Health-Related Podcasts

We've talked about podcasts briefly in class before. As you'll recall (or may already know), podcasting is a method of distributing multimedia files, such as audio programs or music videos, over the Internet for playback on mobile devices and personal computers.

I've been wondering when and how people are going to start using podcasting for health-related purposes, and I came across a terrific resources from the University of Denver and Health Sciences Center. Here, they explain what podcasting is, and how to create a podcast, and they also provide links to a number of health-related uses of podcasting.

Some of the major uses for podcasting and health are for journals, Grand Rounds, subject specialities for health professionals, education for medical students, and as a resources for patient info.

Student Presentations Begin, 4/25

We begin student presentations in class tomorrow. I've posted a grading rubric for the presentations on the course wiki. This should be pretty straightforward from what I've said in class before, but be sure to check it out before you present.

Each presenter will have 20 minutes to make their presentation. Since we only have four people presenting this time, we'll go ahead and keep to our usual schedule with time at the beginning of class to work on your blogs.

And, don't worry...there's no juggling, acrobatics, or dancing required!

New Study: Health Information Literacy

A new study has just been published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research about "health information literacy" that is very relevant to many of the ideas that we've talked about in class.

You can read the entire article here, but I just pulled out a couple of snippets from the abstract:

"Even though most students (89%) understood that a one-keyword search is likely to return too many documents, few students were able to narrow a search by using multiple search categories simultaneously or by employing Boolean operators. In addition, nearly half of the respondents had trouble discriminating between primary and secondary sources of information as well as between references to journal articles and other published documents. When presented with questionable websites on nonexistent nutritional supplements, only 50% of respondents were able to correctly identify the website with the most trustworthy features. Less than a quarter of study participants reached the correct conclusion that none of the websites made a good case for taking the nutritional supplements. Up to 45% of students were unsure if they needed to provide references for ideas expressed in paraphrased sentences or sentences whose structure they modified. Most respondents (84%) believed that their research skills were good, very good, or excellent. ...

Conclusions: While the majority of students think that their research skills are good or excellent, many of them are unable to conduct advanced information searches, judge the trustworthiness of health-related websites and articles, and differentiate between various information sources. Students’ self-reports may not be an accurate predictor of their actual health information competencies."

This corresponds to what I've seen in my own research with adolescents (15-19) and their abilities with search engines. In most instances, the young people I've talked to have a sense that their research skills are "good or excellent" yet they have difficulty critically analyzing the trustworthiness of various sources of information.

Something to think about: what has helped you the most to think critically about information you find on the web?

Easy as 1, 2, 3...

Are you old enough to remember that Michael Jackson song, "Easy as 1, 2, 3..." ? Probably not as this was way (way) before even the days of "Thriller."

Finding and uploading images, photos and pix to your blog is just that easy.

One way to add visuals to your blog is by using digital photos. If you've got digital photos on your computer already, you can just click on the "Add Image" icon in your editing window on Blogger and it will add the image for you (just follow the steps).


Another way to add visuals if you don't have any digital photos on your computer, is to find images someone else has created and posted on the web. One of the easiest ways to do this is by going to Google Images and typing in a keyword for what you're looking for. Not sure what you're looking for? Auntie Google can help, try typing in the title of your blogger post and see what comes up. Then, click to download the image (if you're on someone else's computer this can be easily erased once you've uploaded the image).



Finally, there's a third way to add visual images to your blog. This requires being vastly more tech-savvy than your professor (as I have not done this before), but you can actually add photos to your blog directly from your cell phone! Amazing, huh? If anyone actually does this, let me know... I want to hear how you did it.

See, adding images as easy as 1, 2, 3...!

For more on adding images to your blog, go here.

New Media: Text and Visuals

In developing the grading rubric for the blogs, one of the categories is "visual" style. Several people in the class are doing this well already, better than I am (!!!), and I wanted to mention their blogs here. You should check out Eneyda's blog and Alisa's blog. Both of these have a really good sense of incorporating text with the visual. For me, this is one of the aspects of new media that is so invigorating is the use of text with compelling visuals.

I'm going to start following my own advice and ad some pix and other visuals here. I've already added a profile pic.

