Some of you may have watched it already. It is a nice little video with accompanying music and some of the statistics are US based. But that shouldn’t matter too much. I think you will agree the message is pretty clear.

click on the image below

Technology may help individuals and their quality of life and allow for improvements to overall health care provision; it has the potential to generate truck loads of information that will need to be acted upon by somebody somewhere.

I hope that a machine does not replace the human connections that we crave as human beings and I hope that machines and computers do not end up as decision makers over our lives. Technology should serve to enhance health care and not replace the social networks and social supports that we need for good health.

Watching a teenager MSNing quietly with friends or text messaging on their cellular phones or collecting with other video gamers on-line is a sight to behold. Usually it ends with a real social connection occurring at some point and the teenager flits out the door to connect in real life with real friends. Teenagers definitely understand the need for social connecting and how technology can assist.

In the medical world, numerous studies show the importance to good health of social support. With advances in telehealth, teleconferencing and technology that allow assessment with no direct human interaction, I suppose we will have something else to measure…along with all the other measurements that are being tallied and quantified.

Just remember, the more information we generate, the more that has to be monitored and the more resources are required. As long as technology can support patients it has merit. When technology takes on a life of its own or siphons off human resources into other areas away from direct patient care, we should be wary.