5 Ways Technology Is Transforming Health Care

http://www.forbes.com/sites/bmoharrisbank/2013/01/24/5-ways-technology-is-transforming-health-care/

 Patients who can connect with their doctors more easily, for instance, won’t need to make expensive and perhaps unnecessary trips to the ER or specialists. Doctors will be able to collaborate with other physicians and experts in new ways and use computers to analyze patient and medical data, allowing them to provide better and more efficient treatment for their patients. As technology continues to expand the horizons of medicine and medical interaction, it’s becoming clear that we’re entering a new era of health care — or as some people are beginning to call it,Health 2.0.

Elizabeth Mynatt

Beth Mynatt is the Executive Director of the Institute for People and Technology (IPaT), a College of Computing Professor, and the Director of the Everyday Computing Lab. Themes in her research include supporting informal collaboration and awareness in office environments, enabling creative work and visual communication, and augmenting social processes for managing personal information. She is also one of the principal researchers in the Aware Home Research Initiative; investigating the design of future home technologies, especially those that enable older adults to continue living independently as opposed to moving to an institutional care setting.

Combining Computing, Design and Healthcare: Charting an Agenda for Personal Health Informatics

Elizabeth Mynatt

Georgia Tech

https://www.cs.ubc.ca/event/2013/01/combining-computing-design-and-healthcare-dls-talk-elizabeth-mynatt-georgia-tech

Healthcare for chronic disease is the dominant cost for many healthcare systems, now and for the foreseeable future. The unique capabilities of pervasive technologies have the potential to transform healthcare practices by shifting care from acute to home settings, by enabling continuous data capture and analysis, by creating a network of communication and collaboration channels, and by helping individuals engage in their own care.  In the end, the emphasis is changed from healthcare and chronic disease to a focus on health and wellness.

In this talk, I will draw from a number of research projects that combine computing research, human-centered design, and health management theory to create promising approaches for promoting wellness, supporting behavior change and delivering improved health outcomes.

Fecal transplants cure most cases of C. difficile Randomized controlled trial shows treatment works

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2013/01/17/c-difficile-fecal-transplant.html

But this publication marks the first time a randomized controlled trial — the most reliable type of study — has shown that the treatment is effective.
 

Fecal transplants, first performed in the late 1950s, have come to be regarded by many as the current best chance for cure for people with persistent, recurrent C. difficile.

The idea is relatively simple: Use the feces of a healthy person to restore the normal mix of bacteria to a gut that has been ravaged by C. difficile.

The feces came from donors who had been screened to make sure they didn't have HIV or a number of other infectious diseases. The stools were mixed with saline, stirred and then allowed to sit. Later the fluid was separated from the solids and only the fluid was used in the procedure.

A half-litre of the fluid was dripped into the intestines via the tube. On the day of the procedure most of the patients had diarrhea and some had stomach cramping. But by the next day, most were cured.

 "Most people think that patients are reluctant receiving this treatment. But those patients who have relapsed like four or five times, they are just desperate. It's a terrible disease for them with an increased mortality. It just hampers the whole life." 

Of 16 patients who received a fecal transplant, 13 were cured after a single treatment. Two of the remaining three were cured after a second transplant from a different donor, for an overall cure rate of 94 per cent.

Only four of 13 patients (31 per cent) who received vancomycin were cured; three of 13 (23 per cent) who had the bowel lavage followed by vancomycin were cured.

Figuring out what is needed to restore the bacterial balance destroyed by C. difficile may allow scientists to devise a targeted transplant — a probiotic treatment, perhaps — that would have the same effect without exposing a patient to someone else's stool.

"We shouldn't believe this is the best we can give," Keller said. "We should give better treatments in the future."

IHI Open School: UBC Chapter

http://www.ihi.org/offerings/IHIOpenSchool/GetInvolved/Pages/default.aspx

http://blogs.ubc.ca/ihiopenschool/

The Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), an independent not-for-profit organization based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is a leading innovator in health and health care improvement worldwide. At our core, we believe everyone should get the best care and health possible. This passionate belief fuels our mission to improve health and health care.

High blood pressure

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/high-blood-pressure/HI00016/NSECTIONGROUP=2
http://www.prevention.com/health/health-concerns/how-lower-blood-pressure-naturally

• Check your monitor's accuracy. 
• Measure your blood pressure twice daily. 
• Don't measure your blood pressure right after you wake up.
• Avoid food, caffeine, tobacco and alcohol for 30 minutes
• Sit quietly before measuring your blood pressure.
• Make sure your arm is positioned properly when measuring.
• Don't talk while taking your blood pressure.  

http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/guide/understanding-obstructive-sleep-apnea-syndrome?page=2

• hibiscus tea  
• Dark chocolate varieties contain flavanols that make blood vessels more elastic
• Loud, incessant snores are one of the main symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). If you have high blood pressure, ask your doctor if OSA could be behind it; treating sleep apnea may lower aldosterone levels and improve BP. sleep test called a polysomnogram, or PSG.
• People with sinus problems or nasal congestion, who are more likely to experience sleep apnea, can try nasal sprays to reduce snoring and improve airflow for more comfortable nighttime breathing.
• 
  
  
   

Basic epidemiology

whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2006/9241547073_eng.pdf

http://www.fao.org/Wairdocs/ILRI/x5436E/x5436e04.htm

http://www.mha.spph.ubc.ca/program_course.html

http://www.healthinformaticsforum.com/forum/topics/health-informatics-vs

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC79037/

Health information

http://www.hicareers.com/health_information_101/health_information_101.aspx

Health information professionals care for patients by caring for their medical data. They ensure that all of a patient’s health information is complete, accurate, and protected, yet readily available for healthcare providers when needed. There are three professional and academic areas of health information that you can learn about below: Health Information Management, Health Information Technology, and Health Informatics.


understand the workflow in any healthcare provider organization from large hospital systems to the private physician practice.

http://chcm.ubc.ca/


If You’re Not Keeping Score You’re Only Practicing
Evaluating a System-wide Lean Implementation
With Dr. Martin Puterman

http://chcm.ubc.ca/files/2012/03/Lean-Evaluation-CHCM-Mar-2012.pdf

Eye bags

http://www.getridofthings.com/get-rid-of-bags-under-eyes.htm
http://facialexercisesguide.com/19/eye-bags-how-to-get-rid-of-bags-under-eyes/

cause: genetics, water retention under the eyes due to dehydration or being tired

Using a cold compress for 10 - 15 minutes, one to two times daily, will help get rid of the bags under your eyes for a short period

Out of all the bizarre folk remedies, application of frozen or chilled green tea bags may be one of the few that can actually get rid of bags under eyes.

You may need to address your water retention to get rid of the bags under your eyes.

Doctor's Guide

Doctor's Guide
http://www.docguide.com/dgc.nsf/ge/Unregistered.User.545434?OpenDocument

Sleep, Braveheart

Haven't been getting too many sleep these days, slowly killing myself by overdoing it, first selected a novel gene (was too boring), then the next gene (doesn't satisfy the project criteria of homology) then hopefully this last one is going to be the last. It better because the deadline is in 2 weeks! If I stucked with my first gene then I would have been looong done by now but heck, I'm learning more stuff going down this ragged terrain, so thinking back it's all worth it in the end, no matter what the outcome is, the journey I think matters more than the destination.

As an aside, read an article about standing out in a crowd and this writer mentions the old Braveheart quote,

"Everybone dies, but not everyone lives"

and this one is good too

"Challenge, by definition is the death of the old and the birth of the new."

Desrochers.