Medical uses of a Palm Pilot
By Dr Ng Yih Yng

I used to have a palm pilot in 1996 when the Palm III was first available, which was a very cool device ahead of its time. But due to circumstances beyond my control, such as my Palm’s uncontrollable urge to leap fearless out of my pocket every so often, my palm naturally came to grief within a year. (During those days, I was an active young man, you see.) After many repairs with the 3Com vendors, it finally gave up the ghost.

I can imagine what it must have been like at the Palm office if it was anything like where I work – technicians dressed in face masks, white coats, wrapped up in sterile sheets, all prepared with trays around them filled with tools, and the delivery guy rushing the Palm in a DHL box going – “23 y/o Chinese Male, medical type, PIII, c/o screen asystole status post fall one point five meters. This is the patient’s 4th fall in 6th months.” The technician looks at it and shakes his head mumbling “it’s a goner, but we have to try. Ok team, on my count to the trolley - 1,2,3. Ratchet, screwdriver, Philips head stat! Damn it, give me more lighting! Over here! Here! … Come on, folks, look sharp! …..”

30 minutes later…

“Ok, that’s it. I think we should stop. There is nothing more we can do for this PIII. I’m pulling the plug here. Team, I’m calling it.….. Jackson, put it back together. I have to go out and give the bad news”  

4 years later…

Since the trauma of losing my PIII a few years back, I had no courage to go back to using a Palm until recently, when I received a Palm Vx as a Christmas present. It was like having my old PIII back, only with massive plastic surgery.  Lighter, slimmer, and so much sexier. But if you look past all that, it was still the same old friend I had, with all the same knobs and buttons and the simple and friendly format I had known and loved then. I almost felt guilt-ridden as if I was cheating on my Nokia9110 phone / organizer, which till now was my personal digital assistant (PDA) of choice.

1 month later…

I became a full fledged Palm addict, subscribing to no less than 5 different palm related website mailing lists such as

1) www.palmgear.com
2) www.pilotzone.com
3) www.palmblvd.com
4) www.pdamd.com
5) www.geek.com/pdageek

All these sites provide information on new palm software and hardware, palm pilot related news and reviews. Amongst the five, only www.pdamd.com provides medically related palm information. But if you are going to subscribe to these lists, go for the digest version, or you may be flooded with anywhere from 10 to 100 new mails a day from the lists alone.

I was reading everything on the web related to the Palm, medical and non-medical. And after a month of intense Palm self-indoctrination I became a full-time palm convert. From my short but intense experiences, I will attempt to pass some of this knowledge to you, the reader. To this end, I reviewed some interesting websites with Palm content.

REVIEW OF PALM-RELATED WEBSITES

The following websites are rated according to 5 categories with a food slant to it. Given our medical tendency to use food analogy in descriptions, I had decided to do the same when I dissected these sites.

Digestibility:
This describes if the site makes it easy for people to read and find stuff on it. Buttons in the right places, color coding, nice lettering, easy “clickability” and ease of reaching the information required all count in this category.

Juiciness:
This describes the amount of useful data that the site contains, be it software, news, tips and tricks etc.

Gastrin Inducing:
This is the visual look that the website presents. This category rates how appetizing the site looks at the first glance.

Freshness:
This rates the currency of the news, reviews and software posted on it.

Pizzazz:
This is the X-factor, or the coolness that the site projects.

Overall Rating:
The overall rating will be a combination of these 5 factors.

Please note that these opinions are strictly that of the mine alone and nobody else.

Here they are –

1) The 3Com Palm Website

www.palm.com (where else did u expect to find them?)

This website is a little less friendly to beginners and non-Palm users, but it is essentially THE Palm website. They explain the philosophy behind the design of the Palm system, and why it is successful (75% market share of all handheld computers - IDC, June, 2000) and contains news about Palm and upcoming products. They also have discussion boards where people can help you answer questions about the Palm platform. Furthermore, it has a section which is devoted to true and tried software that are given “Platinum” status, meaning that it is given 3Com’s personal stamp of approval for usefulness and stability of function under all sorts of tests. If you are looking for original Palm OS updates or any other essential stuff, they should have it. However, the site is somewhat cluttered, and prone to having slow pages. What they have is duplicated on most other palm friendly sites, except the company data, OS software and of course, they would be the first to make original announcements. After going through the site once or twice, you will hardly go back again. 

Overall Rating: 31/50
Digestibility: 7/10
Juiciness: 8/10
Gastrin Inducing: 5/10
Freshness: 6/10
Pizzazz: 5/10

Comments:
This site is like the stuff that mom used to make you eat for breakfast every morning…. bland and only mildly appetizing. Has all the 18 minerals and vitamins but not necessarily looking as good as it is nutritious for you. This is the stuff that you stop eating when you become independent, start working, or start staying out alone. 

