Available now from the Guide section at the top of the page, this document is a brief overview of how you utilise the web in better ways to find information for med school.

Or if you’re too lazy to click the Guides button, here it is….

So this is an incredibly rough cut of how videos could work on a site like this…

ThePBLshow Pilot Episode/Demo from John Ellis on Vimeo.

Although it is a rushed production it does show the capability is there to:

• Use greenscreen technology, effectively making it possible to teach the heart inside the heart.
• Make these videos in the first place
• Create some effects that are infeasible elsewhere- as seen you could alter sound effects to simulate different sorts of hearing problems- we’re talking about the ONLY teaching medium with the combined ability to be cheaply produced, tailored to fit it’s audience AND artificially alter the users experience by controlling their senses of hearing and vision!

It’s quite obvious that the timing and editting would be changed, however time constraints meant I couldn’t put together anything else in the time available- however if I were to continue this I would spend some money to get the Adobe Master Collection, allowing:

• Real professional quality video (Adobe make the software used in all sorts of Hollywood productions)
• A redesigned website (created from the ground up, made in collaboration with the University if possible)
• PDFs with video images (looks and reads like a book but pictures and diagrams can be clicked to view movies- potentially brilliant for Clinical Skills)- example
• Create FLASH movies, full interactivity too as I used to code actionscript
• Create professional graphic (the above video was created on a Mac, a terrible environment for graphics software despite what people say)- The pack includes Photoshop,  the industry standard
• Cleaned up audio

Users would then be able to:

• Watch directly on the site (like you can above)
• Download via Bittorrent (meaning low costs)
• Subscribe via Miro, Zune or Itunes - and get shows automatically on their PC as they’re released
• Watch shows on Ipods, Zunes or other compatible MP3 players or software
• Make comments and discuss videos on the site

In the end the goal would be to create energetic and engaging content, something closer to What You Ought To Know.

This small video below is a demonstration of Seesmic, the video collaboration tool I plan to use on thePBLsite.com, allowing communication between users and hopefully giving them a sense of identity and worth on the site….

ThePBLsite.com demo discussion tool
I encourage anybody to give replying a go, there’s no need to make an account although you can if you wish. These videos can be posted by anybody in the comments section and could hopefully encourage some of the following:

• Students sharing mnemonics and other advice
• Feedback on videos and other posts
• Discussion between users who would otherwise never communicate

Worth a try anyway.

P.S. Don’t worry, stupid looking headsets like mine are not required- my Webcam has a broken microphone though so it was my only option.

As a medical student you probably don’t use Office tools that much, at least when compared to other courses, that’s the case until SSM time at least when crunch time starts (about 2 days before deadline) and suddenly an easy to use word processor is a top priority.

That’s why I was happy to find out this morning that Microsoft have rebooted their “Ultimate steal” deal, this gives you Microsoft Office Ultimate Edition 2007, for less than £40, definitely a steal compared to this version’s RRP of ≈£700.

This is the version with almost every program.

Anybody with a .ac email address (e.g anybody@university.ac.uk) is eligible- if it sounds good click the link below before July 2009… no rush then.

Find Out More…

P.S. I don’t mean to start off on a bad foot and begin with an advert (it isn’t I receive squat for posting this), but it’s a good deal, they’ll also be offering Vista Ultimate upgrades for about £40 too come October.

The <acronym> tag should be used more often in education, but it’s barely known about, it’s use is definitely worth pointing out as this can be utilised in nearly ANY online environment.

Two words in this sentence contain an acronym tag, I wonder which?

The problem with learning from books for me has always been that I hate the verbose language relied on by those introducing me to a topic but revision guides assume I know every word in the world, look at the examples below…

Textbook fashion:

“The lungs are macroscopically normal at birth, however bronchiolar inflammation and infectios usually lead to bronchiectasis in childhood. At this stage, the lungs are most commonly infected with Staphylococcus aureas; however, the majority of patients have Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection by the time they reach adolescence…..” (From Davidson’s Principles of Medicine, 20th edition)

Revisionb book style:

• Chest: Chest wall deformities, coarse crepitations, and wheeze.
• Signs of malnutrition: Anaemia, weight loss…… (from Rapid Medicine)

The textbook  is incredibly wordy and required the reader to take in well over 100 words and a separate table to learn the clinical feature of CF, the revision book is the exact opposite, offering as little detail as possible.

What about the use of the acronym tag?

The lungs are macroscopically normal at birth, however bronchiolar inflammation and infectios usually lead to bronchiectasis in childhood. At this stag, the lungs are most commonly infected with Staphylococcus aureas; however, the majority of patients have Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection by the time they reach adolescence….

Lungs appear normal at birth with problems developing in children and teenagers

• Children: Bronchietasis, bronchiolar inflammation, infection
• Teenagers develop further infections…

Notice that things can be kept short and sweet, whilst the student can still read on without loosing their place, looking up extra details by flicking their mouse over the words.