The explosive growth of Facebook and MySpace illustrates the market for electronic tools to enhance communication and collaboration. Could there possibly be another workplace more in need of social networking tools than the modern hospital?If you are not familiar with Facebook, find yourself a teenager and take a look over his shoulder while he is ...

This is one of the most commonly asked questions in IT World, and my answer has always been “CPOE first” – largely because that has always been David Bates’s (the world’s leading IT/safety researcher) answer. But I’ve changed my mind. Here’s why.Before I start, I promised that I’d let you know if I ever blogged on a topic in which I have a ...

Great quote by USC cardiologist Leslie Saxon (a reporter reached her on her cell phone as Leslie was shopping) on this week’s NEJM study on delayed defibrillation: “You’re better off having your arrest [here] at Nordstrom [than in a hospital]… because there are 15 people around me.”You’ve probably seen the study, a detailed analysis of ...

The pharmaceutical industry’s influence in clinical care is increasingly being viewed under a high-powered microscope, and the result is tightening restrictions on what pharma can do with/for/to doctors. Having lived through the era of sun-baked golf and beach “conferences” (with the invited physicians paid handsomely as “consultants”), this extra ...