2021

julesawalters

Dr.Evidence™ partners with MedShr to enhance medical knowledge for physicians and HCPs

Dr.Evidence™ partners with MedShr™ to enhance medical knowledge for physicians and healthcare professionals

8 December, 2021

Putting Knowledge into the Hands of Physicians and HCPs

The partnership integrates Dr.Evidence’s AI-powered DocSearch medical search engine with the MedShr platform for physicians, healthcare professionals (HCPs), medical societies, and academics. MedShr was developed to enable physicians to share and discuss clinical cases, and connects nearly two million physicians and HCPs in 195 countries for medical learning. 

“We are excited about the power that DocSearch puts in the hands of physicians to engage with the published evidence. The real time AI insights and analysis from DocSearch combined with MedShr case discussion and peer-to-peer learning will have a tremendous impact on clinical practice and patient care,” said MedShr Founder and CEO Asif Qasim, MA PhD FRCP.

DocSearch generates evidence-based results from medical search queries by processing global published medical literature and real-world data, utilizing powerful, natural language processing and machine learning technology. Physicians and HCPs on MedShr’s platform will be able to leverage this technology to view co-occurring terms across the available body of literature, enabling them to better understand biomedical relationships, from disease symptoms to drug-adverse events, and beyond. The insights gained will both inform and transform interventions for better patient health outcomes.

“Since the beginning, our vision has been to democratize medical evidence,” said Dr.Evidence CEO Bob Battista, MBA, FRSPH, FRCP Edinburgh. “That starts with getting medical evidence into the hands of physicians and HCPs who interact daily with peers and directly with patients. Combining the power of the DocSearch specialized medical search engine with the expansive reach of MedShr’s HCP-facing platform creates an unprecedented opportunity for putting actionable insights into the hands of physicians and HCPs, and, in turn, helping them deliver better, evidence-based patient care.” 

“While Dr.Evidence maintains a strong position in the pharmaceutical and life sciences sectors, this marks our first significant expansion into clinical decision support for physicians,” stated Joseph A. Boystak, Chairman of Dr.Evidence. “Medical knowledge is rapidly accelerating in scope and complexity and doubling every several months. The need for an enhanced medical information ecosystem is essential and will be enabled by AI / ML tools such as those offered by Dr.Evidence,” Boystak further noted.

About Dr.Evidence™

Dr.Evidence™ is the leading medical intelligence platform for life sciences companies that enables teams to identify breakthrough insights grounded in the vast universe of published medical information, real-world evidence and proprietary data. It pushes the boundaries of healthcare technology and allows for new possibilities in science, enabling more informed decision making and faster time-to-market for accelerated impact.

About MedShr

MedShr is a secure, professional app and network for medical professionals to connect and learn through case discussion. Over 2 million doctors and HCPs use MedShr to discover, discuss and share clinical cases and medical images. The platform’s innovative educational approach puts focus on the application of insights from the latest scientific publications in real-world scenarios. Developed by doctors, for doctors, its speaks to specialists in their language, fostering learning and discussion about the specifics of clinical decision-making and management.

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julesawalters

World Antimicrobial Awareness Week 2021

World Antimicrobial Awareness Week 2021

Connecting healthcare professionals globally to share experiences, spread awareness and stop resistance

18 November, 2021

The 18th – 25th November is World Antimicrobial Awareness Week, Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a growing global health problem, with antibiotic resistant infections causing 700,000 global deaths per year. At current rates, this number is projected to grow to 10 million deaths per year by 2050. We can help prevent infections through measures such as vaccinations, improved hand hygiene, increased availability to clean water and antimicrobial stewardship in community and hospital settings.

In 2015, the World Health Organization (WHO) endorsed a Global Action Plan (GAP) to tackle the global issue of AMR. They urged member states to develop tailored, country specific national action plans with a ‘One Health approach’. Over 130 countries have developed their action plans to date but there is still a way to go to ensure all of these plans are implemented. We know that AMR disproportionately affects low or middle income countries where antibiotic consumption is still alarmingly high and the infrastructure to monitor infectious disease is not well developed.  

