Mayo Clinic is launching two research-based consumer applications (apps) for iPhone and iPod Touch this quarter, the first in a variety of mobile health products and services supporting the goal of making Mayo’s expertise available to anyone, anywhere, anytime.

Mayo Clinic Symptom Checker, which launches today, provides users with focused, useful and actionable information from Mayo Clinic experts. User research dictated the simple, less-is-more nature of both the app design and its content. The free app features an adult and child symptom checker optimized for the mobile experience. It is designed to help people manage acute problems and provides guidance on practicing self-care at home, as well as insights into when additional care is needed. Mayo Clinic Symptom Checker also enables users to search MayoClinic.com for more information about thousands of health topics, and provides access to information about care at Mayo Clinic. Mayo’s approach was to apply user research to guide the first release and then get it into the hands of users as soon as possible. Feedback from users will guide the priorities for future releases. For a demonstration, go to Mayo Clinic News Blog.

Another app, Mayo Clinic Meditation, launched in early January and provides a form of alternative medicine that focuses on the mind-body connection. The app, which is currently available for $2.99 on iTunes, is based on four years of research by Amit Sood, M.D., a physician in complementary and integrative medicine at Mayo, and has been clinically validated by Mayo Clinic. Mind-body techniques strengthen the communication between your mind and body. Integrative medicine practitioners say these two systems must be in harmony for a person to stay healthy. The easy-to-use app can be practiced in the home, office or any quiet place.

While these first two applications are for consumers, Mayo Clinic envisions developing meaningful mobile health offerings for audiences that include patients, consumers, corporate clients, medical professionals, and academia. Some mobile products and services will be designed for use before, during, and after care at Mayo Clinic. Others will provide mobile enhancements and expanded distribution for Mayo Clinic’s many existing products and services. Ultimately, Mayo’s mobile health strategy will be a mix of native and mobile Web applications available across a variety of handsets and platforms.

“We are diligently focused on understanding the intricacies of a mobile platform and the needs and desires of users,” says Scott Eising, director of Advanced Market/Product Development at Mayo Clinic. “We intend to pair our expertise in health care with our growing understanding of the mobile world to develop products and services that are optimized for the mobile audience.”

For more information on Mayo Clinic’s mobile health applications, visit Mayo Clinic News Blog.

A Bangladeshi telemedicine company is set to provide healthcare services for more than five million South Asian workers in the Middle East and Malaysia in a couple of months.

Telemedicine Reference Centre Ltd (TRCL) has already signed agreements with around 25 Gulf and Malaysian companies that recruit workers from South Asia.

Telemedicine is a rapidly developing application of clinical medicine where medical information is transferred through the phone or the internet.

TRCL will launch the mobile phone-based service, said Dr Sikder M Zakir, managing director of the company.

“Under the project, we will start providing medical call-centre services to two million Bangladeshi, 1.5 million Indian and two million Nepalese and Pakistani workers,” Zakir added.

Prime Bank and two investors from the US and India are funding the project, he said.

TRCL has also signed deals with seven mobile phone companies in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, UAE, Qatar and Kuwait.

The company is working to set up multilinguistic medical call centres in India, Pakistan and Nepal, from where dedicated physicians will provide healthcare advice to the expatriate workers.

All the workers under the 25 recruiting companies will be registered with TRCL to get the services free of cost. They will call a particular number and get advice in their own language.

The recruiting firms will pay the service charge to TRCL on behalf of the workers, which is no more than one US dollar a month for a person, Zakir said.

They will also be referred to hospitals if necessary.

Zakir said TRCL is now setting up branch offices in nine countries including Malaysia, UAE and Saudi Arabia to comply with those countries’ regulatory requirements.

“It’s a milestone for telemedicine service. The sector is getting institutional shape,” he added.

Established in 1999, TRCL is operating the first medical call centre or electronic referral centre manned by physicians for the largest cellphone operator in Bangladesh — Grameenphone. More than 10,000 people are using the service by dialling a hotline number (789) from their mobile phones every day.

