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Students commencing medical school and master’s of medicine program at Stanford this year will all get an Apple iPad. The school is trialing a program to see whether the devices are practical to integrate into the academic curriculum.

Before you dismiss this as medical education being sacrificied in the name of fanboy hype, consider this — when some of our editors were in medical school, the semesterly (mandatory) fee for handouts and photocopies was about the cost of a lower-end iPad. And that was years ago. We can only imagine the charges now. So moving the medical education culture of endless handouts and notebooks over to a compact tablet device could be very smart. More from Stanford officials:

The decision to provide the devices was prompted by a desire to give students flexible access to the content that they need whether it is a virtual cadaver in dissection lab, annotated lecture slides and videos in the classroom, or journal articles for evidence-based practice in clinic.

“We want to explore the use of iPads and other technologies to help students access the enormous amount of medical knowledge that is being produced constantly,” said Charles Prober, MD, the school’s senior associate dean for medical education. “Part of the challenge facing medical students, and all doctors, is the overwhelming amount of information. Devices like the iPad may be able to help users access that pool of knowledge.”

The school will monitor the use of the iPads through regular surveys to help determine how helpful they are to students, pointing out that past experiments with similar electronic devices, such as the Kindle, in academic settings haven’t been successful.

“We really don’t know yet how the incoming medical students will use them,” said Henry Lowe, MD, senior associate dean for information resources and technology. But, as a physician using an iPad himself, he’s found the device to be extremely helpful and believes it is growing in popularity among doctors.

“Physicians are a mobile group,” Lowe said. “They’re moving around from clinic to clinic, from patient to patient. … I’ve seen a variety of reports from across the country saying that physicians have seized on the iPad as a helpful device.”

Press release: iPads to be distributed to incoming class by Stanford medical school …

More at SCOPE Blog…

As we promised you a few weeks ago, here is a review of the recently published The History and Future of Medical Technology, a book that aims to cover the complete history of the evolution of medical technology. It is written by Ira Brodsky, former president of Datacomm Research, who has previously written several books on wireless network technology. The book starts off with the development of the microscope in the late 16th and 17th century by Antonie van Leeuwenhoek. It then goes on to describe which developments were made possible by microscopy, including the whole field of microbiology and the art of vaccination. In continuation of this, the next few chapters cover imaging of the body in every possible way, covering endoscopy and computed tomography, only to get back at magnetic resonance imaging and nuclear medicine later in the book. In the meantime the discovery of the ECG by William Einthoven and the development of pacemakers make their appearance in the chapters in between. The rest of the chapters describe a variety of subjects including organ transplantation and replacement, cochlear implants, opthalmological treatments, and many more. In the final chapter an old habit of the author, networks and connectivity, make their appearance showing what is being done and what can be done using wireless technologies, networks and the internet.

The book is written in clear understandable language which is very enjoyable to read. As any book covering such a broad subject, it cannot cover everything, and I found myself searching Wikipedia and Google to find out more on many of the subjects mentioned in the book. Overall it gives a balanced overview of this part of history.

Does it have any deficiencies? Certainly. The first thing that really annoyed me is the amount of small errors which are present in the book. For example, Fahrenheit is described as a Dutch instrument maker, while he actually was a German scientist (with a very German name, indeed). That notwithstanding, he did spend a significant part of his life in Amsterdam and the Hague in the Netherlands and reached some of his greatest scientific achievements while working there. However, if you read a book on history you expect the writer to get these kind of details right and not have to go fact-checking yourself. In an example later in the book when describing cardiac catheterization, the Brachial artery is described as being located in the wrist, which makes the radiologist in me feel very itchy.

The other major weakness of the book is the presentation of the images. The book includes 26 figures which tend to give a somewhat simplified (often a bit too simplified) impression of reality, to give the reader an understanding of how technologies work. However, all of them lack any basic description other than a short figure title. Even in the most simplified drawings this leads the reader to guess at what different arrows and other signs and objects are actually representing, unless you are already fairly familiar with the technology.

