Skyscape’s Medical English-Spanish Interview applications. Again, one needs for these apps to come up quickly on demand. A machine lacking in power and memory can really destroy the momentum of a patient interview.
Battery is vital!!! As I am often running around for a complete day (e.g. during the 3rd year 10-12 hours shifts are the norm for many rotations) there is never time (or a place) to recharge the machine. In addition if one is keeping important information on the unit, it would be a very bad thing to lose power while at work.
Size: I confess to loving the size of my iPAQ. H/e this is a tradeoff I would happily make for the fantastic feature set offered by the A716. In addition, when on the wards, I would use some kind of tethering device such as an iHolster.
So hopefully this explains why the A716 has completely supplanted all others out there as my dream machine. The fact of the matter is that my current PDA simply can not handle all that I am asking of it. And because of insane debt, I can't afford to just go out and purchase another. (Even if I could, the A716 is out of my price league). As much as I'd love to use a laptop, carrying one around with me while running around the floors is clearly not an option.
I realize that this was an unusually long post. I looked, but didn’t see any requirements or restrictions on length- hope I didn’t miss one and that it won’t be held against me. But then again, there was lots to say (and wish for)!
Best of luck to everyone!
-Yosef
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Yosef Mendelsohn
DePaul University CTI
yosef@md.northwestern.edu
Mobile: 773-531-1909
http://www.cs.depaul.edu/people/facultyInfo.asp?id=631
http://www.depaul.edu/~ymendels
Asus A716 Giveaway
by chris_p » Feb 23, 2004 @ 7:33pm 
, Y just bought a BT telephone, and the SD port is just IN.... I cant get a Wi-Fi to work with my PPC....... Pleasi 
) and drawing my own cartoons based on the Simpsons...
