If you haven’t had a chance to play with a netbook yet, you may want to give one a spin to see what you may be missing. One of our team members has been eyeing one of these miniature (about 2lbs or less) laptops for a while, but decided to go with a more traditional laptop for its advantages and versatility instead. The other week however, he was able to give one a test drive, when his father showed off one he’d bought as a Christmas gift.
It’s hard to realize how small these are until you use them. While holding it, Andrew realized that he could literally hold the device in the palm of one hand while typing with the other.
There’s lots of articles out there about how disruptive this portability could potentially be, but even beyond portability, the price point of these devices is what really gives them potential. The Eee PC my coworker’s father got came in at around $200. As he pointed out he could easily buy a whole slew of them for all the nurses at the clinic he runs. Then all he would need is a simple web based front-end for a database and he would have an instant EMR (electronic medical record) solution, along with the hardware to make sure it gets utilized.
It would certainly be better than the traditional EMR route that his organization has tried to go already. Apparently hhe has frequently discussed the hurdles they’ve run into, from buggy software to brainless implementation. (Great example, the data entry terminals weren’t placed within reach of the phones, so nurses have to walk back and forth between the two constantly.)
As the incoming administration pushes for greater adoption of EMR, lots of companies are going to be looking for novel ways to roll out EMR systems without breaking the budget. Netbooks could play a big part in the future of healthcare in keeping costs low, at least for the ‘last mile’ delivery requirements for the healthcare workers themselves.
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