Medical Writing Goes Digital

I’ve been doing Digital Storytelling for more than a decade. What new could be done in the field of medical electronics writing?

Digital has been growing exponentially for 15 years now. But where’s the education that supports further development? How many medical writers are there in the Finnish blogosphere blogging about the healthcare industry?

We could create a team blogging about a medical startups. In three months, the project team has to come up with an idea for a Web-based business support operation, pitch it to a venture capitalist and design a site.

Along with technology and creative skills, the program also needs to emphasize entrepreneurship. The digital platform is ubiquitous. Today, it’s just a part of everyone’s way of thinking and communicating and sharing, connecting, buying, doing business.

It’s probably the fastest-paced industry almost anybody could be in right now.

• we can help to create digital marketing strategies for the medical industry
• we want to transform a technology-focused approach to a practical, easy to handle working model
• learning the newest technologies on the job takes time while digital content development is time-consuming
• copywriters and art directors will help the teams to churn out portfolios of creative concepts

We’ve to ensure that the clients are getting what they needed to grow and develop, especially in areas that combine creative approaches and technology.

Healthcare Economics

I'm consulting wikipedia about health care economics. It says:

"Health economics is a branch of economics concerned with issues related to scarcity in the allocation of health and health care. Broadly, health economists study the functioning of the health care system and the private and social causes of health-affecting behaviors such as smoking."

Helge: I think that spirometry could be considered as a tool that can distinguish some of the effects of smoking.

A seminal 1963 article by Kenneth Arrow, often credited with giving rise to the health economics as a discipline, drew conceptual distinctions between health and other goals.

Helge: We've discussed health care economics in relationship to Carpal Tunnel Diagnostics for several years. There is a resistance to change in the system. New technologies are adapted slowly if they are threatening existing money making practices.

Factors that distinguish health economics from other areas include extensive government intervention, intractable uncertainty in several dimensions, asymmetric information, and externalities.

Helge: Government intervention could be a possibility, but there is much more lip-service and talk than real action in this field.

Governments tend to regulate the health care industry heavily and also tend to be the largest payer within the market. Uncertainty is intrinsic to health, both in patient outcomes and financial concerns.

Helge: It takes a long time for policy makers to learn and understand what could be good and cheaper in the long run.

The knowledge gap that exists between a physician and a patient creates a situation of distinct advantage for the physician, which is called asymmetric information. Externalities arise frequently when considering health and health care, notably in the context of infectious disease. For example, making an effort to avoid catching a cold, or practicing safer sex, affects people other than the decision maker.

Helge: The medical experts do have an advantage, they are trusted and they do have a strong voice. New ideas don't grow in a top-down and authoritarian environment.

The scope of health economics is neatly encapsulated by Alan Williams' "plumbing diagram"[3] dividing the discipline into eight distinct topics:

• What influences health? (other than health care)
• What is health and what is its value
• The demand for health care
• The supply of health care
• Micro-economic evaluation at treatment level
• Market equilibrium
• Evaluation at whole system level; and,
• Planning, budgeting and monitoring mechanisms.

Jimmy Atkinson from WHDb

Thanks Jimmy Atkinson for your Gmail. I hope it's OK to copy paste a part of your Webmasters Guide to Better Health in my blog. I like to improve the dialog with other bloggers, health care professionals and CTS patients.

Jimmy Atkinson to me

show details 11:47 PM (7 hours ago)

Hi Helge

This is Jimmy Atkinson from WHDb. I've just posted a feature article over here titled "The Webmaster's Guide to Better Health -- 101 Tips and Resources" -- http://whdb.com/2008/the-webmasters-guide-to-better-health-101-tips-and-resources/. I thought you and your readers at your CTS website might be interested in it. Let me know if you have any feedback.

