Explosion of medical information: the challenge of keeping up to date

doi:10.15406/unoaj.2014.01.00019

eISSN: 2378-3176

Urology & Nephrology Open Access Journal

Editorial Volume 1 Issue 3

Explosion of medical information: the challenge of keeping up to date

Mohammed Mahdi Babakri

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Urology Unit, Aden University, Yemen

Correspondence: Mohammed Mahdi Babakri, Urology Unit, Surgical Department, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences , Aden University, Khormaksar, Yemen, Tel 00967 777401971, Fax 00967 2 232298

Received: December 22, 2014 | Published: December 23, 2014

Citation: Babakri MM. Explosion of medical information: the challenge of keeping up to date. Urol Nephrol Open Access J. 2014;1(3):84. DOI: 10.15406/unoaj.2014.01.00019

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Editorial

Using the internet became an essential part of medical practice and those medical professionals who don't utilize the IT will go to extinction, the sources and size of medical information are growing fast and every day we are bombarded by enormous amount of newly released medical news, articles and practice guidelines of diverse significance and from different sources of different quality and significance beyond our ability to handle.

By searching the Medline for the term (kidney disease) 14902 titles were identified for the year 2014 only,¹ Keeping up to date with this information flood and assessing the quality of this overwhelming information is a challenging job causing information fatigue² for the clinicians with busy schedule.

Fortunately the technology has many tools to facilitate searching and filtering relevant information from different sources enabling us to select and customize the type and amount of information according to the need of everybody. Cullis & Webster³ suggested some tools such as Really Simple Syndicate (RSS) and data base auto alert to facilitate regular update of relevant information from selected sources of evidence based information. RSS is a simple tool provided by many web sites and mobile App that will bring information from different sources either directly to web page or to specific applications that are widely available free on the mobile stores.

We have to be smart in selecting information that is relevant to changing our practice based on best evidence and directed to providing good quality care for people and community.⁴ Another obstacle for smooth information flow specially in underdeveloped countries is the inaccessibility of information from high ranking sources because it need paid subscription which difficult to obtain in these resource poor countries, for that we should promote and support open access policy of medical information and the professional societies should consider giving waiver from subscription to those professionals from resource poor countries.

Finally it is the duty of every health care professional to prepare him for selecting information sources from evidence based data bases gathering this information to limited number of programs or pages that will save time and effort and provide up to date knowledge.