Archive for the ‘Infectious Disease’ Category

MitchellSteinberg
Mitchell
Steinberg

Imagine That – Smart Phone Diagnosis

Friday, April 29th, 2011

Here’s a cool idea – a team of University of Central Florida students is working on a smart phone application that will help healthcare workers in remote locations diagnose malaria quickly and easily. Using a smart-phone equipped with Windows 7 and a microscopic camera lens, the app will take pictures of a blood sample, identify and point out malaria parasites, and tell the user how much malaria is in the blood. Because it doesn’t use the internet, the application could be especially useful for a healthcare worker in a remote location without Internet access, such as an African village. The data can be uploaded later, however, to help identify disease trends.

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Posted in Awards, Disease Awareness, Health 2.0, Immunization, Infectious Disease, Medical Devices
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jseng
John
Seng

Own Up On Disease Prevention, Oprah!

Wednesday, February 16th, 2011

McCarthy and Winfrey: Scaring the Public About Vaccines

An op-ed in the February 2011 edition of SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN laments recent increases in pertussis, or whooping cough, in California, suggesting the trend may result from parents’ growing reluctance to permit their children to receive vaccines. For those of us not familiar – yet – with whooping cough, the magazine describes the disease as “known…for the distinctive sound its victims make when gasping for air after a fit of paroxysmal coughing…”

There’s nothing wrong with a good measure of healthy skepticism about even long-proven medical treatments and procedures. But why do so many people favor fear over solid science and their own pediatrician’s recommendations?

Here’s one reason: When the television icon of the past quarter century and her Hollywood autism spokesmodel say it’s so, many parents can’t help but agree there must be some, any kind of connection. After all, goes the TV wisdom, a child is perfectly healthy before the vaccine, and just look now.

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Posted in Chronic Disease, Disease Awareness, Infectious Disease
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Spectrum

Walking, or running, in a healthy winter wonderland

Thursday, December 16th, 2010

Baby, (here in DC) it’s cold outside this holiday season! Everyone’s got tips for being naughty or nice when it comes to your health this time of year. Want the scientific basis for keeping the holidays healthy? Here’s our list (Don’t worry, we’ve checked it twice!) to keep you looking your best and feeling even better as you ring in 2011.

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Posted in Biotechnology, Chronic Disease, Health 2.0, Infectious Disease, Public Health
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MollyHippolitus
Molly
Hippolitus

Go Ahead, Pee Your Pants, it’s Good for You

Tuesday, November 9th, 2010

OK, so maybe not your pants, but soon you’ll be able to pee on your phone. At least that’s the UK’s plan to cut the rate of STD infection among the young population. Doctors and tech experts are developing ‘phone kits’ – small devices, similar to a home pregnancy test – that will be able to diagnose you quickly and privately if you believe you may have been in contact with an STD.

The self-testing device is aimed at young, tech-savvy people, who also have a growing infection rate among the UK population for sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Public health experts are concerned that it is this group, in particular, that are too embarrassed to visit a doctor or clinic to regularly test for STIs. Sexual health experts hope this new technology will reduce the growing number of STIs, which have increased for the last decade and reached a record 482,696 last year. Two-thirds of women reporting a new STI were under 25, as were more than half of men.  500x_mantextingphoto

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Posted in Health 2.0, Infectious Disease, mobile, Public Health
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JessicaGordon
Jessica
Gordon

Checking In: Deals, Prizes, and Sexual Health?

Friday, September 17th, 2010

“I could seriously stalk you.”  This is a comment I often hear from my friends due to the fact that I really enjoy checking in on FourSquare.  Not to mention, I LOVE getting deals when I check in (my favorite deal I received so far was 10 percent off my frozen yogurt at Berry Chill in Chicago).  As social media continues to be a large presence in our lives- from 145 million people on Twitter to 500 million people on Facebook – and with a rising trend of location based check-ins, could social media replace print advertising?  An interesting article in the Wall Street Journal outlines three things for businesses to do to develop relationships with their consumers via location based social media outlets like FourSquare and Facebook. jg-91710

I am sad to say that I was late in the game joining FourSquare, so I am not a mayor of any location yet; however, I do have my sights set on a coffee shop I frequent near my apartment.  Would I go there more often if they offered a check-in reward?  Absolutely.  Even ten percent off a purchase is enough to give incentive.  As I continue to go to this coffee shop, those ten percent off check-ins will begin to add up.  This is one of the tips offered in the WSJ article by Riva Richmond.   Richmond writes, “Even if you do nothing, people may discover you through location-based services.”  Additionally, Richmond spoke to a business owner in California that claims his social media customers are more frequent than anyone bringing in his coupons offered in print advertising.  Do more people pay attention to digital offers that what’s on paper these days?

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Posted in Health 2.0, Infectious Disease, mobile, Social Media, Women's Health
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Tonique
Heaven

Games That Changes Lives, Part II

Thursday, July 22nd, 2010

Last month, in Part I of this post, I discussed the “Games for Change & Health Workshop: Brainstorming and Game Design Jam for HIV/AIDS” that Spectrum hosted during Digital Capital Week. In part one, I covered the discussion on HIV/AIDS that took place and how a video game could be created to educate others on the disease. In this post, I’ll explore turning an idea for a game into reality.

After an in-depth discussion on the HIV/AIDS epidemic and a brief introduction of video game basics and strategy, Limor Schmafman, president of Keystone Tech and chief instigator of Games Gateway, led the group’s brainstorming session. I was excited to turn our newfound knowledge into a game that could actually make a difference in the growing HIV epidemic. The group had a healthy debate on the focus of the game: Should the game focus on HIV in DC or on a more global level? Is the target audience those who are already infected or is it people who might be unaware of HIV’s prevalence in the United States? Should the game be explicit or more abstract? (more…)

Posted in Disease Awareness, Infectious Disease
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