Information technology and health-care: Part ll appraisal of quality and relevance of medical information on internet

In the past few years, there has been a tremendous growth in the number of medical resources on the internet, creating new opportunities to improve decisions making among health professionals and enhancing communication in the delivery of health services. The enormity of resources has however generated some problems. Novice users may find it difficult to get quality and relevant information and may even get misled by erroneous information. This paper presents few guidelines for the users to evaluate information that they retrieve through internet. Aspects such as context, content, accessibility and methods of evaluation are presented including upstream and downstream filtering

Acquisition and recall of cognitive knowledge: effect of active learning

This is a prospective study carried out on a cohort of 110 pre-clinical students randomly selected from Dow medical college. The objective of the study was to observe the impact of both the active learning [Method I] and conventional teaching [Method II] techniques on acquisition, retention and recall of cognitive knowledge in our students. The study population was taught similar subject by two different techniques. Base line knowledge was determined using a set of MCQs as Pre-test. Immediate knowledge gain was assessed at the completion of lecture using the same set of MCQs [Post test]. Retention of knowledge was determined through a term test scheduled after three months. The rise in mean scores was significantly greater in post test taken by the study group in method I [65.4%] as compared to that in method II [48.8%] [p<0.001] showing early concept clearance. Similarly the mean scores in term test were higher in students exposed to method I [65.9%] than those in method II [56.6%] [p<0.001]. Among students taught by method II, the term test scores [56.6%] were significantly better in comparison to the post test scores [48.8%] [p<0.05]. Greater proportion of high scorers [scoring > 75% marks] were seen in the group taught by method I[38%] in contrast to those taught by method II [14.5%] [p<0.001]. This pilot study for DMC campus therefore concluded that the interactive mode of teaching leads to improved acquisition retention and recall of knowledge

Magnesium levels in patients with diabetes mellitus

Fasting plasma concentration of magnesium were measured by colorimetric method using kit of Randox England in sixty non-insulin dependent diabetics and forty non-diabetic subjects. Plasma concentration of magnesium were lower in non-insulin dependent diabetic subjects P<0.01. Moreover, concentration of magnesium were lower in females as compared to males in non-insulin dependent diabetic subjects. It may be suggested that supplementation of the diet with soluble fibre and magnesium salts if hypomagnesemia is demonstrated, is recommended