Towards The Direction Of Personalized Healthcare

There have been many breakthroughs and innovations in the field of medicine. The healthcare system that we know of today is incomparable to the medical practices observed and practiced decades to centuries ago. But let’s admit it, things are better the way it is now than it was before. If you watch old films or documentaries that show the medical practices in the past, you’d be shaken at the agony patients had to endure in the name of science.

Some think that the science of medicine that we know of today will be here for good but we are badly mistaken. We only have room for progress and at the rate things are going, technology has a lot to do with the direction medicine is taking and we can only aspire for better things to come our way.The medical practice today all boils down to patient assessment through the symptoms exhibited by patients, which may be interpreted differently depending on the physician and sometimes, underlying conditions can trigger different symptoms that will lead to misdiagnosis. Then, personalized healthcare will definitely be a welcome reprieve for all of us. In fact, it may also be the key to reducing morbidity and mortality rates that are constantly going up because of our unhealthy modern lifestyle.

Imagine a future in which, rather than using symptoms to identify a disease, your genes, metabolism, and gut microbiome inform how your individual health is managed. This is the vision of precision medicine.

Traditional medicine uses symptoms to diagnose diseases, and drugs to treat these symptoms. But precision medicine aims to turn this concept on its head.

By identifying the factors that predispose a person to a particular disease and the molecular mechanisms that cause the condition, treatment and prevention strategies can be tailored to each individual. 

So, how do we get from traditional to precision medicine? Advances in genetics and molecular analysis techniques have been a deciding factor, as has getting patients involved with managing their own health.

(Via: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/319875.php)

Treatment will no longer be based on a patient’s symptoms but take a more tailor-fit approach that analyzes your genes, metabolism, and essentially the biomolecular makeup of your body. It is what precision medicine is all about and this can be turned into a reality with the help of the right technology. Eventually, it will empower patients to manage their own health. The question now is whether everyone can afford to enjoy this more tailor-fit approach to healthcare or will this be a privilege that only a select (rich and affluent) few can only afford?

Whether offering tips on basic genomic facts or exploring the practical implications of precision techniques for hospitals and health system, the MINC toolkit is meant as a "starting point for healthcare providers who want to promote genomic integration into practice to benefit their patients,” said Laura Lyman Rodriguez, director of the division of policy, communication and education at NHGRI.

It can help nursing leaders care for patients who are undergoing genomic testing and treatment and better prepare their workforce for fast-emerging clinical applications, she said.

(Via: http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/tool-helps-nurses-smaller-hospitals-start-practicing-precision-medicine)

Precision medicine is already here. While it is not generally practiced mainstream, there are certain smaller health institutions that practice it to help medical experts (the health team) gradually get used to this approach in the clinical setting as well as provide inputs to the medical experts who are still continuously improving this practice. After all, technology continues to innovate and introduce a better way for us to do things. You just need to keep an open mind because things will definitely change more often than we can keep up with these updates but if it means saving people lives, then we’ll just have to be flexible enough to accept these changes and enjoy a better quality life that isn’t always highlighted by sickness or death.

de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2postlinkde482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2 is courtesy of The IPAC Blog

source https://ipaction.org/blog/towards-the-direction-of-personalized-healthcare/

The Frightful Five And Internet Innovation

The mere existence of the web has ended an era and started another; one that is defined by mindblowing technologies and a different way of life. Imagine what life in the 70s, 80s, 90s, and early 2000s were. If you weren’t personally living through these times, it is quite hard to relate to, right? Even when you watch old TV shows and movies, seeing how people lived during these times will make you wonder how they survived without getting bored to death. Yes, boredom is something that the Internet has virtually rendered irrelevant. How can you even say that you are bored anymore when you can do lots of things on the web and you won’t mind the hours ticking by.

If you think about Internet innovation or the continued advancements on the web today, America is almost always at the top of people’s mind because most big tech companies are found here. However, experts have noticed how these very same big tech brands seem to be dampening the Internet’s progress, thereby preventing the growth of small startups from stealing a piece of their pie. After all, business comes first. We may have seen many of the major breakthroughs made their debut on American soil but big tech brands end up monopolizing the industry in general.

There are multiple reasons why countries like the U.S. have accounted for the bulk of the world’s internet innovation over the past few decades. Simply put, the U.S. is an attractive market with a common language, common currency and common regulatory policy supporting private infrastructure investment, including wireless and wireline networks delivering internet connection. This is not the case in the European Union, where innovators have to contend with 28 nations, 24 languages and 17 currencies.

The U.S. is indeed an innovation hub. However, it’s on the verge of losing this advantage if it continues on with overregulation and doesn’t guard against piecemeal internet policy frameworks.

(Via: https://www.aei.org/publication/ensure-internet-innovation/)

If you look at the World Wide Web today, there are five companies that stand out among the rest whose power and influence spans continents and we'll call them as the frightful five. In a world like ours today that is defined by technology, smart gadgets, and the Internet of Things, it is easy to easy how these companies have built their empires that even governments pale in comparison to the extent of their ability to dictate society, our way of life, and the future of mankind. What many of you are not aware of is that these companies also own a bunch of other businesses that roughly got everything else covered that matters in this planet making it doubly harder for other businesses to thrive.

So what makes them frightful, first of all, is that they are very, very big. And they play a huge role - they all play sort of huge roles in our lives kind of personally and at a kind of society-wide level. So if you live kind of a modern American life, it's impossible to, you know, to live without all of them for most people. And more than that, they sort of are being asked to do and they kind of know more about us than any corporations in history. They're more - they've become kind of more like governments than companies with the amount of money they have, with the kind of power they have over democracy in society.

