PDA

[64microbus]

I don't own a PDA, never have. Should I get a PDA before pharm school to get familiar with it or wait til school starts to see what's recommended? Should I load it with the software that pharmacists use? What do you guys use and what did it cost?

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[moobymaster]

A Palm PDA got me through A&P and Chemistry...I loaded a couple mysteries on them and read them during boring lectures.

 

[MNnaloxone]

I didn't get a Palm until my second year. Depending on your curriculum, you may not need one until then, either. I'd wait and see what everyone else in your class has about 3 weeks into school. Don't worry about learning how to use it-for the typical pharmacy programs, it is pretty simple. And you'll have a stack of classmates that can show you if you have trouble.

I started with a Handspring Visor graphite, which held Epocrates and a pK dosing program (along with Tetris, Tank, and some other games-mooby drops a good point). The fiancee got me the Palm Tungsten T3 for Christmas, and it is more than I needed (although the color screen is nice and I like listening to Rush mp3's when I can).

If on a budget, I'd check out the Zire series-haven't used one but it looks adequate. Make sure it has a stack of onboard memory-that's the most critical thing. For programs, Epocrates is free, but limited in the 'higher level' data on drugs-would be good for the first couple years. After that, I recommend the Lexi-Comp suite-it is not free, but is much more complete.

Anyone use a Zire with these programs?

Also check one palmone.com They keep bombarding my email with refurbished and open box specials that can save you some cash.

 

[LVPharm]

I'll ditto MN on this one. You probably don't need to worry about this until you're about to head out on your rotations.

I will, however, put myself on the record as saying PocketPC sucks. It's slow, it often crashes, has a more complicated interface than Palm, and lacks the availability of medical software (especially freeware) that's available for Palms. Starting up Mobile Micromedex on my PocketPC takes waay too long (maneuvering the "Start Menu", plus the time it takes to load). I remember on my old Palm Vx, I would just tap on the icon, and it loaded quickly. My Dell Axim is a brick, I hardly carry it around. What good is a PocketPC if you can't carry it around in your lab coat POCKET! Not much. I truly envy my classmate's Palm Tungsten T3.

If you must get a PocketPC, the only reason to do so would be the integrated wifi available in some models. I think some Palms might just have integrated Bluetooth requiring you to have a compatible Bluetooth cellphone to connect wirelessly to the internet. AFAIK, that's the only downside to Palms. And even so, you can probably get an 802.11b wifi SDIO card for it, so it's almost a non-issue.

 

[groo1515]

I really do not agree with public displays of affection. Avoid it at all cost.

 

[pharmacy111]

hey guys, I use palm IIIxe. It has 8MB of memory. Is that enough? At UCSF, will you need all of these fancy pharmacy programs on first year??

 

[ucdbiochem]

pharmacy111,
for the past two quarters at SF, i didn't need to use a PDA. i would say we don't really need it until we get to the third year when we do rotations. so i would get a PDA when it becomes a necessity. besides, technology will only get better and the prices will always drop. so there is no hurry to get one at this point. but if you have a few hundred dollars to spare, go for it. =)

 

[pharmacy111]

thanks ucdbiochem!!! ya i thought it was unneeded worry; its just that all my friends are pressuring me to buy sony clie.

 

[LVPharm]

Originally posted by pharmacy111
hey guys, I use palm IIIxe. It has 8MB of memory. Is that enough? At UCSF, will you need all of these fancy pharmacy programs on first year??

Actually...nope. My old Palm Vx had 8 MB of memory too. All it could hold was epocrates and MedCalc (an excellent free medical calculator w/ 75 equations available at http://www.med-ia.ch/medcalc/). Never mind a pharmacokinetics program...no room. You might want to start saving up some of that dough for your rotation year when you'll finally find a good use for a PDA. Don't worry too much about this 'till later.

 

[Sukie]

What is Epocrates?

 

[LVPharm]

Originally posted by Sukie
What is Epocrates?

http://www2.epocrates.com/products/clinical_suite.html#rx

It's essentially a portable drug information resource with monographs for thousands of drugs.
Free download for Palm platform PDAs, no such luck for PocketPC (they want $ for that). It's free, but I think they track your usage.

 

[Sukie]

Thanks, LVPharm... wow, and I was going to use my PDA to enter every drug manually... this program's great.