Thursday, November 08, 2007
Partnership for Healthcare Excellence
Speaking of consumer health care information (see below), the Partnership for Healthcare Excellence has started an ad campaign and a website designed to help create more effective and informed patients. As a new organization, they are very interested in getting feedback, so please take a look and see if their approach and information is helpful to you.
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5 comments:
Site content is a little thin at the moment (except for places to opt in to what seems like four separate mailing lists ... huh? confusing & potentialy spammy!). But I absolutely applaud the initiative. We're pushing more choices and decisionmaking onto patients but not giving them (us) the tools and teachings to enable them to thrive in this environment.
You may be interested in an article, linked below, about a fantastic program at Dartmouth that helps patients navigate informed consent ... and argues that too much choice isn't always a good thing. Could the Partnership for Healthcare Excellence take on a similar initiative?
http://www.dartmed.dartmouth.edu/fall07/html/choice.php
Anything else I can do to help? Very keen on/experienced in adult science/medical literacy. Thanks for your great blog -- I learn so much from it.
Nan, I suggest you get in touch with the people running that organiaation. I know they woud welcome ideas and other help . . . and they are really nice people, too.
It's great to know that people are finally wanting our congress to primarily address the issues of healthcare. The paying field does need to be made to level. Someone needs to speak up for lower-income payers and patients. That is why I am working to support AARP which is trying to make sure all voices are heard. Go to their website at http://www.thisissoridiculous.com and sign their petition, contact congress via phone or email, or to make a donation!
Woohoo!! I am all over this! Thanks!
Times of India @nd DEC 2007..
Now, a tattoo to replace those painful diabetes jabs
Washington: A US researcher has devised a ‘diabetes tattoo’ that may provide some relief to diabetes sufferers from the constant needle pricks.
For most glucose-monitoring methods a blood sample is required, which is taken using a needle. But now, Gerard Cote, a biomedical engineering professor in the Dwight Look College of Engineering, is testing an experimental system using fluorescent polymer microbeads implanted just under a patient’s skin, reports Live Science.
Glucose levels affect how much light the beads emit when exposed to laser light; the blood glucose level could be measured with a wristwatch-like monitor.
When injected under the skin, the microbeads cannot enter cells — unlike tattooing, in which cells absorb the pigment.
The beads remain in the spaces between the cells. These interstitial spaces are filled with water and glucose molecules.
According to Cote, the level of glucose in interstitial fluid is directly related to the blood glucose level measured by the traditional needle-stick method.
The glucose in the fluid binds to the microbeads.
When the beads are illuminated with a small laser, the fluorescent colour of the beads changes in proportion to the amount of glucose present. ANI
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