New Find

PeerClip – for Physicians, Physician Assistants & Nurse Practitioners

Here’s an interesting & free online resource for all you physicians, physician assistants and nurse practitioners out there:

PeerClip is a new tool that combines two ways gain knowledge?óÔé¼ÔÇØreading medical literature and interacting with peers?óÔé¼ÔÇØinto a powerful online tool. Currently PeerClip is available exclusively to physicians, physician assistants and nurse practitioners & free to qualified users. As a librarian, I can’t check it out, but it sounds mighty interesting.

Habla Medical Espa?â??ol with your PDA

Here’s a neat application for your Palm, Pocket PC or Smartphone:

FOCUSED MEDICAL SPANISH
FREE assessment tools to health care professionals who are charged with treating non-English speaking persons in the acute medical setting. These assessments are intended for all levels of Spanish proficiency, but especially for those with little or no Spanish language skills.

This could be really useful to you clinicians out there. These handouts give you phonetical pronunciations and translations of simple Spanish terms & phrases encountered during the medical interview. Whether you need to know
?Le duele el pecho? (Do you have chest pain?) to El sufre a menudo de nerios? (Does he have a history of anxiety?), these handouts show how to ask the right yes/no questions.

All you need to use it is Adobe Reader for Mobile Devices (also free – download here). Once you have Adobe reader, just download the files you want and sync your PDA. To access them from your PDA just use the Adobe link on your PDA.

DONT HAVE A PDA?
You can print out regular PDFs of medical Spanish AND listen to MP3 pronunciations on this site as well.
As they say in Spanish, ?é?íp?â?ísatelo bien! (Enjoy!)

Scholarship Opportunity for PDA users

The second-annual Ali Abdulla Al-Ubaydli scholarships for mobile medical computing offer five $1000 Scholarships for Mobile Medical Computing. In addition to academic record, the application requires reading and critically evaluating a piece of the medical literature. Scholars are also be published in the Mobile Medical Computing Reviews journal.

More information

History Lesson

An article on the History of Charity Hospital appears in this quarters Louisiana Cultural Vistas, a publication of the Louisana Endowment for the Humanities; check it out online.

Doing your civic duty

Notice there’s more mud-slinging than usual on the tv lately? That’s because Louisiana’s Election Day is Saturday, October 20th.

Whether you’re a resident of New Orleans, Jefferson parish or somewhere beyond the Lake, use this website (http://69.2.40.209/) from the Louisiana Secretary of State to find your polling place. Once you’ve found your polling place you can call up a sample ballot. Absentee in person voting is 14-7 days before the actual election.

If you conduct research like this, you’re in big, BIG trouble

A recent article in the Australian Family Physician recently gave this librarian a myocardial infarction.

Meet Dr Q.
When a patient asked his advice regarding the discontinuation of warfarin after an episode of deep vein thrombosis (DVT), he used Yahoo.com to find an answer PDF.

You might be thinking, “what’s so wrong with that?”

Two words: Ellen Roche
In 2001, Ellen Roche, a healthy, 24-year-old volunteer in an asthma study at Johns Hopkins University, died because a chemical she inhaled led to the progressive failure of her lungs and kidneys. In the aftermath, it came out that the researcher who conducted the experiment and the ethics panel that approved it allegedly overlooked numerous clues about the dangers of the chemical, hexamethonium, given to Roche to inhale.

So what resources did this researcher allegedly search?
Look no further than Google, Yahoo!, LookSmart, and GoTo.com.

As a health care professional, you should AT LEAST conduct a cursory search in PubMed. It’s free. It’s authoritative. And on the LSUHSC Library homepage, you can use our customized PubMed link to get ALOT of added content and full text that you’ll never see using Yahoo! or Google.

Plus, if you kill anyone you can at least testify during the malpractice suit to having searched the biomedical literature. In fact, the reference librarians here can even do a mediated search for you. All you have to do is pick it up…and use it.

Friday blog-o-rama

Whew! That test is finally over and you’re ready to kick back, relax and watch the Saints beat the crud out of Tampa Bay. But it’s not like you’re doing anything on Saturday. Why not check out this cornucopia of medical student blogs? Whether you passed or failed that monster MIP exam, there’s bound to be another medical student out there in Internet-land blogging in commiseration.

(& to make sure our other fine schools of health sciences don’t feel left out, OT/PT & Dentistry have a pretty healthy representation on here too.)

Library Newsletter

Check out the latest issue of the Library Newsletter. It’s hot off the html editor!

Library Link Dump: Mosquitoes and Education

What do skeeters & education have to do with each other? Absolutely nothing. However, both are subjects of some free governmental online resources.

West Nile Virus Bibliography, 1965-2007 — National Agricultural Library Animal Welfare Education Center

Multiple sources were searched for citations on West Nile virus. Browse this online list to find peer-reviewed journals, conference proceedings, theses, annual reports, dissertations, books, monographs, letters, Web pages, reviews, and patents published between the years 2004 to 2007.

Mini-Digest of Education Statistics 2006 — National Center for Education Statistics

This 75 page PDF publication is a pocket-sized compilation of statistical information covering the broad field of American education from kindergarten through graduate school. The statistical highlights are excerpts from the Digest of Education of Statistics, 2006.

Pub Alert: Medical Education in Post-Katrina New Orleans

Check out this week’s JAMA for a commentary from Drs. Kevin Krane, Richard DiCarlo and Marc J. Kahn on medical education in post-Katrina New Orleans. This piece includes a table comparing the numbers of medical students, residents & faculty before and after the storm, which is available to download as a PowerPoint slide.

