There have been a number of stories recently about doctors armed with iPhones, using the device to save time and start making the almost extinct house call come back.
Business Week got on the case with a long feature about “Dr. iPhone,” calling it a “critical tool for saving time and improving the quality of the care” provided by the doc profiled, Dan Diamond, a family practitioner who works at the Doctors Clinic in Silverdale, Washington.
“If I leave my iPhone at home, I will turn around and go back for it,” he says. “It’s that important.”
Of 22 applications Diamond has installed on his iPhone, 10 are health related. The most important, he says, is Epocrates Essentials, which lets him quickly check for drug interactions, look up disease symptoms and find out what lab tests he might need to order. “I don’t have everything I need to know memorized,” Diamond says. “This makes me look like I do.”
Interesting that traditional media is looking into how smart phones change the medical profession — just like they are changing police work and other sectors — but how many docs use them?
Photo credit: Lezlie Sterling [email protected]
Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco freelance writer who heads up Cult of Mac Magazine, our weekly publication available on iTunes. You can find her on Twitter and Google+. If you’re doing something new, cool and Apple-related, email her.