Verdict: Bland!

2) Nearly Mobile
 
www.nearlymobile.com

This nifty little website is a starter’s guide to the palm pilot and it explains to  you what the Palm OS (operating system) is all about, what it can do, and how to set it up. All the basics that you need to know to get started. This is a great “how to” site which gets you up to speed with using a Palm competently and with minimal pain. It also has a good news section and discussion boards for people to meet other palm users. However, the software section is a letdown. 

Overall Rating: 35/50
Digestibility: 9/10
Juiciness: 7/10
Gastrin Inducing: 7/10
Freshness: 6/10
Pizzazz: 6/10

Comments: This site is a good place to start with if you don’t own a Palm but would like to know more, or if you just bought a Palm. Can’t go wrong with this! But, after a while you will want to move on to more meaty morsels. 

Verdict: Baby food!

3) The Peripheral Brain

pbrain.hypermart.net

This site, created by Physicians in Newport, Rhode Island, is named after the heavily book-laden lab coats of medical students that we affectionately call their “peripheral brain”. Although it was created specifically for residents in the family practice program there, it contains information that is relevant to doctors anywhere in the world. If you are quite Palm obsessed and a doctor to boot, this site is a good site to bookmark or use as a site link to jump to all sorts of medical and non-medical sites. They have links to everything that you might need from glossaries, palm basics, tricks to improving efficiency, software reviews, recommendations, and multiple links to sites where you can find just about anything that you want to know that is related to the Palm Pilot. Its only deficiency is that it doesn’t have up to date news and it is catered mainly for their residents, so some of the information are not relevant to you. But nevertheless it is a good medical Palm site.

Overall Rating: 40/50
Digestibility: 9/10
Juiciness: 9/10
Gastrin Inducing: 7/10
Freshness: 7/10
Pizzazz: 8/10

Comments: A juicy and highly palatable site! One that you must try!

Verdict: Digestible! 

4) Singapore Palm User Group 

www.spug.org

This is where Singaporean Palm users gather to talk shop. Conceived in February 1999, it has grown from strength to strength – now registering over 3000 members who call themselves Spugers. This is THE place to find out where you can find the best palm deals in Funan, Sim Lim Square (or SLS as the Spugers call it). This is also where you can find downloads of local content that you can never find anywhere else in the world. Information like the bus guide, location of local petrol stations and even Singtel ICC dialup numbers are found on it. This site has a very active forum and IRC chatroom. All the reviews are written by locals and very comprehensively done. Of particular interest is the “SHOWTIMES” software that is featured on the website. This gem of a software hotsyncs the entire movies page from the www.movies.com.sg into your palm. Given our extremely heavy movie watching habits in Singapore (Singaporeans watch more movies than people of any other Nationality in the world last year!), this software is a must for all Palm users in Singapore. Who needs the Straits Times Life! section? It’s a neatly organized site with plenty for the local user and friendly denizens who are ever willing to give online help when needed. 

Overall Rating: 43/50
Digestibility: 9/10
Juiciness: 8/10
Gastrin Inducing: 8/10
Freshness: 9/10
Pizzazz: 9/10

Comments: If you want to be connected to your local Palm scene and meet fellow Palm Users, you must go there! There are times in your life when you love to eat western cuisine, but at the end of the day, as an Asian, you will still miss your Char Kway Teow and your Hokkien Mee. 

Verdict: Local delight!

5) Avantgo

www.avantgo.com

This is a website every Palm user has to visit. Where else can you get the Straits Times, Business Times, USA Today, The Guardian, BBC News all into your Palm daily? Since its conception in 1997 this website has revolutionized the use of the Palm Pilot. Avantgo shrinks content to a Palm friendly format for thousands of websites. And the best part of this is that all of this is FREE. You’ve heard me right, FREE! People waiting for buses, MRT and in queues no longer have to be bored to tears from waiting. In fact, waiting is a joy when you can sit down to read about the latest news or even the latest abstracts from NEJM, BMJ and the Lancet. These can be subscribed to via www.handheldmed.com after you have installed the Avantgo program on your palm. Waiting in a queue has never been so cool.

Overall Rating: 45/50
Digestibility: 8/10
Juiciness: 10/10
Gastrin Inducing: 7/10
Freshness: 10/10
Pizzazz: 10/10

Comments: Inventive, juicy, bold with a dash of ingenuity. This site has been voted many times over by popular internet magazines and portals as the website of the year for Palm users. 