SYDNEY - Walking less than two miles a couple of times a week and taking a natural supplement can significantly ease the crippling pain of arthritis, a new study shows.

 Walking further or for five days a week did not make patients feel substantially better, the study also shows.

Experts recommend that most people walk for much longer, around 10,000 steps a day, to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

But there has been confusion over how much exercise those with osteoarthritis, the ‘wear and tear’ form of the condition, thought to affect around eight million people in Britain, should take.

Dr Kristiann Heesch, from the University of Queensland in Australia, who led the study, said: “These findings provide preliminary evidence that osteoarthritis sufferers can benefit from a combination of glucosamine sulphate and walking 3,000 steps per day for exercise, in bouts of at least 1,500 steps each, on at least three days per week.”

The supplement, glucosamine sulphate, which is made from the shells of shellfish, has previously been linked to easing the pain of arthritis, although the evidence has not been conclusive.

Volunteers took the supplement for six weeks, by the end of which their pain levels had fallen by 13 per cent.

They were then asked start taking regular exercise on top of the supplement.

By the end of six months patients reported that both their levels of pain and stiffness had halved, the findings, published in the journal Arthritis Research and Therapy, show.

Jane Tadman, from the Arthritis Research Campaign, said: “We know that exercise and keeping mobile is very important for people with arthritis to keep the muscles that support the joints strong and supple.

“But we don’t really know what the appropriate amount of exercise is, and this study is an attempt to answer that.”

She added: “Recent studies into the effectiveness of glucosamine have been very mixed, although anecdotally lots of people with osteoarthritis report some benefit.”

Jane Spence, from Arthritis Care, said: “Maintaining a healthy weight and taking a mixture of appropriate exercise and rest as advised by your health professional is sensible for people to manage their condition.

“Exercise is good for overall wellbeing, helps mobility, and actually lifts low spirits by releasing endorphins – the body’s natural ‘painkillers’ – into the bloodstream.”

The University of Queensland team admit that there study was small, with only 36 patients completing the full six months – in part because some were advised to drop out of the trial by their family doctor, concerned that they should not take too much exercise.

They have called for larger studies to validate their findings.

Last year similar research suggested that practising Tai Chi could ease the pain of arthritis.

The NHS performs 65,000 knee replacements a year, many on patients with arthritis of the knee.

We all think eating fruits means just buying fruits, cutting it and just popping it into our mouths. It’s not as easy as you think. It’s important to know how and when to eat.

What is the correct way of eating fruits?

IT MEANS NOT EATING FRUITS AFTER YOUR MEALS! * FRUITS SHOULD BE EATEN ON AN-EMPTY STOMACH.

If you eat fruit like that, it will play a major role to detoxify your system, supplying you with a great deal of energy for weight loss and other life activities.

FRUIT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT FOOD. Let’s say you eat two slices of bread and then a slice of fruit. The slice of fruit is ready to go straight through the stomach into the intestines, but it is prevented from doing so.

In the meantime the whole meal rots and ferments and turns to acid. The minute the fruit comes into contact with the food in the stomach and digestive juices, the entire mass of food begins to spoil.

So please eat your fruits on an empty stomach or before your meals! You have heard people complaining - every time I eat watermelon I burp, when I eat durian my stomach bloats up, when I eat a banana I feel like running to the toilet etc - actually all this will not arise if you eat the fruit on an empty stomach. The fruit mixes with the putrefying other food and produces gas and hence you will bloat!

Graying hair, balding, nervous outburst, and dark circles under the eyes all these will NOT happen if you take fruits on an empty stomach.

There is no such thing as some fruits, like orange and lemon are acidic, because all fruits become alkaline in our body, according to Dr.. Herbert Shelton who did research on this matter.  If you have mastered the correct way of eating fruits, you have the Secret of beauty, longevity, health, energy, happiness and normal weight.

When you need to drink fruit juice - drink only fresh fruit juice, NOT from the cans. Don’t even drink juice that has been heated up. Don’t eat cooked fruits because you don’t get the nutrients at all. You only get to taste. Cooking destroys all the vitamins.

