Thank you Memorial Sloan-Kettering for referencing Prostate Pal

I'm happy to share this link from the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) Library Blog.

They have referenced "Prostate Pal" as a mobile resource for patients dealing with prostate cancer.  MSKCC is one of the premier cancer hospitals in the world. I think it's great to have such a prominent instution advocate for mobile apps as a way to further empower patients and increase efficiency of care.

Their library also has a reference page for other healthcare apps for patients and their families.  The resources were selected by their staff librarians.  I encourage those who are interested in mHealth to look at the site and check out the apps.

ACPE "Share Your Story" session up on their website

The American College of Physician Executives have placed all the posters from the "Share Your Story"
session from the recent 2012 Annual Meeting on their website.  The poster session highlighted various ways physicians are changing healthcare at their institutions.

I was honored to present in this forum regarding mobile healthcare technology.  Through "Bladder Pal" and "Prostate Pal", to date several thousand users have been empowered to track their urologic health.

With the American Urological Association Annual Meeting presentations coming up, there will be more awareness of the apps and hopefully increased usage of these helpful tools.

Gearing up for the 2012 AUA Annual Meeting

The American Urological Association (AUA), has its annual meeting coming up this month from May 19-23.  It's a huge convention with over 11,000 attendees from all over the world.  The topics cover the entire spectrum of urology.  There are so many things going on during the meeting that it is important to be systematic and selective about your learning goals.

For those who have never heard of this meeting, it's probably shocking to know that there will be 11,000 urologists in one city at the same time. Since most urologists are male, I can also tell you that it's one of the few times I've seen the bathroom line being longer for the men's room than for the ladies'.  Leave it to a urologist like me to make such an observation!

It will be a busy meeting for me this year.  Here's what I'll be doing:

- I will help teach a class on laser prostate surgery for BPH  (108HO: Modern Alternatives to TURP: Lasers and Bipolar Sunday, May 20, 2012, 8 – 11 a.m.).  

- From 11a - noon that day, I'll will be at the AUA Foundation (AUAF) booth in the exhibit hall to talk about the Bladder Pal app.   I'm very excited to announce that the AUAF has approached me to collaborate via this app on their new overactive bladder awareness campaign.  By working together we will be able to increase recognition and patient empowerment for this condition.  

- Later in the week, I will be presenting 3 abstracts:

1. Abstract 1548: "Bladder Pal" - Empowering Patients to Monitor Urologic Health with Mobile Technology
2. Abstract 2010: "Prostate Pal" - Empowering Patients to Monitor Urologic Health with Mobile Technology
3. Abstract 2170: It Is Safe to Teach Residents Laser Prostatectomy in the Private Practice Setting

Here is a link to the abstracts if you want to read them.

I hope to catch the BPH and men's health related sessions and as many plenary talks as I can since they are particularly informative and contemporary.

If you are reading this and will be at the meeting, please grab me and say hi!

ACPE meeting debrief - Make your life more like a casino

Just got back from the American College of Physican Executives Annual Meeting.
It was a very enlightening time.  I really enjoyed meeting physicians from all over the world with a deep interest in shaping the future of healthcare.

I presented a poster on my mobile apps - Prostate Pal and Bladder Pal that was very well received!  I got some great feedback for future directions of the apps...as well as my career with respect to mobile healthcare technologies.  Thank you to all those who came by and engaged me about this.

I'd like to focus a little bit on our keynote speaker - Peter Sims, author of the book "Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries".  He gave a great talk about making small low risk pilot projects and prototypes to drive creativity.  Some references he used to support this process were Frank Gehry's extensive use of models to create new buildings, Pixar's way of creating films, and the comedian's use of small venues as a lab to create new material.  After his lecture, we participated in fun exercises to demonstrate the "Little Bet" principles that really let our creative juices flow.

Thanks to the meeting,  I feel more empowered to take more creative stabs at things and approach life like a player in a casino rather than a nervous soldier in a minefield!

Sharing the Apps at the ACPE 2012 Annual Meeting

I will be speaking about patient empowerment through the use of the Prostate Pal and Bladder Pal mobile apps at the American College of Physician Executives (ACPE) Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Here's a link to the meeting

If you don't know about the apps here are my previous blog posts about each of them:

What is Bladder Pal?

What is Prostate Pal?

It will be a poster presentation during the "Share Your Story" session on April 28th from 12:30 pm to 1:30 pm.