On a hospital and community level, initiatives such as simple hand washing and antimicrobial stewardship (promoting and monitoring safe and appropriate use of antimicrobials to preserve their future effectiveness) are paramount to reversing the tide of resistance. One unfortunate consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic has been the acceleration of antimicrobial resistance as doctors over prescribe antibiotics to treat viral infections, as highlighted in a recent article from the Lancet entitled ‘Rising antimicrobial resistance: an evolving epidemic in a pandemic’.

At MedShr, we have developed Global Education Networks [medshr.it/e/globalhealth] to provide a platform for healthcare professionals to share their experiences of dealing with global-health problems such as AMR. What can you do if  there are no antibiotic guidelines in your region? This is where our community of over 1.8 million healthcare professionals can help – share a case on MedShr and discuss the best management of your patient. Through these discussions, we hope to build a network of HCPs, with a common goal to improve antimicrobial stewardship globally, impacting not just the patient in front of you but all patients around the world. 

We all have a duty to act now to raise awareness and take steps to minimise future impact. Join MedShr and our Global Health Networks to spread awareness and stop resistance. 

For free access to the Antimicrobial Resistance Education Network, doctors and other health professionals are encouraged to sign up using this link: medshr.it/amr.

MedShr also offers free, fast-tracked, registration for medical schools, hospitals and medical societies. Please contact globalhealth@medshr.net to make arrangements.

About MedShr

MedShr is a secure, professional app and network for medical professionals to connect and learn through case discussion. Over 2 million doctors and HCPs use MedShr to discover, discuss and share clinical cases and medical images. The platform’s innovative educational approach puts focus on the application of insights from the latest scientific publications in real-world scenarios. Developed by doctors, for doctors, its speaks to specialists in their language, fostering learning and discussion about the specifics of clinical decision-making and management.

 

Note to editors

Please contact globalhealth@medshr.net for more information.

About antimicrobial resistance (AMR)

“The thoughtless person playing with penicillin treatment is morally responsible for the death of the man who succumbs to infection with the penicillin-resistant organism.”

Sir Alexander Fleming (1945 Nobel Prize winner for the discovery of penicillin)

The following video from TedEd outlines how antibiotic resistance (AMR) has progressed over time and summarises some key ways to prevent new resistant microbes from developing. 

AMR - Where Are We Now?

In 2015, the World Health Organisation (WHO) endorsed a Global Action Plan (GAP) to tackle the global issue of AMR. They urged member states to develop tailored, country specific national action plans with a ‘One Health approach’. Over 130 countries have developed their action plans to date but there is still a way to go to ensure all of these plans are implemented [2]. 

We know that AMR disproportionately affects low or middle income countries where antibiotic consumption is still alarmingly high and the infrastructure to monitor infectious disease is not well developed. For example, India, one of the world’s largest consumers of antimicrobials saw the proportion of Staphylococcus aureus which are methicillin resistant nearly double between 2008 and 2014 while other countries with effective programmes for antimicrobial stewardship and/or infection prevention, saw the proportion of methicillin-resistant S. aureus decrease [3].

Investment in agriculture, safe drinking water and healthcare is vital to fight the growing problem of AMR and the Global Action Plan hopes to encourage world governments to step up to the challenge of AMR. On a hospital and community level, initiatives such as simple hand washing and antimicrobial stewardship in healthcare settings can significantly decrease infectious diseases and the use of antimicrobials [4]. These initiatives are paramount to reversing the tide of resistance. This has never been so critical as the COVID 19 pandemic has accelerated  antimicrobial resistance through over prescription of antibiotics to treat viral respiratory infections [5]. 

How is MedShr helping to tackle AMR?

At MedShr, we have developed Global Education Networks to provide a platform for healthcare professionals to share their experiences of tackling global health problems such as AMR on the ground. We are promoting good antimicrobial stewardship as an effective way to prevent antimicrobial resistance. 

