Every year, when the Arab Health Congress comes to Dubai, I suddenly get popular with young women in the media and communications field.
“Please drop by at the congress and we can talk about heart attacks among women,” said one media person the other day.
The congress and the exhibition attract hordes of visitors and representatives from specialised companies and every year there is a traffic jam leading to the World Trade Centre on Zabeel Road and trying to get parking at the massive open-air lot becomes a challenge.
Every year, medical firms show off their latest technologies that will help us live longer and hopefully with a better quality of life. It’s amazing to see the tremendous advances taking place in this field and some equipment and drugs seem straight out of science fiction.
With things such as a polymer cable that can be screwed on to fragile bones to repair fractures, many parts inside the human body are slowly being replaced with supposedly more efficient man-made stuff that will turn you into some sort of a Robo-cop.
The big things this year are wearable health gadgets that keep track of heartbeat, cholesterol and sugar levels.
It was only two years ago that I had bought a pedometer with a GPS and it is already redundant. It could be attached to a PC and I could keep a record of my runs and it would tell me where I should shape up.
But every time I ran under a tree or under a bridge, the GPS wouldn’t work.
The wearable technology is getting more bizarre and this one introduced at the CES (Consumer Electronics Show held recently in southern California) caught my eye. It’s called Sensoria Smart Socks that has a band that attaches to the sock. It connects to your smartphone app and tells you what your foot has been up to.
It gives you advise on how to run, whether your gait is right. Watch out if you try to be lazy and sit on the couch, as it even nags you like your partner about it. The same company has built a heart-rate monitor that is built in your inner wear.
But despite these wonderful medical advances, and despite the vast knowledge available on the internet, more people are falling sick because of advances in the food industry that bring to you cheap, tasty, fast food that kills.
The other thing I noticed is that clinics and hospitals still need cumbersome paper files for each patient. It seems silly in today’s world that thousands of paper files have to be stored in some room.
Surely, all that data can easily be stored on a memory stick or the information can be electronically shared with the patient, so that the patient is better aware of his or her condition.
The other day, I was at a clinic and noticed that it took people a long while to get to see their doctor. The number of patients are increasing and it seems the doctors are seeing more patients than they are able to handle every day.
That brings me to the subject of my mother-in-law who is sort of an expert in medical affairs. She doesn’t trust anyone from the medical fraternity, saying that everyone is after her money, instead of making her feel good.
She always gets a second opinion whenever a doctor prescribes something and she calls up my wife and asks for her opinion. “The quack has asked me to take the blood pressure medicine, but he knows I am allergic to it,” she says.
I notice that she never asks for my opinion even though I am a health and medical reporter!