For those who won't be at the meeting, here is the poster:
(my apologies if the font is real small, it was hard to get it to fit within the borders of the blog text box)

ACPE 2012 "Share Your Story" Poster

Over 3,000 users have visited the apps over 10,000 times from countries all over the world!
It's quite gratifying to see that many people use the app to facilitate the tracking of their urologic health.

About me and the ACPE -
Since I have a deep interest in medical management, I've been a member of the ACPE for several years. The organization is at the forefront of physician leadership empowerment. With healthcare in turmoil, I'm happy that the ACPE is giving doctors the training and encouragement to be difference makers and facilitators of change. I'm currently working towards an MBA through the ACPE and U. Mass - Amherst.

About 2/3 of the way through!

Prostate Pal Initial Reception

When the app was submitted, it only took a few days for the Apple team to review it and clear it for distribution on the App store.  It was definitely gratifying to see it go live for the world to download!
Upon release, it was even listed as a "New and Noteworthy" app in the medical app section. That was an unexpected surprise.

Soon after release, an additional surprise was being approached by a reporter at the Associated Press for a story about the app!  It was exciting to relay to them my vision for utilizing mobile healthcare technology to improve doctor/patient communication and increase efficiency of care within urology.

Things truly move fast in the internet age because I spoke to the reporter about Prostate Pal in the morning and it was released on the newswire that afternoon.  Soon, it was carried by tons of news outlets and was all over the internet. When I was driving home from work that day, I even heard the story on the radio!

Short form of story

Long form of story

So the initial reception was truly beyond my wildest dreams.  I was just very happy that the increased exposure meant that more men would be aware of such a tool for their mobile devices and feel empowered to use it to improve their health.

Secondarily, by getting the app out there and having such press, I hoped that the stigma of prostate diseases can be lessened somewhat.  As the story revealed, many men believe that you should just live with prostate conditions....when in actuality proper urologic care can improve quality of life and be life saving in some cases.

Prostate Pal Mobile App

With the mobile technology revolution in full swing, I believe that this is an opportunity for healthcare to harness this energy to further empower patients, facilitate doctor/patient relations, and improve the efficacy of care.

Since I'm a urologist, I naturally think about such things within my realm of expertise.
For men, prostate disorders impact millions of men throughout the world.  In an effort to marry mobile healthcare (mHealth) with these interests, I came up with Prostate Pal.

Prostate Pal is a free app.  By free, I mean the real free - no in app purchases, "liteware",  or banner ads. By releasing the app in such a manner, the goal was to give men worldwide the ability to track their urologic health.

It's available on Apple and Android platforms:

Prostate Pal for Apple Devices

Prostate Pal for Android

The app consists of three parts:

• Bladder Diary - This is used to track fluid intake, urine output, urinary leakage, and incontinence pad changes.  The information that is logged will help your healthcare assess your urinary health and response to therapy.  Containers to measure output can be purchased at your local drug store.
• AUA Symptom Score - This is a questionnaire produced by the American Urological Association. It has been validated with numerous medical studies.  The list of questions are used to help men and women in conjunction with their healthcare providers assess their urinary symptoms and response to therapy.
• PSA Tracker - Prostate specific antigen or PSA is a blood test that is used to screen for prostate cancer and monitor response to prostate cancer therapy.  The tracker has a table and graph format.

Prostate Pal Home Screen

I first came up with the idea in early 2010.  Initially, I tried to program it myself with the Apple Software Development Kit.  However, the programming was too time intensive as well as too complex for me to fully implement my vision for the app.

Thankfully, two things happened that allowed the app to come together.  First, I received funding from the LeBaron Foundation and Concord Hospital Trust for the project.  Second, I ran into Cameron Banga and Mike Phelps from 9Magnets, LLC - an app development company. They did a great job executing the app and it was first released in January of 2011!

In other posts I'll talk about the further development of the app and stuff that happened after the release, It's been a pretty crazy ride since I thought about this app in my living room on a cold, New Hampshire winter night!

First Post

Hello, world!

I've created this blog to educate the public regarding urology and male health as well as share with you my exploits.

First of all, who am I?  I'm a urologist in Concord, NH with a clinical and research interest in male health and mobile apps.

Here is my LinkedIn profile - this will give you more details:
My profile

The blog is called Prostate Pals because I think it has a nice ring to it and because it is also the title of the free urologic health app (no ads too) I created for Apple and Android devices.  Here are some links to the apps:

Prostate Pal for Apple Devices

Prostate Pal for Android

There is a unisex app called Bladder Pal also for Apple and Android:

Bladder Pal for Apple Devices

Bladder Pal for Android

If you are reading, please comment...and send over any request you have for topics.

I hope to start generating further content real soon, so stay tuned!