I don’t know about you guys, but I use quite often Wikipedia for my USMLE studying. Now, the powerful Google launches Knol, the real competition for Wikipedia and considering the fact that Google is very rich, probably in the next few years Knol will be more and more popular.

Google opened its website Knol to the public on Wednesday, allowing people to write about their areas of expertise under their bylines in a twist on encyclopedia Wikipedia, which allows anonymity. “We are deeply convinced that authorship — knowing who wrote what — helps readers trust the content,” said Cedric DuPont, product manager for Knol. The name of the service is a play on an individual unit of knowledge, DuPont said, and entries on the public website, knol.google.com, are called “knols.” Google conducted a limited test of the site beginning in December. Knol has publishing tools similar to single blog pages. But unlike blogs, Knol encourages writers to reduce what they know about a topic to a single page that is not chronologically updated.

Google launches Knol [reuters via rlslog]

Reading USMLE step 2 CK materials and facing so many related to alcohol abuse and the complications of it,few questions related to alcohol popped up in my mind. Here are the questions and the answers I found.

1. How much is one drink of alcohol? The answer with some simple calculations can be seen here>>>.

2. How much drinking is too much? This is probably the toughest question, especially for people coming from countries having long traditions and even competitions in drinking (e.g. mostly Eastern European countries including Russia, Bulgaria, Poland, and some Western European countries famous with beer drinking and bar fist fighting, such as Scotland, Ireland, England, less likely Germany). For some people the limit is until they fall under the table. For that type of “macho drinkers” I would recommend one fast alcohol drinking screening test before they start feeling their liver close to the spina iliaca anterior superior (anterior superior iliac spine). How to Recognize Problem Drinking will also be helpful to identify the problem.

3. Is there such thing as a healthy drinking (they say one glass of red wine increase HDL with 5%, one to two shots of liquor are good for the heart)? There is a new research from this year showing that one drink might be of some benefit, but 2 is not healthy anymore. However, doctors will never prescribe anybody alcohol for healthy reasons. You better hit the gym, not the bar.

4. How much alcohol per day/week is still in the normal range? Good news for the few drinks per weeks lovers. Here is the “safe” amount of alcohol you can ingest weekl without fear of becoming alcoholic in the next few years.

5. Drinking and driving is out of question. Just it case here is a Blood Alcohol Content (BAC) Calculator.

usmle.org

There will be some changes in the software for the computer based USMLE exam.

A new version of the software used to deliver the computer-based USMLE Step examinations is scheduled to be introduced in mid-August 2008. Migration to the new version will occur first in the Step 2 Clinical Knowledge (CK) examination, and will be phased in over several weeks. If you plan to take the Step 2 CK examination in August 2008 or later, you should familiarize yourself with both the current test delivery software and the new version.

new usmle update [via firstaidteam]

Can you share the way you solve UW puzzle?
Do you have any special tricks and weapons, besides good preparation and memorization?
Do you know any good resources giving tips for approaching difficult questions?

This is still hot. Neeraj sent it to me today. If you like his notes for USMLE Step 2 CK and CS, you will find useful and this one.

Few months ago I was talking to one of the doctors from the same Hospital I work at. I showed him the website ratemds. He looked at it and I said, “I don’t buy this. I don’t like the idea patients to rate doctors. Who are they? They don’t know anything about medicine. I can rate somebody I work with for 10-15 years, but a patient can’t rate a doctor. Than he continue…, “I prefer to get treatment from an asshole doctor who is very good, than from somebody nice and polite who is just playing as a doctor without knowing anything”.

Initially I was kind of surprise and said to him, “Yes! The doctor should be knowledgeable. Knowledge comes first, but a good doctor has to know how to sell his knowledge too. He/She should be diplomatic as well. Medical business can be compared at some points to any other business. For example: you have a fabric and make the best shoes, but if you don’t know how to sell your product, how the people will buy from you. He said again, “the best doctors I know are assholes:)”. OK, I questioned him, “why the best doctors are assholes”. He answered,”because if you wanna be a good doctor you have to separate from the patient’s situation. The patient is not your friend. Who is the patient? Nobody…if you want to be the best doctor you don’t have to care that much about the patient and his/her feelings”.

I don’t know what to say. That conversation made me kind of confused. What do you thing? Do you like the best asshole doctor (whatever that means), or you are more into the nice, showing empathy but lacking knowledge one. Is there such thing as the “optimal” doctor. Smart and educated enough, polite enough, respectful enough?

Medics believe iwantgreatcare.org will lead to professionals being unfairly criticized and even libeled.The site, which has been set up by an English doctor, went live at the weekend and includes the details of dozens of Edinburgh hospital doctors and GPs, which the site’s bosses say were taken from the most up-to-date records available.

People can rate them out of 100 in trust, listening and recommended categories, and leave comments.

However, one consultant had used his own rating to protest about being included, especially as he has now left the Western General Hospital, where he is listed as working as a urologist. Read the original article here>>>

Pass program clue PDF file and Microsoft Power Point file. Both files have the same information, just different format. I found some very useful points. You can go quickly trough all of the slides and pick only what you like.

For some more free downloads check out the download page of the USMLEMD website.