Key Elements of Antimicrobial Stewardship Programmes [6]

  • Guideline driven antibiotic prescribing 
  • Antibiotic prescribing is re-assessed when sensitivity results are received
  • Patients are prescribed antibiotics for the appropriate length of time
  • Every member of the medical team is accountable 
  • Education on antimicrobial resistance and appropriate antibiotic prescribing is delivered to all medical staff 

If you have been involved in an antimicrobial stewardship programme, your experiences may help others on MedShr to implement their own. For those who are working in settings without antimicrobial stewardship programmes, the full text to core elements of hospital antimicrobial stewardship programmes can be found here.

We hope to empower clinicians to tackle issues such as antimicrobial resistance through sharing knowledge and expertise, as well delivering the most up to date clinical guidance and publications. If there are no antibiotic guidelines in your region, discussing a case on MedShr could help guide the best management of your patient whilst impacting other patients by protecting them from antimicrobial resistant organisms. 

Given the projection of 10 million deaths attributable to antimicrobial infection by 2050, we all have a duty to act now to raise awareness of the severity of the problem and to do something about it. Join MedShr and our Global Health Networks to spread awareness and stop resistance. 

References

[1] WHO New Room – Fact Sheet: Antimicrobial Resistance

[2] Chua, Alvin Qijia, et al. “An analysis of national action plans on antimicrobial resistance in Southeast Asia using a governance framework approach.” The Lancet Regional Health-Western Pacific 7 (2021): 100084

[3] Dixit, Avika, et al. “Antimicrobial resistance: progress in the decade since emergence of New Delhi metallo-β-lactamase in India.” Indian journal of community medicine: official publication of Indian Association of Preventive & Social Medicine 44.1 (2019): 4

[4] Pokharel, Sunil, Shristi Raut, and Bipin Adhikari. “Tackling antimicrobial resistance in low-income and middle-income countries.” (2019): e002104

[5] Manesh, Abi, and George M. Varghese. “Rising antimicrobial resistance: an evolving epidemic in a pandemic.” The Lancet Microbe 2.9 (2021): e419-e420

[6] Centre for Disease Control and PRevention (CDC) – The Core Elements of Hospital Antibiotic Stewardship Programs ANTIBIOTIC STEWARDSHIP PROGRAM ASSESSMENT TOOL

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julesawalters

MedShr wins Trinity Challenge for pandemic early warning system

MedShr wins Trinity Challenge Prize for pandemic early warning system

29 June, 2021

MedShr Insights and Early Warning System, led by cardiologist Dr Asif Qasim, has today been announced as one of the winners of the inaugural Trinity Challenge. Drawing from real clinical case discussions posted by its 1.6 million members, MedShr Insights and Early Warning System will apply natural language processing, machine learning and AI to identify trending medical terms and symptoms and thereby predict potential outbreaks.

MedShr, the world’s leading platform for healthcare professionals, enables doctors to use their smartphone to safely share and discuss anonymised clinical cases with peers around the globe. Their discussions range from straightforward clinical cases and images, to diagnostic dilemmas, alongside X-rays, ECGs, blood results, medical imaging and more. With many conferences and courses transitioning to digital formats, physicians now also share interesting academic papers, webinars, podcasts and medical education. 

With a global community of 1.6 million members in 195 countries, MedShr is uniquely positioned to identify patterns and trends from real world medical practice. This provides an unrivalled opportunity to detect novel and emerging healthcare challenges. 

MedShr’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic illustrates the potential impact. As COVID-19 emerged in early 2020, the MedShr team saw a corresponding increase in the number of X-rays posted on the platform, and increasing mentions of fever, dry cough and loss of sense of smell – symptoms we now know are associated with coronavirus. 

Responding to these emerging trends, MedShr’s engineering, data and clinical teams came together to rapidly develop new features, secure global knowledge-sharing groups and free medical education programmes to support its clinical members through one of the most challenging periods in recent history. This included MedShr Polls and MedShr Learning, an interactive online medical education platform. 

Data from these new features and programmes, combined with clinical case discussions and other contextual information, allowed the MedShr team to quickly address the knowledge gaps, amplifying targeted medical education to the healthcare professionals who needed it most. 

MedShr Insights and Early Warning System aims to identify future outbreaks of this and other diseases at the earliest possible stage using medical natural language processing, machine learning, AI and social listening technology to MedShr’s real world medical data. To allow for an even stronger surveillance system, the data can in future be further enriched by ingesting scientific research papers, electronic medical records and social media.  

