Apr 7
This video has been circulating in many of my social media networks in the past couple of days. It shows how glasses could include augmented reality and Google’s online services mashed up:
Imagine this in the OR when doctors can “see through” patients by mixing the picture they see and radiology images. Then imagine adding additional information and accessing those through eye movements.
Feb 25
A medical professional (just like an e-patient) has to be proficient at searching online. I’ve been telling my students that they have to keep practicing. One of the ways to do so is a Chrome extension, A Google a Day.
Let’s see one example:
If you key in international dialing code 40, how would you say “good morning” in the language of the country you’re calling?
Google Correlate is a tool on Google Trends which enables you to find queries with a similar pattern to a target data series. The target can either be a real-world trend that you provide (e.g., a data set of event counts over time) or a query that you enter. I found a slightly good correlation between weight loss and wedding checklist. Is it surprising?
Try other medical conditions as well.
Oct 23
I’m still trying to find ways to use the really professional network, Google+, in medicine and I asked my community a few days ago about that:
I haven’t asked you about that for a while, but how have your habits been changing in the last few weeks on Google+? Do you use it more than Facebook? For me, it seemed to be a fantastic professional network, but still have many more peers on Twitter and Facebook. What to do?
I got some interesting opinions and ideas, but a French colleague told me French doctors actually perform case presentations in private ways. They upload information about the case, discuss it with other peers and get to a final diagnosis. Based on the very simple privacy settings of Google+, it can be useful for such purposes. Anyone else with similar experience?
A nice video for Sunday from an old television show in which players tried to find out who the real Google founder was.
This Facebook roast performed by Google, Twitter, MySpace, etc. made me laugh today.
Jul 22
I’ve been playing around Google+ for the last couple of days and I have to admit it I really love it. Why? I’ve been using Facebook as a source of professional information but I have to add those people I like to follow as friends even if in most cases we are not friends. A few reasons why I use Google+ now for this purpose.
This is a real professional networking site, while Facebook is just a playground for friends.
For more details and tricks, here is the Complete Google Plus Cheat Sheet infographics.
Jul 14
There have been some articles and blog entries lately focusing on whether Google+ could be used in medicine or pharma. I’ve been trying to use it more actively in the past couple of days and it’s still a question for me to figure out whether I should separate my professional Facebook and Google+ activities. A few comments from fellow bloggers:
Google+: the ultimate tool for social geeks
My first impressions are enthusiastic. Google+ has enormous potential and can become the future of private and social communication. Fresh and slim design, no gaming distractions, no 140 word limit. Yes, it sets itself between facebook and twitter. There is a necessary condition: people willing to adopt this new tool and even migrate from other platforms. If I really have to say, I think its competing more with facebook, since twitter can be easily synced with Google Buzz, which I have ultimately activated today. In few words Google+ has given me an excellent impression of being a professional and versatile platform.
Could Google+ be Pharma’s Answer to Social Media Marketing?
Google+ may be a lower risk option for pharmaceutical companies. One of the features of Google+ is that you can easily share your information with select groups of people. These groups of people are referred to as “circles”. When you add somebody to your Google+ network, you have the ability to place them in a specific circle. The default circles are “Friends, Family, Acquaintances, and Following”, but you can also add some new circles as well. When you share a post or statement, you can then select which circle(s) receive the message, thus eliminating the other circles from seeing your message.
Google+, Google’s new social network, currently in Beta, comes at a perfect time for pharma. Pharma firms have been volleying with the idea of social for a while now, dipping their toes in the water at Facebook, creating their own communities, and working with foundations online.
There are always lots of questions. Does pharma want to go there? Will they be accepted if they do? I think Google+ is a great opportunity for pharma to get in on the ground floor.
Jun 27
I guess you’ve heard the news:
Google is giving up on its vision of helping people live healthier lives with online personal health records.
When Google Health was introduced in 2008, Marissa Mayer, a Google executive, said it would be a “large ongoing initiative” that the company hoped would attract millions of regular users.
But Google Health never really caught on.
Well, I know it’s easy to say now, but I wasn’t that surprised. After the first steps, and after years of hard work, Google Health failed to make a real impact on healthcare. When I read the news, an old blog entry of mine came to my mind:
Expecting Google Health to change healthcare is something like expecting Wikipedia to substitute all encyclopaedias in the world…
Some great pieces on this issue:
Jan 24
If you have ever had language problems with patients or collegues, you will find the Conversation Mode Beta of Google Translate amazing.