And for you old school researchers, here’s the citation:

Krane NK, DiCarlo RP, Kahn MJ. Medical Education in Post-Katrina New Orleans: A Story of Survival and Renewal. JAMA. 2007 September 5; 298(9):1052-1055.

TIP: JAMA is available full-text from the library catalog. Use WAM to login off campus.

Recently published?? Send an email to mknapp@lsuhsc.edu to be a featured on Pub Alert

Writing a paper or article on Hurricane Katrina?

The Katrina Resources page from the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado has a great collection of government reports, websites & peer-reviewed journal articles.

Check it out!

Local mental health resources for Louisiana residents

Following up on our previous post, here’s even more local mental health resources, phone numbers and services.

If you know someone having trouble coping with the anniversary of Katrina – or who is just having problems trying to get things moving again in their life, pass this along.

— Louisiana Spirit Hurricane Recovery provides individual and group crisis counseling services. Call (225) 219-5000. The agency also operates a crisis line at (800) 273-TALK.

— Family Service of Greater New Orleans offers counseling to victims of Hurricane Katrina at several locations:
2515 Canal St., New Orleans, (504) 822-0800
201 Evans Road, Harahan, (504) 733-4031
1799 Stumpf Blvd., Gretna, (504) 361-0926
317 N. Jefferson, Covington, (985) 641-1025
3002 Jean Lafitte Parkway, Chalmette, (504) 271-3781
1377 Lindberg St., Slidell, (985) 641-7185.

— The Center for Family and Youth Services offers counseling and educational services on a sliding fee schedule.
(985) 331-1999 | www.centerhope.org | 13101 River Road, Luling

— The Metropolitan Human Services District is providing services for addictive disorders, developmental disabilities and mental health treatment at these clinics:
Central City Behavioral Health Clinic, 2221 Philip St., New Orleans, (504) 568-6686
Chartres Pontchartrain Behavioral Health Clinic, 719 Elysian Fields Ave., New Orleans, (504) 942-8101
Plaquemines Behavioral Health Clinic, 3708 Main St., Belle Chasse, (504) 393-5624
Algiers Fischer Community Clinic, 4422 Gen. Meyer Ave., New Orleans, (504) 210-7611
Tulane Medical Clinic at Covenant House, 611 N. Rampart St., New Orleans, (504) 584-1100
MHSD Division for Citizens with Developmental Disabilities, 1010 Common St., New Orleans, (504) 599-0245. Call (504) 568-6686 or (866) 248-0662. After hours and weekends, call the Cope Line at (800) 749-2673.

— Odyssey House Louisiana offers several programs: Katrina Aid Today provides support services for hurricane victims, connecting victims to resources and assisting in developing personal recovery plans. Substance Abuse Treatment provides outpatient counseling, including services for those living with HIV/AIDS. The Community Prisoner Re-entry program assists nonviolent, non-sex offenders with transition to the community after release from prison. Call (504) 821-9211.

— Volunteers of America offers free adolescent suicide prevention counseling for ages 13 through 24. Contact Elaine Lane at (504) 485-0147.

— The National Suicide Hotline offers mental health support and counseling 24 hours a day. Call (800) 273-8255.

— First Baptist Church of New Orleans offers free crisis counseling for those affected by stress from Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. Call (504) 482-5775.

— The T.E.C. Counseling and Training Center at Our Lady of Holy Cross College, 4123 Woodland Drive, Algiers, offers counseling services Mondays through Thursdays, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Call (504) 398-2168.

— The Orleans Parish coroner’s office has a psychiatrist available to process requests for orders of protective custody. These allow emergency psychiatric evaluations for people suffering from mental illness or substance abuse. Concerned family members or caretakers may call Dr. Jeffrey Rouse at (504) 658-9660.

— The Greater New Orleans Mental Health and Resilience task force is a group of public and private behavioral health partners working on post-Katrina mental health. For information on community resources and meetings, e-mail NOMHR-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

— U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has a confidential help line for hurricane survivors. Call (800) 789-2647.

— National Suicide Prevention crisis counseling hotline: (800) 273-8255.

— American Red Cross’ Access to Care provides long-term recovery support to victims of Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma. Visit www.a2care.org or call (866) 794-HOPE.

Adapted from a post on the LiveJournal NewOrleans community.

New Orleans Post-K Stats

The Greater New Orleans Community Data Center has just updated their website with the latest New Orleans Index. This 2 year anniversary summary is a snapshot on the current state of the city and its surrounding parishes.

Health Care & Katrina…Two Years Later

The Kaiser Family Foundation has dedicated resources in the aftermath of the disaster to track the rebuilding efforts of the New Orleans area with a special focus on the health care needs of residents.

As part of this effort, the Foundation has created a Health Care in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina resource page, offering a wealth of resources related to an ongoing effort to monitor and study the health coverage and needs of the victims.

Here you’ll find surveys, survivor experiences, statistics and health coverage reports. Visitors can even listen to interviews, including one from from Cathi Fontenot, M.D., medical director, Medical Center of Louisiana at New Orleans, discussing the current health care situation in New Orleans two years later.

Forget Google ~ try MEDgle

MEDgle is a new search engine designed with patients in mind.

Describing itself as a “personalized medical search by doctors for everyone (for informational purposes only)”, MEDgle is a search for general medical conditions. Users can type in their symptoms or click on the body part image to see the associated symptoms. You can also personalize your search by adding ethnicity, pregnancy status, drinking/smoking frequency, and more.

MEDgle excludes psychiatric, neonatal, obstetrics, orthopedics and other medical subspecialty information, & search results are described as “part of general medical knowledge learned in medical school and residency.” Even so, it is an interesting resource for patient health information.