But eating a whole fruit is better than drinking the juice.. If you should drink the juice, drink it mouthful by mouthful slowly, because you must let it mix with your saliva before swallowing it. You can go on a 3-day fruit fast to cleanse your body. Just eat fruits and drink fruit juice throughout the 3 days and you will be surprised when your friends tell you how radiant you look!

KIWI: Tiny but mighty. This is a good source of potassium, magnesium, vitamin E & fiber. Its vitamin C content is twice that of an orange.

APPLE: An apple a day keeps the doctor away? Although an apple has a low vitamin C content, it has antioxidants & flavonoids which enhances the activity of vitamin C thereby helping to lower the risks of colon cancer, heart attack & stroke.

STRAWBERRY: Protective Fruit. Strawberries have the highest total antioxidant power among major fruits & protect the body from cancer-causing, blood vessel-clogging free radicals.

ORANGE : Sweetest medicine. Taking 2-4 oranges a day may help keep colds away, lower cholesterol, prevent & dissolve kidney stones as well as lessens the risk of colon cancer.

WATERMELON: Coolest thirst quencher.. Composed of 92% water, it is also packed with a giant dose of glutathione, which helps boost our immune system. They are also a key source of lycopene - the cancer fighting oxidant. Other nutrients found in watermelon are vitamin C & Potassium..

GUAVA & PAPAYA: Top awards for vitamin C. They are the clear winners for their high vitamin C content. Guava is also rich in fiber, which helps prevent constipation. Papaya is rich in carotene; this is good f or your eyes.

Drinking Cold water after a meal = Cancer! Can u believe this?? For those who like to drink cold water, this article is applicable to you. It is nice to have a cup of cold drink after a meal. However, the cold water will solidify the oily stuff that you have just consumed. It will slow down the digestion. Once this ’sludge’ reacts with the acid, it will break down and be absorbed by the intestine faster than the solid food. It will line the intestine. Very soon, this will turn into fats and lead to cancer. It is best to drink hot soup or warm water after a meal..

A serious note about heart attacks HEART ATTACK PROCEDURE’: Women should know that not every heart attack symptom is going to be the left arm hurting. Be aware of intense pain in the jaw line.. You may never have the first chest pain during the course of a heart attack . Nausea and intense sweating are also common symptoms.. Sixty percent of people who have a heart attack while they are asleep do not wake up. Pain in the jaw can wake you from a sound sleep. Let’s be careful and be aware. The more we know the better chance we could survive…

JOIN US ON TWITTER - USTELEMEDICINE

insured people who use alternative remedies.  This means No Cost Medical Care, No Cost Refunds for your purchases of alternative remedies. 

US Tele-Medicine, a leader in Internet health care is offering No Cost Memberships to How is this possible?  Recent changes in health care take Tele-Medicine into special consideration.  Tele-Medicine is the forefront of health care and now it is in your favor. 

Imagine getting 30% 40% or even 50% CASH back for your purchases of vitamins, weight management products, supplements, protein shakes, homeopathics, flower remedies, herbal formulations and more.  You can and it’s FREE and easy to join.  Just click the JOIN NOW button above and your on your way to financial rewards at NO COST to you - ever.

BEVERLY HILLS – We are both honored and thrilled, to find our Link on hundreds of Blogs and health related web sites throughout the world.  If you too wish to link to our Blog, we invite you to do so.  We do not list a blog roll or links to other sites because of many conflicting medical theories and practices.  We post our blogs in the spirit that communications and information of all integrative modalities, brings awareness of health and personal wellness to a broad spectrum of people, who may not have concise alternative information at hand.

US Tele-Medicine is now on Twitter.  In the past 10 days we have posted 582 Tweets. Become a follower of the US Tele-Medicine Tweets.    

US Tele-Medicine, a leader in Internet health care is offering FREE Memberships to insured people who use alternative remedies.  This means FREE Medical Care, FREE Refunds for your purchases of alternative remedies. 

