App Wrap: September 2010
Price: Free
Memory: 2.7MB
Average App Store Rating: 2.5 stars (18 ratings)
Designed for both you and your patients, this app will keep you up-to-date with continually updated news and alerts for prescription medications. Based on the reviews of this app, the only reason it has a 2.5-star rating is loading issues. All other reviewers have given it 5 stars, saying, “Finally an app for clinicians that enables quick AE reporting and a list of ongoing FDA alerts,” and “…the ‘my drugs’ section is particularly useful to keep track of drugs that practitioners commonly prescribe.”
-Yvette Crabree, M
Newcomer of the Month
MedWatcher: Drug Safety Reporting
Price: FREE
Memory: 0.6 MB
Average App Store Rating: 3 stars (19 ratings)
For use by “trained medical professionals,” this applications supports conversions to and from opioids that are commonly prescribed and used in the US. We’ll let the only review of the current version say the rest for us: “Use this almost daily on the Medicine wards. Far superior to the one in MedCalc. Fast, accurate, and useful. It’s clear that the authors spent a lot of thought and had expertise in this area. In particular, the links to the Reference material give you all the details you need to have confidence in dosing opiates. I was particularly impressed by the Methadone dosing, which is not easy to do, and not done accurately in MedCalc…” Five other reviews are provided for all
versions of this app, each giving it praise.
Editor’s Pick
Price: Free
Memory: 1.5MB
Average App Store Rating: 4 stars (12 ratings)
This app is for the doc who often searches for medical information on Medline, Medscape, or even Google. Simply speak your search terms and the voice recognition software searches in all the databases at once. Spin the source tab at the top to change the data source; I really like that feature! Explore the IMO database as a convenient way to find an ICD9 or CPT code—this may be its most useful feature. The Drugs.mobi database is also available, providing users with a quick and easy way to look up a medication and find pharmacology, indications, and dosing. I wanted to give this app five stars, but took it down one star for collecting my name and contact information as a condition of use. Enhancements I would like to see include the ability to set a default database or disable the ones you don’t want, and add access to other online databases, such as UpToDate.
Price: $14.99
Memory Requirement: 6.0MB
Average App Store Rating: 3.5 stars (29 ratings)
Updated as of September 09, 2010, Chronic Pain Tracker version 2.5 allows patients to track their symptoms and share the results with their physicians. The app offers the patient an opportunity to give his or her doctor a complete report that includes graphs and diagrams. Each pain entry can track the level of pain (on a scale of 1 to 10) and include descriptors such as “burning” or “stabbing,” location, medications used, and any other comments. Patients can also choose from four colors to paint pain levels and visually represent the pain experience. The app also offers statistical information (based on data recorded), interactive graph timelines, advanced pain mapping, a full-color pdf generator that can create documents to be e-mailed or printed out to an external device, and a medication tracker.
Price: $0.99
Memory Requirements: 1.7MB
Average App Store Rating: 3 stars (26 ratings)
This app offers pain sufferers the chance to learn about a number of exercises that can correct posture, help improve muscle strength and flexibility, and relieve some pain. According to the developer, it’s like “having your own exercise therapist in your pocket.” The app will help users who have acute pain symptoms to work on correcting postural causes of their pain. It is based on the Egoscue Method program of corrective exercise and also allows the users to be connected to an Egoscue Clinic near them via phone when using the app on the iPhone. The app works by letting users tap on the “pain” button and picking an area of the body where pain is experienced. A number of exercises are provided next and the user can choose from the list by tapping on one. An image is provided and directions explaining the exercise are featured below it.
iHeadache — Free Headache & Migraine Dairy
Price: Free
Memory Requirements: 1.0MB
Average App Store Rating: 3.5 stars (9 ratings)
This app can help patients keep track of triggers, duration, symptoms, medications taken, number of headaches, and more, which can be then shared with their physicians. Patients can enter notes about the specific headaches as well. The app can also help inform patients about the type of headache they may be having by capturing and analyzing real-time data. It uses the International Headache Society Criteria to classify the headache as a migraine, tension headache, or unclassified headache. The latest version, 1.40, has improved performance of headache log and the ability to export the headache log.