Thanks,

Jimmy Atkinson

WHDb: http://whdb.com/

Carpal Tunnel

Do you have carpal tunnel syndrome? Are you sure? If you have this ailment, do you know how to alleviate the pain? If you’re not afflicted, do you know how to prevent it? The following sites may point you in the right direction to answer these carpal tunnel questions:

12. Mayo Clinic’s Carpal Tunnel Syndrome: This site explains carpal tunnel syndrome, its symptoms, treatments and prevention in an easy-to-understand tutorial.
13. MedlinePlus’s Carpal Tunnel Syndrome: MedlinePlus provides a resource-heavy explanation about carpal tunnel, including tutorials in Spanish.
14. Carpal Tunnel Exercises: This is a very simple site that holds an exercise you can do to help prevent and ease the pain of carpal tunnel syndrome.
15. Carpal Tunnel Surgery: WebMD offers a concise explanation of what you might go through if you choose surgery to relieve your carpal tunnel syndrome.
16. Carpal Tunnel Syndrome & Tarsal Tunnel Syndrome: Learn more about what carpal tunnel is and isn’t all about from MedicineNet.
17. Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Fact Sheet: “You’re working at your desk, trying to ignore the tingling or numbness you’ve had for months in your hand and wrist. Suddenly, a sharp, piercing pain shoots through the wrist and up your arm…” Although this page begins like a novel, their information about how to avoid this problem and how to treat it is factual.

International Health Care Forum,

Dear Sirs,

On behalf of World Congress, I am pleased to invite you to join me at the exclusive International Health Care Forum, held as part of the 2008 World Health Care Congress (April 21-23, 2008 in Washington, DC).

Billions of dollars are spent each year on health care in developing countries. Ensuring that these valuable resources are spent wisely has become a major priority for the international development community and other partners.

The International Health Care Forum offers executives the opportunity to exchange global best practices and solutions to achieve great strides in improved health care quality, cost and access.

Helge: I've to dig into this. What about CTS?

Health Economics Research - Knowledge@Wharton

Health Economics Research - Knowledge@Wharton: "Presidential Candidates Push Health Care Reform, but Who Will Pay? As medical costs escalate and the number of Americans without health insurance continues to rise, the 2008 presidential candidates have responded by putting health care near the top of their agendas.

Indeed, many candidates have already laid out detailed programs to address the nation's health care problems. As a result, meaningful change in the system seems likely to occur once a new president takes office.

As Mark V. Pauly, Wharton professor of health care systems, notes: 'I'm optimistic this time that we'll get something.... There is actually a chance of doing more good than harm, and I wouldn't have said that in some other years."

Helge: Health Economics and Innovation. The "health care industry" is conservative. Adopting new innovations takes time. Aggressive cost saving strategies and tactics are possible. We've a debate about the health care costs in Finland as well. Finnish nurses are treating to go on strike unless their salaries are increased. Cities and municipalities are facing growing cost expansions. Mediracer is a diagnostic point of care innovation including cost and resources saving telemedicine dimensions. The adoption of mediracing could save costs of diagnosing and treating carpal tunnel syndrome. That's a small part of a big picture but the time it takes for an innovation to move from R&D to market and effective use is an issue I would like to talk about.

Health economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Health economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "Health economics is a branch of economics concerned with issues related to scarcity in the allocation of health and health care.

Four factors that are important to Health Economics: Government Intervention, Uncertainty, Asymmetric Knowledge, and Externalities.

Governments tend heavily regulate the Healthcare industry and also tend to be the largest payor within the market. Uncertainty is intrinsic to health, both in patient outcomes and financial concerns.

The knowlege gap that exists between a physician and a patient creates a situation of distinct advantage for the physician, which is called Asymmetric Knowledge. Finally, there are many effects that happen between two parties without monetary compensation, called externalities, within healthcare, from catching a cold from someone to practicing safe sex.

The scope of health economics is neatly encapsulated by Alan William's 'plumbing diagram' dividing the discipline into eight distinct topics:

• what influences health? (other than health care)
  
• what is health and what is its value?
  
• the demand for health care (e.g. occupational health and carpal tunnel syndrome)
  
• the supply of health care (rapid diagnosis with innovative new method)
  
• micro-economic evaluation at treatment level
  
• market equilibrium
  
• evaluation at whole system level; and, (innovations are changing operational processes)
  
• planning, budgeting and monitoring mechanisms. (cities and municipalities)

Helge: the (red) is added by me to relate this definition to Mediracer and CTS point of care diagnostics.