How is this possible?  Recent changes in health care take Tele-Medicine into special consideration.  Tele-Medicine is the forefront of health care and now it is in your favor. 

Imagine getting 30% 40% or even 50% CASH back for your purchases of vitamins, weight management products, supplements, protein shakes, homeopathics, flower remedies, herbal formulations and more.  You can and it’s FREE and easy to join.  Just click the JOIN NOW button above and your on your way to financial rewards at NO COST to you - ever.

Virtual Medical Visits

NEW YORK - “Telemedicine has the potential to improve quality of care by allowing clinicians in one ‘control center’ to monitor, consult and even care for and perform procedures on patients in multiple locations,” Doctor and Patient columnist Pauline Chen writes. “A rural primary care practitioner who sees a patient with a rare skin lesion, for example, can get expert consultation from a dermatologist at a center hundreds of miles away.”

The Times continues, “But despite its promise, telemedicine has failed to take hold in the same way that other, newer, technologies have. Not because of technical challenges, expense or insufficient need. On the contrary, the most daunting obstacle to date has been a deeply entrenched resistance on the part of providers”

Virtual Reality Tele-Rehab Improves Hand Function

BLOOMINGTON - Remotely monitored in-home virtual reality videogames improved hand function and forearm bone health in teens with hemiplegic cerebral palsy, helping them perform activities of daily living such as eating, dressing, cooking, and other tasks for which two hands are needed.

“While these initial encouraging results were in teens with limited hand and arm function due to perinatal brain injury, we suspect using these games could similarly benefit individuals with other illness that affect movement, such as multiple sclerosis, stroke, arthritis and even those with orthopedic injuries affecting the arm or hand,” said Meredith R. Golomb, M.D, M.Sc., Indiana University School of Medicine associate professor of neurology. A pediatric neurologist at Riley Hospital for Children, she is the first author of a pilot study which reported on the rehabilitative benefits of these custom videogames.

This project was done in collaboration with the Rutgers University Tele-Rehabilitation Institute, headed by Grigore Burdea, Ph.D., professor of electrical and computer engineering. The study appears in the January 2010 issue of Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.

The researchers also reported that improved hand function appears to be reflected in brain activity changes as seen on functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans.

The three study participants were asked to exercise the affected hand about 30 minutes a day, five days a week using a specially fitted sensor glove linked to a remotely monitored videogame console installed in their home. Games, such as one making images appear (”sliders”) were custom developed at Rutgers, calibrated to the individual teen’s hand functionality, included a screen avatar of the hand, and focused on improvement of whole hand function.

“Popular off-the-shelf games are targeted to people with normal hand and arm function and coordination. These games don’t work for or benefit those with moderate-severe hemiplegic cerebral palsy and many other disorders that affect movement. They just aren’t made to be used by or improve hands that can’t pinch or grasp” said Dr. Golomb.

In the future, physical therapists could remotely monitor patients’ progress and make adjustments to the intensity of game play to allow progressive work on affected muscles. In addition to meeting an unfulfilled need, this could potentially also save healthcare dollars and time.

Typically, insurance or government program coverage for rehabilitation therapy for cerebral palsy does not cover teens. Long term physical rehabilitation is costly. And even if cost is not an issue, taking an adolescent out of school and transporting him or her to the hospital or rehab center puts stress on both the patient and their parents. These specially developed games motivated rehabilitation exercises in the home at a time convenient for the teens, broadening access to rehabilitation

The Pill Bottle Gets a Cell Phone, to Remind You to Take Your Medicine

CAMBRIDGE - “Hi! This is your aspirin bottle calling. I haven’t seen you in a while. Why don’t you come see me soon? I’m good for the heart, you know.”

That’s the spirit, if not the wording, of the calls that will come from new pill bottle caps that connect to AT&T Inc.’s wireless network.

A Cambridge, Mass.-based startup called Vitality Inc. was set to announce the pill-bottle system Thursday, saying it helps solve one of the biggest problems in medicine: that people don’t consistently take the drugs they’re prescribed.