What sort of visuals have you added to your blog?

IT - By African Women, for African Women

My customized Google News (it pulls stories with the word "women" in the title or first sentence) alerted me about this gender and IT story out of Africa (via the Indo-Asia News Service):

"LinuxChix Africa was formed in 2004 'by African women for African women' because, as one of the co-founders Dorcas Muthoni says, 'people fear computers and women are more affected by this fear'.

'But with a lot of technology tools coming into their lives, women are becoming more and more open to this (computers). The whole IT industry has opened a lot of specialised areas, which are not necessary geeky,' Muthoni said.

The group plans to acquaint schoolgirls with IT as an industry so as to enable them to choose IT as a career. Thanks to its efforts, networking, web design and web development are no longer a taboo area for women.

Muthoni said: 'We see LinuxChix Africa as a solution provider and also a development organisation.'

The group is a chapter in Africa affiliated to Linuxchix worldwide. Another group started in India just a few months back.

South Africa's Anna Badimo and Kenya's Muthoni - both co-founders of Linuxchix Africa - are focused on implementing activities.

'We are working to get communication going with other partners across the continent. We've been drafting our business plan for the next three years. Basically, we are emphasising networking, both for recruiting members and for recruiting partners,' Muthoni said.

Africa faces a number of challenges currently - AIDS, illiteracy, the lack of development, building up the educational infrastructure, an unfair global economic system and more.

Linuxchix Africa argues that community development can no longer be viewed in isolation but require multi-tiered, cross-sectoral, and well-coordinated approaches that are aligned to information and communications technology (ICT).

'Without ICT, communities get left behind and are unable to take advantage of its social and economic benefits,' argues the group on its website - africalinuxchix.org.

FLOSS, or Free/Libre and Open Source Software, now makes it possible to make software available to people who could otherwise not afford it.

Countries will no longer have to prioritise between poverty and the digital divide. Women, affected the most, need to be "properly tooled and positioned" to make that difference in their lives, Muthoni said.

Hoping to make the field of ICT less male-dominated, Muthoni and Badimo are going about adding details to their effort at gender parity.

'Few people in our part of the world have contact with, or a background in, IT. Women also try to avoid science or mathematics. They've not been in big numbers in IT or computers. So we've had very few opportunities for women to interact or mentor other women,' Muthoni added.

What I find interesting about this story is the unique attempt to bridge one aspect of the 'digital divide' with a specific focus on gender. This is crucial given efforts, such as those explained by Jennifer Nadeau of the Guttmacher Institute, when trying to bring sexual and reproductive health information to women in Africa. I say, BRAVA to LinuxChix!

RSS Explained

For those of you looking for content for your blogs, I'd to point you to the technology of RSS, or "real simple syndication," which can help you with getting content for your blog.

Here's a blog that explains RSS.

Feedback on Blogs

Everyone in the class should have received an individual email from me giving you feedback on your blog. If you haven't receive this email, or if you received the email but have trouble opening the attachment, let me know.

Communicating with Policy Makers

Yesterday, we were honored to have Dr. Jennifer Nadeau, Director of Communications at the Guttmacher Institute make a presentation to the class.

Nadeau explained the mission of her organization, "to communicate research about reproductive health to policy makers, journalists and other decision-makers" and some of what she does as Director of Communications, "communicate research in plain language."

There are a number of points that Nadeau made in her presentation that I wanted to highlight here.

First, she talked about the strategic use of different types of media for different types of communication. In several settings (W. Africa) with various audiences (policy makers), new media is simply not the most effective mechanism for communicating. However, in terms of reaching journalists she pointed out that the Institute's website is a crucial tool for getting information to the media. I found her discussion of the way quotes are generated (often made up by communications staff) and used by journalists (they need these to write articles, but rarely call to get quotes given tight deadlines) to be particularly illuminating.

(On a related note, though not discussed in class, you should note the distinction here between the way articles are written by journalists and the methods used for peer-reviewed articles, such as the journals that the Institute publishes. )

Second, her discussion of the uses of new media and emerging technologies, such as Skype, for internal and project communication is an important one. We need to think of new technologies as not only changing the way we communicate health messages, we need to also consider how these technologies can change the way we do our jobs in developing and fine-tuning those messages within health-focused organizations.

