Among the things I like: Patient safety, Jon Stewart, and Atul Gawande.
Gawande talks with Stewart about The Checklist Manifesto (video embedded below).
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
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Steven Levitt calls this “…the best book I’ve read in ages.”
Dagnabbit. Now I need to read it.
My brother, Andrew, a Web developer, is a very clever guy and a fan of woot.com.
Recently, he bought a digital picture frame from Woot that can be fed photos via RSS- as a gift to my parents.
The clever bit is where each of my siblings created a Flickr or Photobucket account in which to post photos of grandchildren. The feeds from each of these accounts was combined in Yahoo Pipes so that, once the frame is set up on my folks’ WiFi network, any new photos posted appear in their digital photo frame.
What a great way for a geographically dispersed family to keep grandparents updated.
My mom called to tell me how much she liked it, and I made a point of noting it was Andrew’s clever idea. All I did was mash the feed together in Yahoo Pipes.
I love technology when it is used intelligently.
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I got my 2009 H1N1 live, attenuated (nasal spray) vaccine today.
I continue to be surprised by how many otherwise rational people (including health professionals) are frightened by the prospect.
For the record: If New York State law did not require me to get both the seasonal and the H1N1 vaccine, I would get both anyway.
I’ve avoided commenting on the media coverage of Swine Flu. Why bother when Jon Stewart does it better?
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Snoutbreak ‘09 – The Last 100 Days | ||||
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| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| The Last 100 Days | ||||
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| The Colbert Report | Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Nailed ‘Em – Library Crime | ||||
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I’d be interested to hear response from this library…or from other public libraryfolk.
Jill Jarrell hipped me to the fun videos her library posts on Vimeo. Here’s one on workplace etiquette (Jill stars in the fridge, grazing, at about 3m:19s).
How timely that a friend sent me the link to this game just when I needed a fun break from Swine Flu panic.
In Sneeze, you are an influenza virus in one human and have the opportunity the spread yourself in various environments by having your human sneeze just once on each level.
Dated 2007 but new to me:
Havidol is clearly an amazing new drug. Thank goodness there’s such a wonderfully detailed site to tell us all about Havidol and how it can treat Dysphoric Social Attention Consumption Deficit Anxiety Disorder (DSACDAD).
Click to visit the site
Great parody of direct-to-consumer advertising.
I know a lot of great association professionals (and association leaders), but this made me chuckle:
Hat tip: Brandi Tuttle via FriendFeed.
Dr. Doug Farrago is a board certified family practice physician in Maine who happens to publish my favorite medical journal, the Placebo Journal.
For the uninitiated, it might be fair to say that the Placebo Journal is sort of like The Onion, but all about medicine.
Here’s an example parody advertisement from PJ for the Drug Rep Piñata:
(This and other sample pages from PJ available here).
I met Dr. Farrago at the AMA Medical Communications Conference in April. He seems willing and able to mock anything or anyone, including himself, and he’s very funny.
How’d the Placebo Journal get started?
“About 9 years ago I was totally burned out. Things were getting to me. When I went to the office all the crying and whining was driving me crazy. Then I realized that the crying and whining was coming from me. What saved me was the stories my partners and I shared with each other. It made me realize I wasn’t alone. Ripping on all the absurdities that go on in health care didn’t hurt either.”
What are your richest sources for subjects to satirize?
Medicine is so chock full of bullshit. The shenanigans of the Medical Axis of Evil (lawyers, insurance companies, big Pharma) makes life too easy for me.
Have any of your targets ever come after you for criticizing or satirizing them?
Google “Cigna” and “Farrago” together1. Let’s just say parody holds up pretty well as a defense mechanism.
To what do you attribute the growth of the Placebo Journal? What need does it fill?
Everyone loves medicine. There is a reason that ER, House and Grey’s Anatomy are so popular. We all have been patients at one time or another so everyone can relate. My audience initially was just doctors but it has spread like a virus. There is a vaccine for it, by the way, but it is only about 40% effective and may cause autism.
Placebo Journal fills the need of humor for many people – especially physicians, the majority of which are socially retarded.
Dr. Farrago is branching out into other media, including video. Embedded below is a recent episode of Placebo Television (distributed via YouTube).
(Those reading via RSS may need to visit the site to vbiew embedded video above)
To keep on top of new episodes, subscribe to this feed.
He also has a blog and an email newsletter you can sign up for here.
Good news for academic medical librarians:
Dr. Farrago is looking to improve his exposure to medical students. He tells me that he wants to give some free, one-year subscriptions to libraries that’ll put the Placebo Journal out where medical students can see them. If you’re interested, leave a comment below and I’ll pass your email address on to Dr. Farrago.
Good news for everyone else:
Want a sample issue of the Placebo Journal so you can consider adding it to your serials budget? You can get one by clicking here.
Bonus: Dr. Farrago graciously gave me permission to post this sneak-preview of a page from the upcoming June edition of the Placebo Journal:
I think this is the first time I’ve actually recommended a non-free product or service on this blog. Let that inform your estimation of how much I enjoy the Placebo Journal. 
1
You might remember that about a year ago I posted about our friend Fritz’s “Novel-a-month” project.
Of of those books is published and available now. Here’s Fritz explaining Boogle and Sneak in 32 seconds:
(Those reading via RSS may need to visit the site in order to view embedded video above)
I think this makes Fritz pretty much the coolest Dad ever.
You can purchase the hardcover book via Amazon or Barnes & Noble.
Fritz adds:
Boggle & Sneak is Creative Commons licensed (CC-BY-NC).
Download the full text for free: PDF · HTML · TXT
Noncommercial sharing and remixing are strongly encouraged.
See what I mean? Coolest. Dad. Ever.
More detail (including Maker Faire video and Instructable for Fritz’s Time Machine) here.
I cracked up when I saw this last night and rewound/rewatched it three times.
Have a great weekend!
This short quiz from the University of South Carolina was a fun way to waste 5 minutes.
I got 24 out of 25 and am kicking myself for the one I missed.
[via]
Okay …THIS is the last post of 2007.
NameThatDisease.com will rank you based on a quiz about well-known diseases. Some of the clues may just be trivia…but I still thought it was fun- and I scored “Hawkeye Pierce.” (Woohoo!)
Given that, I can’t imagine that a physician would score lower than Doogie Howser.
Related: NameThatDrug.com
Thanks to my brother Andrew for the heads-up!
A YouTube user going by the handle of “TVLibrarian” is collecting and posting short clips of librarians and libraries from popular television programs. Neat!
I love this one:
Although I’ve never heard of of a public library volunteer being called a “docent”…
Want to be informed when TVLibrarian posts new videos? Subscribe to this feed.
Becky Jerome points to this fun video in which The Brain teaches us about the anatomy of the brain through song.
Confession: I own Animaniacs soundtracks and DVDs. I love the music and I thought the Wheel of Morality was a riot.
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