IPad in OR?

[PMPMD]

What's your experience with iPads in the OR? Anyone use one regularly in this setting? I'm in love with mine but not sure if its too big to carry around.

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[periopdoc]

For what purpose? I carried one for a few months, but ultimately went back to the macbook air and gave the ipad to my son. I can't stand webmail/ no flash etc. Ultimately the best combo for me was my iphone/ MBA. Of course we are not restricted from bringing our briefcases into the OR and we have a very trustworthy OR crew.

- pod

 

[Idiopathic]

i carry mine around, plenty of attendings and a few residents have them here

 

[sevoflurane]

Mac air every single day.

 

[hb2998]

I'm an MS4, matched into prelim-med & anesthesia [CA(-1)]. I bought a galaxy tab last year and have used it on regular bases constantly. I had it during all my anesthesia rotations and found it really useful for both reference and actual studying/surfing/email, etc. If only it had a phone. I think the size makes it a more desirable device (7 vs 10.1 inches). Its very portable, light, and has great battery life, android market, nice tablet apps, multitasking, hdmi, dlna, full usb access, itunes wireless sync (DoubleTwist), flash, etc. I bought my galaxy tab the day steve jobs said he has no plans for a smaller iPad. If I were buying today, I'd probably go for the iPad2 because its dual core and I don't see another 7 inch device coming on the market anytime soon (Amazon tab?), and i'm not impressed with the Xoom or GTab 8.9/10.1.

As an aside: I do a lot of reading my galaxy tab, but I think I retain more when I read a book. A book doesn't have angry birds, so its less distracting and more on focus/target. Its so easy with a book to flip back and forth and shove your fingers btw pages and reference ideas. I'm not really happy with some school districts taking away books from kids in favor of an iPad.

Oh yeah, forgot to mention: Don't drop the galaxy tab! I broke one already. Thank god for insurance. I carry mine everywhere, on the wards, to the beach, you name it. It sits in my back pocket.

 

[aneftp]

I have all three. iPhone, iPad 2, MacBook air.

Unless I know I will be in long cases that day, I only bring the iPhone with me.

iPad is nice but I keep it at home along with the MBA. Try to be discreet while working.

I know people like to have all the "office stuff" in OR but I like to keep lower profile I'm OR.

At outpatient center, I have never brought any thing other than iPhone. Too many cases, too busy.

Besides the less stuff u bring less chances of anything getting stolen. Lots of physicians have had their electronic stiff stolen in ORs. My $500 brand new Sony Clie (when they were popular was stolen) when I was in residency on top of anesthesia cart while I forgot it transporting patient. So I am very anal about just putting phone in pocket.

 

[drmwvr]

I keep at least one Earl Gray in the foil pouch and a crossword in case of emergency. Rarely, I will have a sudoku.

 

[Jay K]

Several of my partners use either laptops, ipads or smartphones in the OR.

We only use our cellphones in practice (no pagers), so I always have my smartphone. I agree with the above comments re: discretion. I use my smartphone mostly for coding cases, business e-mail, FB and news.

 

[B-Bone]

Maybe it's just me, but I've always been of the mind that if i'm in the OR, I should be watching the monitors and taking care of the patient. God forbid some s%*t goes down and the post-mortem review of the room finds angry birds open on your ipad. lawyers eat that junk up. In general, I supervise most of the time, and I would definitely say something to my in room providers if they were reading a novel or deeply entrenched in farmville. When I'm sitting my own cases, I maybe bring the most recent Anesthesiology or A&A to long boring cases, but I don't do anything that takes my attention away from the case for any length of time (i.e. sudoku, facebook, etc). I think it just looks bad. I mean, people are always trying to replace us and claim nurses can do our jobs; if our "job" is to surf the net and watch netflix on demand, then maybe the haters are right.

Anwyay, just my two cents. Especially for trainees.

 

[PMPMD]

Yeah I was thinking of using it for reading anesthesia and CCM - I have all my articles and textbooks on it.

 

[Jay K]

I use my smartphone mostly for coding cases, business e-mail, FB and news.

Lest I be misinterpreted, by FB I meant casual sex partners.