Third, Nadeau addressed some of the constraints on the Institute's work based on the political context surrounding reproductive health. This is something we've heard before, in Estelle Raboni's presentation on TEENWIRE.com. The social, political and cultural context in which health messages are created and distributed is an important factor to address, whether you are talking about reproductive health or another area. And, it makes the Guttamacher Institute's focus on communicating with policy makers all the more crucial.

“Open Source” and “Open Medicine” at UN

There is an interesting symposium at the UN on Thursday, 4/13/06, that is relevant to the course and might be of interest to some in the class.

UNU-MERIT holds Research Symposium on “Open Source” and “Open Medicine” at UN Headquarters

Can an Intellectual Property regime designed to protect private interests be reformed to open up standards and knowledge? What results when government authorities promote free, open source software in their jurisdictions? Who (if anyone) should own or control access to the human genome sequence? What parallels can be drawn with the fundamental principles of 'openness' for science and society as a whole?

These are among the issues to be discussed at a Research Symposium titled Challenging Intellectual Property Access to Knowledge Issues in Open Source and Medicine, at the UN Headquarters, New York, on 13 April 2006 . The event is co-organized by the United Nations University -Office at the United Nations, New York , and UNU-MERIT.

The speakers include:

* Tim Hubbard, Head of Human Genome Analysis, The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute,
Cambridge, UK;
* Louis-Dominique Ouédraogo, Retiring Inspector, UN Joint Inspection Unit;
* Tadao Takahashi, Principal Investigator at Project Foresight ICTs-2015, Centre for
Strategic Studies in Brazil; and
* Rishab Aiyer Ghosh, Senior Researcher, UNU-MERIT.

The event is open to interested members of the public. Registration forms can be downloaded from the website of the UNU Office at the United Nations , New York .


See full announcement here.

Health Disparities Symposium @ Columbia U

The First Annual University Research Symposium for Understanding Fundamental Disparities in Health will be held on Monday, April 24,from 8:45 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. in the Low Library Rotunda at Columbia University.

Keynote Speakers will be Antonia C. Novello, MD, MPH, DrPH, New YorkState Health Commissioner and 14th Surgeon General of the UnitedStates, and David Satcher, MD, PhD, Interim President, MorehouseSchool of Medicine and 16th Surgeon General of the United States.

The purpose of the symposium is to stimulate thinking about theunderlying themes or fundamental social causes of health disparities and to initiate the development of cross-disciplinary Working Groups that could coalesce and continue after the Symposium.

Advance registration is required. To register,

Guttmacher Institute

I've just heard from our guest speaker from the Guttmacher Institute, Jennifer Nadeau, Director of Communications, and she will be joining us for the second half of the class today.

Please take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with her organization (linked above), and think about what kinds of questions you want to ask Ms. Nadeau.

Digital Divide - Closing?

The New York Times reported last week that the digital divide may be closing for African Americans, and that story has been picked up by lots of other folks around the Internet.

An interesting fact concerning these new findings about African Americans and the Internet is that, as the Marketing Profs point out on their blog, "the falling price of laptops, more computers in public schools and libraries, and the newest generation of cell phones and handheld devices that connect to the internet have helped more people to gain access the internet."

To me, this is highlights two important facts: 1) it illustrates the interconnectedness of race and class; and, 2) it demonstrates the shift from the locked-down "desktop" model of the Internet to the mobile-computing, ubiquituous model that Howard Rheingold sketched out in his prescient book, Smart Mobs.

PEW: An Essential Resource

As folks in the class start to do some serious preparation for their projects, I wanted to remind you of an essential resource: The Pew Internet & American Life Project.

These folks do some terrific work. At their website (linked above) you can always find new, rigorously researched, and accessibly written reports.

Of course, I should also tell you one of my dreams is that the Pew will decide to create a New York office and I will get to work there. HA! Now you know.

Enjoy the Pew!

Internet in Medicine Conference

If you are interested in finding out what's happening in the growing field of Internet in medicine, you might want to consider attending this conference.