That costs the U.S. $290 billion in added medical spending each year, according to a study published in August by the New England Healthcare Institute. Mortality rates are twice as high among diabetes and heart disease patients who don’t take their pills properly, it said.

With Vitality’s system, when a pill-bottle cap is opened, it uses a close-range wireless signal to tell a base station in the home. That station, which looks like a night light, essentially has a cell phone inside that can send messages through AT&T’s network.

If the bottle isn’t opened at the appointed time, the cap and night light start blinking to remind the owner to take the medication. If that doesn’t serve as enough of a hint, they start playing jingles as well. If the bottle stays unopened, the night light will send a message to Vitality’s system, which can then place an automated phone call or send a text message with a reminder.

That points to another possibility opened by the wireless bottle cap: making the pill-taking routine more than just a matter between the patient and the bottle. Vitality’s system can be set to alert a relative if someone isn’t taking medicine.

“The social aspect of this is important,” Vitality CEO David Rose said. “Almost every successful behavior change program, the academics will tell you, involves social dynamics, whether it’s smoking cessation or Weight Watchers.”

A price for the new system hasn’t been disclosed. Vitality hopes insurance and drug companies will get on board with the system and cover the cost.

Vitality has been selling an earlier version of the product in small numbers from its Web site for $99. In that version, the night light doesn’t contain a cell phone. Instead it connects to a third piece of hardware, a “gateway” plugged into a home’s Internet router. But not all homes have routers, and configuring them can be tricky. The AT&T-powered night light simplifies the installation.

DES MOINES - Iowa State University has opened a Biofeedback Center for students to help them deal with stress.

Directed by Student Counseling Service staff psychologist Todd Pietruszka, the center is free and open to all ISU students.

The university is first of the three Regents’ universities to offer a biofeedback service to address students’ emotional needs.

The center has adopted technologies like video games and guided meditations to teach relaxation techniques, concentration skills and healthy coping responses.

It also teaches people to become aware of their physiological responses, while providing techniques like deep breathing, visualization or mindfulness, to consciously reset the body’s conditioned responses.

Pietruszka said: “Biofeedback is a fancy name. It really means getting information about your physical responses and using that information to take action.

“For example, when you take your temperature and find you have a fever, you might call the doctor.”

The compact room of the center has three massage recliners, each facing its own wall-mounted computer monitor.

Students begin with an orientation session that explains how to check out and use the equipment, and how to navigate the computer programs.

During a biofeedback session, the room is quiet and darkened as the students sit in the recliners wearing noise-cancelling headphones and fingertip sensors, which measure skin conductance and heart rate.

Three choices of computer software offer a variety of self-guided, interactive programs.

As students practice the relaxation techniques presented, they can watch real-time graphs of their physiological responses.

This information helps them identify the activities that work best for them. Once mastered, they can use the techniques whenever needed-before taking a test or giving a class presentation, for example.

Sessions last from 15 minutes to an hour or more.

Pietruszka said: “The training module teaches how to become aware of your body, how to use breathing, how to become mindful of your thoughts.

“As you practice and use the tools and get feedback, you can see what works for you.

“Biofeedback is really a way to have a coach. It basically lets you know when relaxation techniques are working.”

Iowa State’s Information Technology Services’ Computation Advisory Committee’s fund of 4,654 dollars helped establish the center.

Alternative Supplements Can Now Be Claimed on Your Insurance and Get a Cash Refund

BEVERLY HILLS – If you use vitamins, minerals, supplements, meal replacements or other forms of natural medicines, you can claim these expenses on your health insurance.  US Tele-Medicine (www.ustelemedicine.com) offers this FREE service.

You simply sign on and become an E-Patient.  Then when you buy your supplements or vitamins, simply log-on to the site and file your claim for the amount for purchase.  There is NO Cost to you.

Click here: www.epatienthealthcare.com to enroll for Free and start getting some money back. You have nothing to lose and No Risk.  

SALT LAKE CITY - Novel iPhone applications developed by University of Utah researchers could help students, doctors and patients study the human body, evaluate medical problems and analyse other three-dimensional images.

