Google Wave for Scientists: Video August 23, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Google, science, Video, Web 2.0.9 comments
Cameron Neylon posted a nice video about how scientists may use Google Wave in the future. I saw it myself in action at this year’s Science Foo Camp in San Francisco, but it would be nice to have a really huge base of early adopters soon.
Bioweathermap: Genomic Surveillance July 12, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, e-Science, eHealth, Genome, Health, Health 2.0, Medicine, Microbiology, Web 2.0.add a comment
Yesterday, I attended the session of George Church that focused on personalized genomics. He mentioned one of his new projects, Bioweathermap, an experiment in collaborative environmental surveillance and discovery.
The BioWeatherMap initiative is a global, grassroots, distributed environmental sensing effort aimed at answering some very basic questions about the geographic and temporal distribution patterns of microbial life. Utilizing the power of high-throughput, low cost DNA sequencing and harnessing the drive of an enlightened public we propose a new collaborative research approach aimed at generating a steady stream of environmental samples from many geographic locations to produce high quality data for ongoing discovery and surveillance. Our approach will provide a unique opportunity to engage the public in the scientific research process while we address fundamental questions such as “How diverse is the microbial life around us?” and “How do microbial communities in different habitats change over time?” and “How can advanced sequencing technologies best be utilized to address issues in biodiversity, public health, and biosurveillance?”
George Church will also be featured in the Silverstein Lecture Series: Personal Genomes and Web 2.0 Volunteerism (May 11th and 12th, 2009).
Junior Physicians and Web 2.0: Call for action! July 6, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Health 2.0, Medical education, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Medicine 2.0 Course, Web 2.0.5 comments
There is a new article published in the International Journal of Medical Informatics about Junior physician’s use of Web 2.0 for information seeking and medical education: A qualitative study.
Web 2.0 internet tools and methods have attracted considerable attention as a means to improve health care delivery. Despite evidence demonstrating their use by medical professionals, there is no detailed research describing how Web 2.0 influences physicians’ daily clinical practice. Hence this study examines Web 2.0 use by 35 junior physicians in clinical settings to further understand their impact on medical practice.
CONCLUSION: Web 2.0 use represents a profound departure from previous learning and decision processes which were normally controlled by senior medical staff or medical schools. There is widespread concern with the risk of poor quality information with Web 2.0 use, and the manner in which physicians are using it suggest effective use derives from the mitigating actions by the individual physician. Three alternative policy options are identified to manage this risk and improve efficiency in Web 2.0′s use.
I launched the world’s first university course focusing on web 2.0 and medicine for medical and dentistry students. The third semester will begin this September. I asked all of my students to fill a survey before and after the course so then I could somehow see how their attitude changed during the course.
I have a lot of data, but much less time and I have never written a publication in such a field. If you want to join, let’s make it a collaborative project. Please drop me a line (berci.mesko at gmail.com) if you are interested.
PS: How could we expect physicians to be web-savvy or to meet the expectations of e-patients if they are not educated properly to do so? That is where my course is meant to enter the process…
Toxipedia: Collaborative Environmental and Public Health Resource Center June 1, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Web 2.0, Wiki.2 comments
I just came across Toxipedia and found an interesting press release about it:
The collaborative environmental and public health resource center Toxipedia has won the right to manage the National Library of Medicine’s World Library of Toxicology (WLT)!
The WLT is a repository of public health links from over 40 countries. In collaboration with the International Union of Toxicology, and with financial support from the National Library of Medicine, Toxipedia will manage the WLT, strengthen its content, increase the number of participating countries, and expand its focus to highlight issues of environmental and public health significance to these countries.
Radiopaedia: Section Editors Needed May 11, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Health, Health 2.0, Medical education, Medical Imaging, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Radiology, Web 2.0.2 comments
Radiopaedia.org is a free online radiology resource built and maintained by it’s users. Section editors , as well as being regular users are responsible for overseeing part of the site, e.g. Gastrointestinal section. More information is available here. It is a great way to contribute to the site and radiology community in general, and you can also have something unique on your CV. Previous editors are of course remembered in the editor hall of fame.