Verdict: A delight to savour!

6) Palmgear HQ

www.palmgear.com

This is a very good site for Palm users who know what they want. For the experienced Palm user who knows what he or she wants, Palmgear is a treasure trove of news, reviews and software. In fact, if you can’t find any software or Palm news on Palmgear, it is highly unlikely you will find it anywhere else. It is that complete. This site is like an industry standard that other websites use to compare themselves against, in terms of content. However it is somewhat untidy looking and sometimes information is a little hard to find on the site unless you are experienced in searching for what you want. This website also suffers from heavy traffic, and there are times when its pages have difficultly loading or the downloads get hung. But despite these issues, this is an excellent site to bookmark.

Overall Rating: 37/50
Digestibility: 5/10
Juiciness: 10/10
Gastrin Inducing: 6/10
Freshness: 10/10
Pizzazz: 6/10

Comments: Going to Palmgear is like going to a really large buffet; invariably there will be lots of variety but like most buffets, there will be some stuff that isn’t properly well done. But at the price and the variety, most of us are willing to overlook a shortcoming or two. 

Verdict: Filling! 

7. Tucows Software Library

www.pilotzone.com

This is another good download site which is similar to PalmgearHQ, sliqhtly more crisp in presentation but a little less juicy. All the software on it is neatly organised into categories which are browseable from its front page. Its other notable features are it amusing cow rating system (courtesy of its owners – Tucows, get it?) and the fact that its site is mirrored locally on the Starhub servers, which makes downloading a breeze.

Overall Rating: 41/50
Digestibility: 10/10
Juiciness: 8/10
Gastrin Inducing: 7/10
Freshness: 8/10
Pizzazz: 8/10

Comments: Not the freshest site around, but its crispy look and fast download times alone warrant a visit from every serious downloader. One of the easiest sites to go to top up a new Palm with all the goodies that you really want but had no idea that you needed!

Verdict: Feed your Palm here!

8) Memoware

www.memoware.com

Memoware is another buffet like website similar to Palmgear, except that they are providers of content such as databases, literature, maps, technical references and lists in the 3 main types of PDA formats, namely Palm, PocketPC and EPOC. It is large, filled with all sorts of content, but really quite disorganized. After you get pass the first page that splits the content into various broad categories, the next level just totally disintegrates into a mess. The site is not friendly to people who are generally browsing around to look for useful downloads. However, if you already know what you are looking for, this is a good site to dig around. And again I emphasize the word, DIG.

Overall Rating: 31/50
Digestibility: 4/10
Juiciness: 10/10
Gastrin Inducing: 5/10
Freshness: 7/10
Pizzazz: 5/10

Comment: Memoware is like a like one of the cheap steamboat buffets at Marina – lots of stuff to eat, the stuff is not all that fresh, and you really have to know what is good, what to avoid. And you have to enjoy digging around for what you really like to eat. Some people like love it… others just can’t stand it. Voluminous but only for the persistent type! 

Verdict: Acquired taste!

There are tons of sites on the net with Palm related content and this number is growing everyday. If you haven’t gotten on the bandwagon yet, there is no time like today to start! Even if you don’t intend to get one, don’t be left out of the loop. Find out more about it because medical Information Technology is changing medical practice even as we speak (or read in this case!) and it is one trend that will last much longer than dot com companies, at any rate. 

Before I go, here is something conceived during idle chat on www.spug.org

Top Ten list of signs that you are spending too much time on your palm pilot:

1. You refer to Pocket PC as "the Dark Side". 
2. You have rewritten the entire OS to configure it to suit your use. 
3. You managed to modify 2 Palms to use together as a defibrillator for night duties... just in case. 
4. You actually bring the Palm into your on-call room toilet to use the "Mirror" program after every night duty for freshening up.
5. You have configured your palm infrared to remotely operate all the ICU equipment. 
6. You have modified your Palm to perform ECT (Electro-convulsive therapy), ECG and EEG
7. You've read the entire Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine............ on your Palm. 
8. Your Palm has add-on attachments of a Pager, Telemetry monitor and has a receptacle for the ABG syringe.
9. Instead of showing your stethoscope to the hospital canteen staff to get a discount, you show your Palm instead.
10. For neurological examinations, your stylus has a red hatpin at one end; at the other end you unscrew the reset tip and poke your patient with it to test their pain sensation.

Many thanks to Whei Chern, my fiancé, who bought me a Palm and got me addicted to it all over again, Mr. Johann Annuar (my tenant/entrepreneur) who came up with the rating system, and the people from the Singapore Palm Users Group who contributed their favourite websites – Coffee chip, Juragan, Trucido, and Joselle.