A clinic where patients did not wait more than 15 minutes from the time of arrival to see the doctor
A clinic where appointments were not scheduled so tightly that nurses have to explain diagnoses and prescriptions because the doctors are already on to the next patients
A clinic where doctors address patients at the same level of formality which they expect (i.e. don't call my 75-year-old mom Millie but get huffy when she calls you Dave)
A clinic where I'm allowed to read my own medical records and obtain copies
A clinic which will see me even though I'm self-insured (i.e. I pay my entire cost because I don't have health insurance)
A clinic which places more emphasis on patient care than on whizbang technological innovation - or at least where the doctors appear to care more about patients than about their tech.
I find it really hard to believe that doctors will enter their own case notes on the computers in the exam rooms. That's what $8-an-hour receptionists and fileworkers are for. Seeing a computer in an exam room (especially one on which we cannot check my e-mail during the 40 minutes we're waiting dressed only in a flimsy gaping robe) and all the other fancy stuff will only make your patients think "I wonder how much I'm being overcharged for this?"
I'm sick of technology. I wish it would go away, sometimes. I really do.
And the alternative would be....what? Living in a cave as a hunter-gatherer? Whoops, can't use a bow and arrow. Nope, no sieve to help sift the grains you've gathered, nor sickle to cut the stalks from the ground. And that's just the 'primitive' lifestyle - if you wanted to go back 600 years, you'd have to avoid stone-ground flour, wagons, candles, forged iron, locks, armor, and prescribed medications.
Technology isn't just computers and robots. It's every idea someone has had to make a task a bit easier or safer or shorter. Wanting to live without technology is not only a fool's dream, it's impossible.
Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic (US-based)
on
Geek Charities?
·
· Score: 3
If you want to do something for an organization that is not a policy-based group (like EFF), may I suggest Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic? RFBD is a group in the United States which - using volunteer labor - records books and other written material so that blind and dyslexic people can have access to the same information.
There are only 34 recording studios across the nation, usually in urban areas, and it requires a screening test and a weekly commitment to be a volunteer. However, RFBD is in desperate need of readers who can handle scientific and technical material. If you can't volunteer physically, they take cash too; they are starting to convert hundreds of thousands of audio tapes to CD-ROM and need to raise $35 million to do so and to upgrade the recording facilities.
RFDB is the only organization that does this in the US. It is non-governmental and community based. If you care about giving back to the geek community in more than just a policy way, here's a way to help students and adults learn about technical subjects (as well as every other subject under the sun).
Both. The press release states (in the first paragraph) that the school will "standardize on Open Source technologies" and that "the first deployment will be Red Hat Linux on Optiplex hardware".
Slashdot Mirror
A clinic where patients did not wait more than 15 minutes from the time of arrival to see the doctor
A clinic where appointments were not scheduled so tightly that nurses have to explain diagnoses and prescriptions because the doctors are already on to the next patients
A clinic where doctors address patients at the same level of formality which they expect (i.e. don't call my 75-year-old mom Millie but get huffy when she calls you Dave)
A clinic where I'm allowed to read my own medical records and obtain copies
A clinic which will see me even though I'm self-insured (i.e. I pay my entire cost because I don't have health insurance)
A clinic which places more emphasis on patient care than on whizbang technological innovation - or at least where the doctors appear to care more about patients than about their tech.
I find it really hard to believe that doctors will enter their own case notes on the computers in the exam rooms. That's what $8-an-hour receptionists and fileworkers are for. Seeing a computer in an exam room (especially one on which we cannot check my e-mail during the 40 minutes we're waiting dressed only in a flimsy gaping robe) and all the other fancy stuff will only make your patients think "I wonder how much I'm being overcharged for this?"
And the alternative would be....what? Living in a cave as a hunter-gatherer? Whoops, can't use a bow and arrow. Nope, no sieve to help sift the grains you've gathered, nor sickle to cut the stalks from the ground. And that's just the 'primitive' lifestyle - if you wanted to go back 600 years, you'd have to avoid stone-ground flour, wagons, candles, forged iron, locks, armor, and prescribed medications.
Technology isn't just computers and robots. It's every idea someone has had to make a task a bit easier or safer or shorter. Wanting to live without technology is not only a fool's dream, it's impossible.
If you want to do something for an organization that is not a policy-based group (like EFF), may I suggest Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic? RFBD is a group in the United States which - using volunteer labor - records books and other written material so that blind and dyslexic people can have access to the same information. There are only 34 recording studios across the nation, usually in urban areas, and it requires a screening test and a weekly commitment to be a volunteer. However, RFBD is in desperate need of readers who can handle scientific and technical material. If you can't volunteer physically, they take cash too; they are starting to convert hundreds of thousands of audio tapes to CD-ROM and need to raise $35 million to do so and to upgrade the recording facilities. RFDB is the only organization that does this in the US. It is non-governmental and community based. If you care about giving back to the geek community in more than just a policy way, here's a way to help students and adults learn about technical subjects (as well as every other subject under the sun).
Both. The press release states (in the first paragraph) that the school will "standardize on Open Source technologies" and that "the first deployment will be Red Hat Linux on Optiplex hardware".