The winners of the first annual Ali Abdulla Al-Ubaydli⢠Scholarship for Mobile Medical Computingâ¢, sponsored by Epocrates Inc., are announced at the Mobilising the Clinician conference. The Scholarship received applications from medical residents and students interested in exploring the integration and impact of mobile technologies in medicine. Applicants came from the USA, Mexico, Puerto Rico, UK, Portugal, Romania, Croatia, Egypt, Israel, India, China, Philippines and Australia. The five winners are: Dr. Yunan Chen, from China, currently a PhD candidate at Drexel University; Dr. Adesina Iluyemi, from Ghana, currently a PhD candidate at the University of Portsmouth; Joshua McAllister, from the USA, currently a medical student at the University of Texas; Emily MacDonald, from the UK, currently a medical student at the University of Cambridge; and Dr. Devashish Saini, from India, currently a Resuscitation Sciences Fellow at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
The winners will receive a $1,000 stipend and premium mobile reference subscription from Epocrates. They will also work with world-renown technology expert Dr. Mohammad Al-Ubaydli to create a meta-analysis of research on the topic of mobile medical computing.
Under Dr. Al-Ubaydli's guidance, scholarship winners will create a free online resource www.handheldsfordoctors.com/research for healthcare professionals to drive the implementation of mobile medical computing globally. The website will provide visitors with immediate access to evidence supporting the use of mobile technology, which will assist them in obtaining funding for projects at their practice or institution.
"When I began in this field, the challenge was to convince fellow doctors that mobile medical computing is useful," said Dr. Mohammad Al-Ubaydli. "Now, most clinicians recognize the value; however the need remains for medical informaticians to research and disseminate best practices. This scholarship program will be the vehicle to do so, while training next generation informatics innovators." He added "I was overwhelmed with the high standard and global distribution of the applicants and I am delighted with the caliber of the five winners."
Dr. Al-Ubaydli graduated as a physician from the University of Cambridge and is currently a Consultant at the IT Insights team at The Advisory Board Company www.advisory.com. He is the author of Handheld Computers for Doctors www.handheldsfordoctors.com/book, the world's first book on the topic, and The Doctor's PDA and Smartphone Handbook, and is on the executive committee of the UK Health Informatics Society www.ukhis.org.uk.
The announcement will be made at the first annual Mobilising the Clinician conference http://fusion.eyeforhealthcare.com/mobile2006/ in London on December 7th. Dr Al-Ubaydli is giving the keynote speech at the two-day event.
The scholarship's sponsor, Epocrates, is the industry pioneer and leader in medical references and decision support software for mobile devices and the Internet. For more information about Epocrates' free and premium product offerings, please visit www.epocrates.com.
For further information, please visit:
www.handheldsfordoctors.com/scholarship