Neurosurgery is currently the focus of one of the nation’s premier multimedia technology projects. The National Medical Practice Knowledge Bank (NMPKB), a $51 million project between Allegheny Health Education and Research Foundation and AT&T in conjunction with Pittsburgh’s Carnegie-Mellon University, was instigated by a $21.3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce. The objective of this project is to develop a suite of multimedia technologies to support a series of national medical specialty practice knowledge banks. These will gather, analyze, index and retrieve medical information in multiple media formats including text, still images, audio and video in order to improve access to expert advice and consultation. This Internet-based project is entering its second year of funding and activity, and has accomplished several milestones.
The groundwork is laid for creating the world’s first on-line, interactive “virtual” textbook. Neurosurgery is the first medical specialty to be involved with creating such a unique and encompassing patient management and educational resource. This project will endeavor to construct intelligent software to create services which are context-based, interactive and pooled from all available medical data. Petabyte database capacity will exist to incorporate the existing and future massive amounts of information in video, audio, imagery, text, sensory and other data.
The first “virtual” medical meeting took place in May and featured 12 of the country’s top experts in stroke in a presentation entitled, “Brain Attack: Current Treatment Recommendations.” The meeting was organized by Marc Mayberg, MD, and myself, and took place in a television studio setting in Scottsdale, Arizona. The meeting was recorded, digitized, and reworked and will be available for interested physicians to view on AT&T’s Web site in the near future.
NMPKB is a unique project, pulling from diverse sources, a mulitude of high technology and computerized systems to bear upon the organization and delivery of medical knowledge. As an Internet-based system with universal access, this project and its resultant technology can play a pivotal role in all forms of medical applications. Although the project is beginning with the field of neurosurgery, it is anticipated that proven paradigms will rapidly expand to other medical specialties.
NEUROSURGERY://ON-CALL® will be incorporated into as many components of the NMPKB project as possible. AANS and CNS members will be able to access links to “virtual” conferences like the recent stroke presentation, and future AANS and CNS sponsored events will also become available on-line. Projects like this will help spread research and medical knowledge throughout our field.
If you have questions on NMPKB, please call me at (407) 667-9399 ext. 355 or e-mail [email protected]
AANS Heads to Amsterdam
The International Congress of Neurological Surgery Meeting held in Amsterdam was the recent focus of AANS international recruiting efforts.
Several AANS membership staff members, as well as staff members from the Journal of Neurosurgery, went to the Meeting and sold AANS publications, Journal subscriptions, and back Journal issues on CD ROM’s.
During the meeting, over 1,000 applications for International Associate Membership were distributed. The Journal staff also demonstrated Neurosurgical Focus The Amsterdam trip was financed through product sales and was used as a means for increasing the Association’s visibility on an international level.