The researchers have developed three iPhone apps, which are available via Apple’s online iTunes App Store.

The first applications is called ImageVis3D Mobile, which lets iPhone users easily display, rotate and otherwise manipulate 3-D images of medical CT and MRI scans, and a wide range of scientific images, from insects to molecules to engines.

The application, which is available free on the iTunes store, is based on computer software from the university’s Scientific Computing and Imaging (SCI) Institute.

Another application-AnatomyLab-allows students to conduct a “virtual dissection” by providing images of a real human cadaver during 40 separate stages of dissection. All you have to do is hit the “View Cadaver” button.

The software, available for 9.99 dollars, has been designed by biology Professor-Lecturer Mark Nielsen and two University of Utah students, including his son.

The third application, called My Body, a scaled-down version of AnatomyLab, is available for 1.99 dollars and is intended for the general public, including “anyone curious about what their body looks like,” said Nielsen.

The SCI Institute is also developing another iPhone app, called ViSUS, which now allows users of desktop and laptop computers - and soon iPhones - to quickly and easily analyse and edit massive image files containing hundreds of gigabytes of data.

ImageVis3D Mobile and ViSUS “help people visualize and manipulate large amounts of image data,” particularly biomedical images, said Chris Johnson, director of the SCI Institute and a distinguished professor of computer science.

Nielsen says AnatomyLab is meant for students and teachers, but “a lot of medical professionals are buying it because they can show it to their patients on the spot and clarify injuries or problems they are discussing with them about their body.”

Johnson said that doctors could use ImageVis3D Mobile the same way, but with images from patients’ own CT or MRI scans.

“We assume the doctor already has looked at and analyzed the image data on a larger display device.

Now he goes back to the patient and can display that visualization interactively on a mobile device like the iPhone without having to go back to a computer screen somewhere else,” said Johnson.

BEER SHEVA - A new study done by Israeli scientists has shown that heartburn drugs are safe for the foetus.

The study, conducted by researchers at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel, has been published in the Journal of Clinical Pharmacology.

According to the new findings H2 blocker drugs like Famotidine, Cimetidine and Ranitidine, administered to pregnant women for reducing acid influx can be safely used.

The H2 blockers are the most commonly used medication to relieve acid reflux symptoms of heartburn, regurgitation and trouble swallowing in pregnant women.

Dr. Rafael Gorodischer, professor emeritus at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev said: “Of the vast majority of medications approved for use, there is insufficient data from human studies to determine whether the benefits of therapy exceed the risk to the fetus.

“Medicines are approved for use only after there is sufficient scientific evidence demonstrating the drug safety and effectiveness for its intended uses.”

“Exposure to H2 blockers among this group was not associated with significantly increased risks of major congenital malformations. The results were unchanged when therapeutic abortions of exposed fetuses were included in the analysis.

Also, infants exposed in utero had no increased risk of perinatal mortality, low birth weight or premature birth,” said Dr. Amalia Levy of the BGU Faculty of Health Sciences.

SYDNEY - Australian scientists have found that the bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans catalyses the biomineralisation of gold by transforming toxic gold compounds to their metallic form using active cellular mechanism.

According to Frank Reith, leader of the research and working at the University of Adelaide, “A number of years ago we discovered that the metal-resistant bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans occurred on gold grains from two sites in Australia.

“The sites are 3500 km apart, in southern New South Wales and northern Queensland, so when we found the same organism on grains from both sites we thought we were onto something,” he said.

“It made us wonder why these organisms live in this particular environment. The results of this study point to their involvement in the active detoxification of Au complexes leading to formation of gold biominerals,” he added.

The experiments showed that C. metallidurans rapidly accumulates toxic gold complexes from a solution prepared in the lab.

This process promotes gold toxicity, which pushes the bacterium to induce oxidative stress and metal resistance clusters as well as an as yet uncharacterized Au-specific gene cluster in order to defend its cellular integrity.

This leads to active biochemically-mediated reduction of gold complexes to nano-particulate, metallic gold, which may contribute to the growth of gold nuggets.