We're seeing that with the way that, you know, news on Facebook and Google affected the election, with their impact on the economy, you know, the way they're disrupting kind of how retail works, with their impact on jobs and inequality. And eventually, you know, they're all working on artificial intelligence. And their technologies will affect probably most of our jobs. Most of the ways that people make money now are going to be changed by technologies that these companies make.

(Via: http://www.npr.org/2017/10/26/560136311/how-5-tech-giants-have-become-more-like-governments-than-companies)

How do they trump innovation then, one might ask. Well, by dominating the market, they limit the opportunity for small businesses to prosper or for them to even have a fighting chance to get their names out there. The irony here is that they make money every single time these smaller businesses use their online platforms while the average entrepreneurs struggle to make ends meet and rise above the endless competition. You don’t even have to look far to understand how this monopoly works. All you need is to simply check out the web. There are many smaller tech businesses in there, true, but they still need to get their business heard using any of the frightful five as platforms. They may make money but the five still makes the most money as they earn from other people’s success as well, thereby killing not only innovation but these businesses as well.

The article de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2postlinkde482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2 Read more on: The IPac Action Blog

source https://ipaction.org/blog/the-frightful-five-and-internet-innovation/

The Dark Side Of Substance Abuse

People often associate substance abuse to the abuse of illegal drugs that give its users an unrealistically high that consequently messes up with their brain and over time with their life. Doing drugs is cool at first. After all, mostly cool people do it. It gives the user a false sense of belonging as they continue to have pot sessions with fellow drug addicts who have lost their sense of direction and reality. It might be fun at the beginning as you relish in the unnatural high these illegal substances bring you but wait until their undesired effects kick in and you’ll regret doing it at all. Drug users look terrible physically as they are no longer able to look after themselves and they look like wasted versions of who they once were.

For years, we have seen drug junkies ruin their lives as they can’t seem to break away from their nasty habit. Drug addiction does not discriminate. It will not spare you from its bad effects whether you are a famous personality or just an average Joe. Celebrities have fallen out of the limelight and weren't able to stage a successful comeback after succumbing to illegal substances. Some even died either by suicide or because of an accidental overdose as they may also take other prescribed medications in conjunction with their drug use that unknowingly became a lethal combination that took their lives away. (more…)

de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2postlinkde482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2de482eb4182815e4397bda7e9c10d3fd88d8e09da808395d54f8dd885ae330e2 was originally seen on The IPAC Blog

source https://ipaction.org/blog/the-dark-side-of-substance-abuse/

Why You Need To Learn Coding Now

The world is changing. That cannot be denied. If you just look around you, you’d notice how more advanced our society has become and tech gadgets seem to be sprawled all across town, even in the comforts of our own homes. There is even one or two inside your pocket and your whole world probably revolves around the use of smart technology because that is likely what the rest of the population does. Everybody is so active online that it has opened up a whole new world of possibilities for people whose technical expertise lies in the use of computers and anything tech-related.

If there is one skill that will prove handy in the years to come, it definitely has to be related to technology especially in the use of computers. Wherever you look, some sort of tech device is running a business, office, institution, or even in your own home. We need to learn to adapt to all these changes if we don’t want to be left behind because sooner or later, technology will run the world (as if it is not already doing it now). And if there is another skill you should master or at least know about, it is coding or computer programming. The possibilities are endless if you finally figure out how computers work from the inside and it can work to your advantage when expanding your career options.

A whole new tongue – the language of computers – will be what separates the educated from the ignorant masses of tomorrow. Understanding how to write code for computers is already becoming one of the most highly prized skill sets anyone can have in the global economy. Here’s why:

1. Code rules everything around me, cream get the money

All major tech companies, from Google to Facebook, aggressively compete to hire gifted young coders. In the Silicon Valley area, for example, some reports suggest engineering graduates from Stanford University expect their starting salary to be nothing less than $100,000-120,000.

“It’s fair to say that for school-leavers looking to maximise their potential income, few other skills open the door to as many well-paying and varied careers,” says Prof Rory O’Connor, head of the school of computing at Dublin City University.

(Via: https://www.irishtimes.com/business/innovation/coding-will-be-the-most-important-skill-in-the-future-1.3233019)

Learning the language of computers is no longer just a second-thought for many but a priority given that today’s world is highly reliant on these modern contrivances in getting things done. There are other reasons why coding makes for a great new skill to learn aside from its practical applications in life. For instance, it is that universal language spoken by all that knows no boundaries or prejudices. It’s what you know and is capable of doing that matters not who you are.

Computer science courses for children have proliferated rapidly in the past few years. A 2016 Gallup report found that 40% of American schools now offer coding classes – up from only 25% a few years ago. New York, with the largest public school system in the country, has pledged to offer computer science to all 1.1 million students by 2025. Los Angeles, with the second largest, plans to do the same by 2020. And Chicago, the fourth largest, has gone further, promising to make computer science a high school graduation requirement by 2018.

The rationale for this rapid curricular renovation is economic. Teaching kids how to code will help them land good jobs, the argument goes. In an era of flat and falling incomes, programming provides a new path to the middle class – a skill so widely demanded that anyone who acquires it can command a livable, even lucrative, wage.

(Via: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/21/coding-education-teaching-silicon-valley-wages)

There is a major downside, though, to the popularity of coding class/courses as it will eventually produce a large number of coders who’ll be looking for a job and we all know how the law of supply and demand works, right? The lucrative salary in this industry today may significantly go down if there is a surplus of skilled workers capable of doing the job at a lower income range.

If there is another positive note we can highlight about this aggressive initiative to educate the youth of computer technology is that it ensures they are equipped with the knowledge and skills they need to meet the demands of our modern world and survive no matter the odds.

The blog article Why You Need To Learn Coding Now is available on The IPAC Blog

source https://ipaction.org/blog/why-you-need-to-learn-coding-now/