World Congress on Internet in Medicine (MEDNET 2006) in Toronto, Canada: October 13-20, 2006. Topics include "ehealth technologies for healthy eating and active lifestyle," among many others.

This would be a great opportunity to learn more about the field, especially if you have an employer who would pay for you to attend. Otherwise, it's worth a bookmark for future reference.

Study of Email Messages to Promote Health Behavior

Researchers at UMass and Syracuse have just published a study called, "Using Sequential Email Messages to Promote Health Behaviors: Evidence of Feasibility and Reach in a Worksite Sample," that some may find interesting.

The study, which you can read here, surveyed 960 employees at a worksite of a large insurance company, then:

"participants received daily emails, Monday through Friday, for 26 weeks. The emails provided (a) succinct strategies to encourage physical activity or increase fruit and vegetable intake and (b) links to detailed Web-based information and tools. Program reach was assessed by the number of emails opened, measures of sustained participation over 6 months, and the number of health-related Web-links clicked."

While the title of the research article suggests that the email messages "promote health behavior," in fact, what the researchers are measuring is whether or not the study participants opened email or visited health-related websites. Although they found fairly high rates of "email opening" over time (and these did not vary by gender, age, income, education, ethnicity, or baseline health behavior), whether or not there is a connection between health-related "email opened" and actual health behavior change, remains an open question.

Upping the Ante and Leading by Example ~

So, in class yesterday, I mentioned that I've raised my expectations about how frequently people post to their individual blogs, "upping the ante," so to speak (a phrase used in playing poker).

I thought I would lead by example, and start posting more here about issues related to e-health as I come across them. I get items through my email inbox and on my customized news sources that I'll post here and comment about.

And, as a reminder about the class, I've revised the grading rubric for blogs based on your comments and you should find a copy of that in your inbox.

Screening Messages

In class on Tuesday, we heard from Martine Hackett, Ph.D. Candidate at the CUNY Graduate Center. Martine's presentation touched on the intersections between Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) and electronic media, specifically on how the Internet is being used to address SIDS.

After an overview of the history of public health campaigns, with an emphasis on the combination of visual imagery and text message in early posters, she then turned to new technology and more recent public health campaigns. Finally, she focused on how electronic media relates to audience.

In terms of how the Internet is used to communicate health messages about SIDS, Martine posited three types of communication: 1) Official Sources, including governmental agencies and non-profit organizations; 2) Professional to Professional, via a state to state listserv; and, 3) Parent to Parent, via message boards, blogs and memorial sites.

There were some interesting discussions in the class about how "horizontally segregated" these forms of communications remain. In other words, Martine posits that most of the communication is within and among professional or parent groups, and rarely are these boundaries crossed. Some in the class, like Alisa, didn't see anything wrong with this. Others, such as Velma and Lorraine, suggested that parents may know more than professionals about how they incorporate public health messages into their lives. Martine suggests that there is a middle ground for discussion between reified "scientific" knowledge and parents' culturally-grounded knowledge of parenting skills.

I'm hoping that in your blog entries about this presentation that you will find and provide links to some of the parent-to-parent message boards, blogs, and memorial sites.

All in all, a terrific presentation and a good discussion. I've posted the PPT over in Blackboard for you to review.

A meta-note about the presentation: Class members should also note that this presentation should serve as a guide for what is expected in the in-class presentations by students beginning 4/25/06. While you don't need to provide the kind of historical background that Martine so expertly did, you should follow Martine's lead in the way that she educated the class about SIDS and then looked at the way new media is being used to address this health concern. In addition, you should then look at what the peer-reviewed literature says on the use of new media related to your topic.

Grading Rubric for Blogs & Wikis

I've come up with a draft for a grading rubric for evaluating your work on the blogs and the wiki and want to discuss it this morning in class.

Basically, the categories I'm thinking of include: Content, Organization, Audience, Style, and Mechanics. Then, within each of these categories evaluations would be rated "Excellent," "Good" or "Fair."

Give these categories, and these levels of evaluation, some thought and we'll discuss. I'm very open to students' input on this and it's a chance for you to influence how your grade for the course is determined.