By determining what elements there are, scientists can see where the gold is located in relation to the cells.

For this study, scientists combined synchrotron techniques at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) and the Advanced Photon Source (APS) and molecular microbial techniques to understand the biomineralisation in bacteria.

It is the first time that these techniques have been used in the same study, so Frank Reith brought together a multinational team of experts in both areas for the success of the experiment.

This is the first direct evidence that bacteria are actively involved in the cycling of rare and precious metals, such as gold.

These results open the doors to the production of biosensors.

“The discovery of an Au-specific operon means that we can now start to develop gold-specific biosensors, which will help mineral explorers to find new gold deposits,” said Reith.

As medical providers, we believe that patients who are seeking wellness deserve a choice. You ought to have a choice in medicines. In addition to synthetic prescription drugs, there are natural medicines which may be more beneficial to you, but insurance companies offer you no such choice.

Integrated medicines have always been an out of pocket expense. The purchase of expensive natural and integrated medicines causes financial burdens on the average patient, because there is no reimbursement. The patient is only guilty of trying to feel better, live longer with fewer complications, and find relief for pain and chronic conditions.

It is our firm belief this added financial encumbrance on people, especially these days, is both unfair and unjust. We know that even the most generous health care reform enacted in 2009-2010 will take two years to realization.

Therefore, we elected to assign a percentage of our income to our E-Care patients. We trust these monies will empower those patients to purchase and use integrated medicines for their complete health and wellness.

We provide people with the financial freedom of choice.

ROCHESTER - For centuries, humans have looked for signs of diseased tissue and organs by tapping the outside of the body to measure stiffness. Obviously such a method is only so effective, especially when trying to evaluate someone’s liver, say, or heart. And more modern biopsies, while highly effective, are invasive procedures that involve removing tissue for examination.

Since 2007, researchers at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., have been working with magnetic resonance elastography (MRE), a medical imaging technique developed to non-invasively diagnose and monitor disease.

The device they use, MR-Touch, uses low-frequency sound waves for just 15 seconds at the tail end of a typical MRI procedure to measure tissue elasticity. It is essentially touching the tissue through vibration instead of surgery.

“Abnormal tissue stiffness can actually be a cause of some disease processes,” Richard L. Ehman, professor of radiology who heads up the team that developed MRE at the Mayo Clinic, said in a GE statement:

Many regions of the body are not accessible to palpation, and conventional diagnostic imaging technologies do not allow physicians to assess tissue stiffness. The introduction of MR elastography…is an important milestone. It will also allow physicians around the world to explore new applications of this unique diagnostic imaging technology.

Recently cleared by the Federal Drug Administration, the MR-Touch has been licensed to GE Healthcare, which announced the device for commercial use at the 2009 meeting of the Radiologic Society of North America in Chicago this week.

MRE has been mostly used at the Mayo Clinic to diagnose liver disease because the disease is so widespread and, if detected in time, the resulting scarring (fibrosis of the liver) can be treated before the tissue becomes so stiff that it leads to cirrhosis, which is irreversible and requires a transplant for the patient to survive.

Also, because MRE provides a complete view of the liver, as opposed to smaller, individual samples, clinicians can better monitor disease progression and provide more informed preventative guidance. And, of course, the non-invasive approach is more comfortable and less risky than traditional biopsies.

This virtual palpation technology might even allow for the early detection of liver cancer, Eham says, not to mention monitoring the heart and brain, organs that have required major surgery to reach.

Telemedicine is a rapidly developing application of clinical medicine where medical information is transferred through the phone or the Internet and sometimes other networks for the purpose of consulting, and sometimes remote medical procedures or examinations.

Telemedicine may be as simple as two health professionals discussing a case over the telephone, or as complex as using satellite technology and video-conferencing equipment to conduct a real-time consultation between medical specialists in two different countries. Telemedicine generally refers to the use of communications and information technologies for the delivery of clinical care.

Care at a distance (also called in absentia care), is an old practice which was often conducted via post. There has been a long and successful history of in absentia health care which, thanks to modern communication technology, has evolved into what we know as modern telemedicine.

