IPods are good for your heart or at least they can help doctors to make a more correct diagnosis of the sounds that they can hear from our heart. Professor Michael Barrett MD launched a project last year at the American College of Cardiology in which the sound of heart beats was made available to all students in MP3 format to carry on their iPods.
The goal was to help students understand the sounds a heart makes when they listen to it using a stethoscope. According to PhysOrg.com, the professor assembled a recording of five common heart murmurs for reference and study.
After listening to the recording, the rate of correct diagnosis of heart murmurs among his students went up 40 percent. “Medical students greatly improved their stethoscope skills by repeatedly listening to heart sounds on their iPods,” the report explains.
Given the success of this project, the Barrett School of Medicine recently launched a course within the four-year curriculum that teaches students how to correctly diagnose heart disease using a variety of educational tools, including iPods.
Web: www.physorg.com/news94102926.html.