MedShr’s Early Warning System was awarded third prize of $660k in The Trinity Challenge by an independent panel of world-renowned experts, including Jacqueline Miller (Moderna’s Senior Vice President of Infectious Diseases), Roopa Dhatt (Executive Director, Women in Global Health), and Githinji Gitahi (Chief Executive Officer, Amref Health Africa). 

About the Trinity Challenge  

The Trinity Challenge (TTC) is a coalition of 42 organisations committed to leveraging the power of big data and digital technologies to protect the world from future pandemics. Launched in September 2020 by England’s former Chief Medical Officer, Dame Sally Davies, TTC invited applications from across the world to develop and scale non-medical interventions to predict and prevent pandemics. MedShr was among eight winners selected by a prestigious international panel of expert judges, out of 340 applications from 61 countries. 

About MedShr

MedShr is the world’s leading case discussion platform and has won multiple awards including Facebook’s Social Good App of the Year 2016, United Nations World Summit Award 2017 and ES SME Award in 2018, was a 2019 TechCrunch DT50 Award for Social Impact finalist, and was recently MedShr was named one of the UK’s top 70 high growth technology companies. The platform works in partnership with healthcare providers and hundreds of national and specialist medical societies, as well as the NHS, Health Education England and several Royal Colleges.  

About Dr Asif Qasim

Dr Asif Qasim is a Consultant Interventional Cardiologist, NHS Clinical Director and Founder and CEO of MedShr based in London, England. Dr Qasim graduated from the University of Cambridge in 1995 with prizes and awards for research and clinical medicine. He has published papers in peer-reviewed journals on a range of interventional and general cardiology subjects.

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julesawalters

World Sickle Cell Awareness Day 2021: Connecting healthcare professionals globally to share experiences and learn

World Sickle Cell Awareness Day 2021

18 June, 2021

Connecting healthcare professionals globally to share experiences and learn in a multidisciplinary education network

Every year, over 300,000 babies are born with a severe haemoglobin disorder, of which a major proportion is sickle cell disease (SCD). Despite this significant burden, the diagnosis of SCD is often delayed, particularly in low resource settings where access to screening is not widely available. This means SCD may only be detected after the child develops severe or sometimes even life threatening complications, resulting in both increased morbidity and mortality in this age group.

As access to screening and interventions to prevent complications in early life increases, this will help improve survival for children with SCD, and healthcare professionals must be equipped to help support older patients with multimorbidities as a result of complications developed later in life. This care throughout the lifetime will require a multidisciplinary approach, and therefore the potential value of cross-discipline, peer-to-peer learning cannot be underestimated.

In response to this, MedShr – a global learning platform for healthcare professionals – has launched a free, open access Sickle Cell Education Network to empower healthcare professionals, students, and experts in the field to share knowledge around SCD. The aim is to connect professionals across the multidisciplinary team – including physicians, nurses, clinical officers, pharmacists and community health workers – to promote peer-to-peer learning and engagement around some of the challenges encountered in caring for patients with SCD.

There are already specialists from a range of disciplines, including haematology, paediatrics, general practice and emergency medicine, discussing cases focussed on the management of SCD in children. Future cases include a focus on care in special situations, such as optimising pain control or managing SCD during surgery and in pregnancy.

As this network continues to grow, we hope it will become a sustainable educational forum for healthcare professionals around the world to help raise awareness and promote education about SCD, and ultimately help improve the lives of patients living with this disease.

For free access to the Sickle Cell Global Education Network, doctors and other health professionals are encouraged to sign up using this link:  https://medshr.it/sicklecell 

MedShr also offers free, fast-tracked, registration for medical schools, hospitals and medical societies. For more information, please email: globalhealth@medshr.net.

About MedShr

Now with over 1.5 million members worldwide, MedShr provides a unique digital channel for medical professionals to share their knowledge and skills, discuss complex and challenging cases, and learn from one another. 

MedShr is available to download free for iOS and Android from the App Store and Google Play. Access to the platform is limited to verified doctors and registered healthcare professionals.