In its early manifestations, African villagers used smoke signals to warn people to stay away from the village in case of serious disease. In the early 1900s, people living in remote areas in Australia used two-way radios, powered by a dynamo driven by a set of bicycle pedals, to communicate with the Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia.

The terms e-health and telehealth are at times wrongly interchanged with telemedicine. Like the terms “medicine” and “health care”, telemedicine often refers only to the provision of clinical services while the te term telehealth can refer to clinical and non-clinical services such as medical education, administration, and research. The term e-health is often, particularly in the UK and Europe, used as an umbrella term that includes telehealth, electronic medical records, and other components of health IT.

Telemedicine can be broken into three main categories: store-and-forward, remote monitoring and interactive services.

Store-and-forward telemedicine involves acquiring medical data (like medical images, biosignals etc) and then transmitting this data to a doctor or medical specialist at a convenient time for assessment offline. It does not require the presence of both parties at the same time. Dermatology (cf: teledermatology), radiology, and pathology are common specialties that are conducive to asynchronous telemedicine. A properly structured Medical Record preferably in electronic form should be a component of this transfer. A key difference between traditional in-person patient meetings and telemedicine encounters is the omission of an actual physical examination and history. The store-and-forward process requires the clinician to rely on a history report and audio/video information in lieu of a physical examination.

Remote monitoring, also known as self-monitoring/testing, enables medical professionals to monitor a patient remotely using various technological devices. This method is primarily used for managing chronic diseases or specific conditions, such as heart disease, diabetes mellitus, or asthma. These services can provide comparable health outcomes to traditional in-person patient encounters, supply greater satisfaction to patients, and may be cost-effective.

Interactive telemedicine services provide real-time interactions between patient and provider, to include phone conversations, online communication and home visits. Many activities such as history review, physical examination, psychiatric evaluations and ophthalmology assessments can be conducted comparably to those done in traditional face-to-face visits. In addition, “clinician-interactive” telemedicine services may be less costly than in-person clinical visits.

Benefits and Uses of Telemedicine

Telemedicine is most beneficial for populations living in isolated communities and remote regions and is currently being applied in virtually all medical domains. Specialties that use telemedicine often use a “tele-” prefix; for example, telemedicine as applied by radiologists is called Teleradiology. Similarly telemedicine as applied by cardiologists is termed as telecardiology, etc.

Telemedicine is also useful as a communication tool between a general practitioner and a specialist available at a remote location.

The first interactive Telemedicine system, operating over standard telephone lines, for remotely diagnosing and treating patients requiring cardiac resuscitation (defibrillation) was developed and marketed by MedPhone Corporation in 1989.

Monitoring a patient at home using known devices like blood pressure monitors and transferring the information to a caregiver is a fast growing emerging service. These remote monitoring solutions have a focus on current high morbidity chronic diseases and are mainly deployed for the First World. In developing countries a new way of practicing telemedicine is emerging better known as Primary Remote Diagnostic Visits whereby a doctor uses devices to remotely examine and treat a patient. This new technology and principle of practicing medicine holds big promises to solving major health care delivery problems in for instance Southern Africa because Primary Remote Diagnostic Consultations not only monitors an already diagnosed chronic disease, but has the promise to diagnosing and managing the diseases a patient will typically visit a general practitioner for.

CHICAGO - Scientists have developed a stamp-sized sensor that can sniff out some poisonous gases and toxins and can show results simply by changing color.

The sensor could be useful in detecting high exposures to toxic industrial chemicals that pose serious health risks at the workplace.

While physicists have radiation badges to protect them in the workplace, chemists and workers who handle chemicals do not have equivalent devices to monitor their exposure to potentially toxic chemicals.

Senior study author Kenneth S. Suslick, chemistry professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UI-UC) and colleagues have created what they refer to as an opto-electronic nose.

It is an artificial nose for the detection of toxic industrial chemicals (TICs) that is simple, fast, inexpensive, and works by changing color.

“By comparing that pattern to a library of color