This is a system Wikipedia should use as I’ve been saying for years.
They still have a few vacancies, and are therefore still accepting applications for the following positions.
- gastrointestinal (GIT)
- nuclear medicine (NM)
- radiology physics
- breast imaging
- juniour trainee
Simply write to editors at radiopaedia.org with your CV and the section you are most interested in.
The new design of Radiopaedia that they will implement soon
Further reading:
- Radiopaedia: a wiki for radiology
- Medical wikis: the future of medicine?
- Launching MedPedia: From the perspective of a Wikipedia administrator
- Google vs Wikipedia? No!
- Medicine in Wikipedia: Reliable Information?
- Wikipedia: Reliable Sources and Gene Wiki
- WikiProfessional Alpha Testing: a wiki of web 3.0
- Why to work in Wikipedia: I’ve been mentioned in Nature Medicine
Fast Communication: Launch a Meeting in Seconds May 9, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Web 2.0.1 comment so far
A short post about how to organize an online meeting for your international collaborators in just seconds. Here is TinyChat where you can launch an online meeting room easily.
I thought I should give it a try so I created a chat room in 2 clicks, posted the link in my Twitter community and people started to join. That’s how it works.
Collaborative Research with Patients: Migraine Treatments April 20, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Community Site, eHealth, Health, Health 2.0, Healthcare, Innovation, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Web 2.0.2 comments
Do you remember the research Patientslikeme.com did on lithium and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis by using the data uploaded by patients?
Now CureTogether has a similar approach but in migraine treatments.You can check how many users tried those treatments and how many of them had positive or negative results. Very interesting concept. Actually this is a live collaborative research project.
Hospitals on Twitter, Facebook or Youtube: What about Europe? April 11, 2009
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, eHealth, Health, Health 2.0, Hospital, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Web 2.0.14 comments
Ed Bennett has been working on an incredibly extended list of hospitals having Twitter accounts, Facebook pages, blogs or Youtube channels. According to the latest graph, now there are more hospital Twitter accounts than Youtube channels.
Now my friend and fellow blogger, Lucien Engelen, started a great project. He wants to create a similar list but for European hospitals. Please let us know if your hospital has a Twitter account, a Facebook page, a blog or a Youtube channel. Let’s build THE list of European hospitals in social media collaboratively.
Medical Education Evolution: Looking forward to 2009! December 31, 2008
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Education, Health 2.0, Medical education, Medical Education Evolution, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Web 2.0.Tags: Education, Medical education, Medicine
5 comments
This July, Jen McCabe Gorman, Ted Eytan, and me created a Ning community for those who are interested in changing medical education. We’re working on a new concept and plan to find a medical school that would use it. Feel free to join us and let us know your thoughts.
The community now has 95 members and 22 ongoing discussions.
As some of us organize university courses about medicine 2.0 or health 2.0 (e.g. my course in Debrecen) and as the Google Document containing the database of useful medical links is still growing, I can’t wait to see the results in 2009. This document features now almost a hundred sites, services and projects. Include your favourite websites!
I hope we can build a concept on how to reform medical education worldwide with the tools of web 2.0.
Let’s work even harder for a better education in 2009 (as Sir Ken Robinson described):
Further reading:
- Do you think medical education can be reformed? How?
- Medical Education Evolution: A Growing Community
- Medical Education Evolution: Time for a change
Like this:
MyNetResearch: The newest addition to the squad August 29, 2008
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Collaboration, Community Site, Health, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, science, Web 2.0.1 comment so far
The newest addition to the List of Community Sites for Scientists and Physicians is MyNetResearch.
Our purpose is to assist you in maximizing your research productivity through global collaborations. We all have outstanding colleagues, yet have felt the disappointment of these colleagues not sharing our research interests and passions.
This is not modern research-at least it’s not what research should be in the 21st century. Why be limited to local research collaborations when there are hundreds or even thousands of research experts across the world with whom you could have highly productive collaborations?
