But the question is are all the translations good enough? Are the Hindi, Chinese, Arabic translations accurate? The answer to this question is it depends. If you have a few words sentences or simply meaning of a word, then they do do good job in translation. But if you have a long sentence, the translation may loose the real meaning or gist of the original statement specially in Hindi and Chinese that I can tell from my own experience.

Spanish translations are however more reliable than any other language. As I have not used any other language translations, it is hard for me know as to how good the translations are.

None the less, it is better than nothing. When you have to talk to a patient who does not speak commonly spoken language, Google Translations does become handy. You can type a small sentence in English and Google translates in the desired language. You can then either have the patient read the translation on your phone or can play the voice (provided by some apps).

Here are some good Translation apps

for iPhone:

• iTranslate ~ the universal translator
• GoTranslate (Google Translate™ support)
• Translator with Voice
• TranslatorGo with Voice

Google Voice. It is a free service from Google which gives you a phone number (which is free at present). All you have to do is register. Once registered, you can set-up your current phone number’s voice mail through it. It is really easy to do. Instructions on the Google Voice site are very nice. Once Google voice is setup for your iPhone number, all the unanswered calls gets routed to Google Voice where it takes the voice message and then stores it for you in you account. You also gets option to either receive a text message whenever you have a voice mail OR have the complete voice mail TRANSCRIBED and send to you as TEXT or EMAIL so that you can READ your voice mail. The transcription however is not great when the person speaking have an accent or not speaking clearly. But you can always listen your messages with click of a button the phone itself.

Read more about the GOOGLE Voice and its features at www.google.com/voice.
Fusion Voice Mail plus. With Fusion voice mail plus, you can see, hear or read your voicemail messages with just touch of a button. No more dialing multiple phone numbers, no more remembering multiple passwords. You just register your iPhone number with them (Free). Each time a caller leaves a voicemail, an SMS message is forwarded to your mobile phone, a tone is played and information displays on your handset screen — including the date and time of the voicemail as well as the caller’s information. To make life easy, Fusion Voicemail Plus lets you easily scroll through the list and select the voicemails you want to hear or read in the order of your choice. With the tap a button, you can select, listen to, call back, send a text message and delete voicemails as desired. The transcription is little better here than Google Voice. You also have an option to receive FAX on your iPhone for as low $2 for unlimited faxes.

1. Epocrates. This application has evolved a lot since it started. It not only provides most up-to-date drug information but it also provides information on diagnostic test, symptoms, diseases and antibiotic guide. The Fee Rx app is good but the Epocrates Essentials offers a lot more.
   
2. ICD Meister. It is an app for practicing physician and healthcare professionals who needs to look up ICD-9 codes during billing process. Now you have this search capability as well as option to look up frequently searched codes right in this small app. This app will not only allow you to search the ICD-9 codes but allows you to bookmark the frequently searched codes in your favorite for quick reference later.
   
3. Medscape from WebMD. This app is new in the block but it free and offers Medical News, CME credits, Drug information, Drug Interaction informations, Physician / Pharmacy / Hospital directory with options to make call directly from the app. The Medical news is customizable to your specialty and interests.
   

You can access a lot of this information via very simple interface designed specially for mobile devices, such as, iPhone and other PDA. The URL for the mobile friendly site is:

http://pubmedhh.nlm.nih.gov/sec508/

You can see the screenshots of the website below. The search engine is very robust and occurs almost in real time. You can view the ABSTRACT right there and if the articles is freely available you can even download the PDF of the article right then by following the FULL TEXT link.

You should bookmark the above URL for all your quick medline reserach. This is even better than paying for medline apps for iPhone and iPod touch.

• Browse the ICD-9 codes by categories
• Search the ICD-9 codes by diagnoses and as soon as you start typing the diagnosis, closest match lists below
• You can also type in the ICD-9 codes to find out what diagnosis it belongs to
• Option to add the frequently searched codes in favorite list allows you to search those codes quickly in future

Special Features of this App:

• Complete 2009 ICD9-CM diagnosis codes and 2008 ICD9-CM procedure codes, with all subcodes and all long descriptions: over 21,000 individual codes, instantly accessible
• Search automatically attempts to expand abbreviations and terms for the best results; e.g. “MI” ? “Myocardial Infarction.”
• Keep a Favorites list of diagnoses and procedures, which may include specific and nonspecific codes.
• Browse diagnoses and ICD9-CM procedures by category and subcategory; easily limit searches to particular categories

1. Browse through the extensive list of categories and find your code
2. Search the medical condition using the powerful search feature. You can not only search the medical condition but also search for medical condition associated with a particular ICD-9 code.
3. Use the favorite to look up bookmarked ICD-9 codes

Special features of this app:

• The powerful search function lets you search for abbreviations & acronyms. Search for Afib, DM, CHF, SK, FTT, SCFE, AGE, NAFLD, FB, LBP, CVA, DUB, CAD – just some of the hundreds built into ICDMeister
• Search for full words or part of a word. Can’t spell De Quervain’s tenosynovitis? No problem. Just search for querv and find the code you want in seconds.
• The author claims that all of the codes in ICDMeister are current (2009) and valid (no non-billable codes). That is great plus…
• Option to adjust the font size of the text is built in the program.
• You can search the sign and symptoms to find the correct ICD-9 code that is billable
• Osteopathic (Non-allopathic) conditions are listed as well

Get it at iTunes

If you have your iPhone in hand, give it a try now! Open Safari on your iPhone and visit http://iphone.liferecord.com

You can see it in all it’s splendor on YouTube! View it now at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uX_6yIO2bR8

Source: Life Record EMR

Heart Imaging Technologies is offering a non-proprietary PACS (picture archiving communication and storage) systems, as opposed to others that are tied to specific hardware. Medical images displayed in a web browser have traditionally been of lower quality and therefore had limited diagnostic utility. This technology is the first to provide physicians with the ability to drill-down and view medical images, including movies, on a hand-held device. Physicians can simply click on a web link sent via email by one of their colleagues, enter their password, and, for example, instantly view movies of a patient’s beating heart halfway around the world. They can even put their colleagues on speakerphone and carry on a medical consultation while simultaneously browsing through the imaging results.

Source – Heart Imaging Technologies