All that being said, I would still greatly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in reading a great overview of the history of medical devices. The book kept me and held my interest until the last page. It is amazing to see how many technologies that we take for granted were developed only in the last few decades. Its weaknesses could easily be overcome in a second edition, but I wouldn’t hold your breath until that appears. It does an impressive job covering such a broad subject in just 332 pages, so much so that I couldn’t discover any great omissions. The book is a bit short on the “future” part of its title, but that of course is what you can already see everyday here at Medgadget. In conclusion, I think it is a great book and a recommended read for every Medgadget addict.

Interview with the author: Changesurfer Radio

Publisher’s page: Telescope books: The History and Future of Medical Technology

Here’s another report by Medgadget editor Dan Buckland from his trip to Minnesota to visit the headquarters of Medtronic.

To get a good idea of where Medtronic sees the future of medical information technology, go to Minneapolis and visit the Mounds View Bakken Education Center (note: you probably will need an appointment). It gives off the impression of Disney Epcot’s Tommorowland, complete with gift shop but with fewer kids around. The center is billed as a place where physicians come to meet with company employees to discuss products in development, partnerships and it’s where Medtronic demonstrates future concepts to gain feedback. Using high end computers, tablets, teleconferencing, advanced inventory tracking, and other tech, the Education Center speaks to the Medtronic’s prediction of the integrated OR of the near future. Open to internal Medtronic tours since October, the showroom places a heavy emphasis on a new IT infrastructure. A non-disclosure agreement prevents us from detailing the tech inside (a 2008 Star Tribune article describes it as having “two virtual catheterization labs to help train doctors and company field representatives”) but many non-medical tech brands are well represented and Medtronic has put together a very slick integrated health IT system from the looks of it.

Previously: Future Directions For Medtronic…

The Continua Health Alliance has developed a set of standards and protocols to facilitate communication between different medical devices. This was meant to allow various manufacturers to create devices that would automatically be compatible with those from other firms. Cambridge Consultants has now teamed up with Qualcomm to create a standard wireless unit that can communicate data from a Continua certified device to remote servers. This technology, in one swoop, may allow for any compatible device to be used in telemedicine applications.

The new, low-cost platform is a combination of Qualcomm Incorporated’s Wearable Mobile Device cellular module and Cambridge Consultants’ Vena software stack. The platform enables the collection of data from Continua certified devices over the Continua Personal Area Network (PAN) interface, and transmits this data over the Continua Wide Area Network (WAN) interface* to on-line health services. The Wearable Mobile Device module has dimensions of 21 x 22 x 4.5mm, enabling a Continua Application Hosting Device (AHD) to be built that provides a PAN-to-WAN bridge within a small highly portable footprint.

Cambridge Consultants’ Vena wireless healthcare software stack, which implements the standards selected by the Continua Health Alliance, empowers patients to manage health and wellness anytime, anywhere. It embeds the Bluetooth™ Health Device Profile (HDP) optimized for the secure transport of medical data and the IEEE 11073 standards for compatible exchange of information between health devices.

The Qualcomm Wearable Mobile Device 1X, 1X EV-DO and UMTS modules are industry-leading products that support a variety of 3G networks and provide integrated GPS, an accelerometer and Bluetooth technologies. With data and voice support, a standardized USB 2.0 interface and defined APIs and development kit, the modules provide unprecedented functionality and streamlined 3G connectivity for M2M and CE devices.

Press release: New Cambridge Consultants platform brings mobile health one step closer …

St. Jude Medical has received the European CE mark for yet another ablation catheter, its Therapy Cool Flex ablation catheter. It is the first ablation catheter with a fully-irrigated and flexible tip available for treating cardiac arrhythmias. It has a flexible coil spring-loaded and laser-cut tip with irrigation slits in a zig-zag pattern to accommodate cardiac anatomy and to ensure efficient cooling of the tip. Conformation with the endocardial contours ensures efficient energy delivery. The catheter is not yet available in the United States.

Press release: St. Jude Medical Announces European Approval of Industry’s First Flexible Tip Ablation Catheter