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julesawalters

Malaria Day 2021: MedShr Launches Free Malaria Global Education Network for Healthcare Professionals

Malaria Day 2021: MedShr Launches Free Malaria Global Education Network for Healthcare Professionals

23 April, 2021

MedShr, the world’s leading platform for healthcare professionals, launches their Malaria Global Education Network on World Malaria Day, 25 April 2021. Aimed at preventing malaria and improving care and outcomes for patients, the free network will enable healthcare professionals around the world to share knowledge and experience and discuss malaria cases. 

Every year, malaria is responsible for half a million deaths worldwide. Despite being entirely preventable and treatable for less than $1 per patient, around 300,000 children die annually from malaria before their 5th birthday, nearly all of whom live in sub-Saharan Africa. 

Morbidity from malaria is also substantial, disrupting school attendance in poorer countries and significantly slowing the economic growth of high burden nations.

Despite significant progress in reducing the malaria deaths by 60% since 2000, saving over 7 million lives, progress has now plateaued according to the WHO.  With the COVID-19 pandemic further disrupting access to essential medical services, especially in low and middle income countries, there is a huge risk of reversing the gains already made. Latest research estimates that a 50% disruption in access to malaria treatment in sub-Saharan Africa could lead to an additional 100,000 deaths this year (source to be added).

On World Malaria Day 2021, MedShr joins global efforts in drawing the line against malaria through our new Malaria Global Education Network, aimed at preventing malaria and improving care and outcomes for patients. 

“The burden of malaria is enormous, and every effort to limit its impact, especially on vulnerable groups such as women and children makes a real difference,” said Dr Antonia Trent, Clinical Director at MedShr. “We have developed a unique tool to support colleagues in addressing this disease, and would like to take the opportunity to invite all healthcare professionals globally to take part .”

The Malaria Global Education Network will enable healthcare professionals worldwide to connect and learn through clinical case discussion on the MedShr app and platform. There will also be the opportunity for healthcare professionals to share their own experiences, discuss challenging cases, and have access to free, mobile-friendly resources that support them in their daily practice.

By joining this network and contributing relevant educational experiences, doctors and healthcare professionals can do their part to fulfil this year’s motto: Zero Malaria Starts With Me.

For free access to the Global Malaria Education Network, doctors and other health professionals are encouraged to sign up using this link: https://medshr.it/malaria

MedShr also offers free, fast-tracked, registration for medical schools, hospitals and medical societies. For further information, email: globalhealth@medshr.net

About MedShr

Now with over 1.5 million members worldwide, MedShr provides a unique digital channel for medical professionals to share their knowledge and skills, discuss complex and challenging cases, and learn from one another. 

MedShr is available to download free for iOS and Android from the App Store and Google Play. Access to the platform is limited to verified doctors and registered healthcare professionals.

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julesawalters

MedShr launches global health programme on World Health Day

MedShr launches global health programme on World Health Day

6 April, 2021

Introducing MedShr’s global health programme

This World Health Day 2021, MedShr is delighted to announce the launch of its new Global Health Programme, connecting over 1.5 million healthcare professionals (HCPs) in 190 countries.

The programme will bring together healthcare professionals through specially curated educational networks, with the goal of providing education for key diseases and emerging priorities in global health.

These global networks will enable HCPs everywhere to explore challenging cases, share resources and experiences, and discuss research priorities in a variety of areas. 

Free, interactive case-based learning and disease-specific discussion groups are now available on the MedShr app, focusing on Chagas disease, malaria, leprosy, sickle cell disease, preventable blindness, antimicrobial resistance and other global health challenges. 

HCPs with a special interest in these areas, or with relevant educational experience to share?, are invited to join one of MedShr’s new online global networks and engage in the latest discussions.

The new networks are linked and listed here:

About MedShr

MedShr is a secure, professional app and network for medical professionals to connect and learn through case discussion. Over 2 million doctors and HCPs use MedShr to discover, discuss and share clinical cases and medical images. The platform’s innovative educational approach puts focus on the application of insights from the latest scientific publications in real-world scenarios. Developed by doctors, for doctors, its speaks to specialists in their language, fostering learning and discussion about the specifics of clinical decision-making and management.

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