Here’s a recent post from Not Nurse Ratched that lists five things she uses her iPhone for at work: the programs/apps or features she uses are Epocrates, the calculator, Ratios, DrugInfusion, and Instant ECG. A Web site called Software Advice recently sent us the results of a useful survey on the use of smartphones among medical personnel. The figure below shows the most popular uses of smartphones at work, not just for nurses but for a variety of health care industry workers.
We know many nurses have already begun to use whatever smartphone they may have to access 5-Minute Clinical Consult, a Wolters Kluwer product (full disclosure: AJN is owned by Wolters Kluwer) that “provides instant access to the essentials of 700+ medical conditions” and ”includes dermatology images, videos of medical procedures, AAFP patient handouts, drug database and more.” It can be downloaded to many types of mobile device — iPhone, BlackBerry, Palm, Android, or Windows Mobile.
But let us know: how are you using smartphones/handheld devices at the bedside? If not, do you plan to start using one? And do they really help?
-Jacob Molyneux, senior editor/blog editor
