diately and securely, and it’s easy for me to respond promptly and to provide more efficient patient care,” she said.
DocbookMD allows phy- sicians to transmit text mes- sages and images to each other that meet Health In- surance Portability and Ac- countability Act (HIPAA) encryption and security re- quirements. It is available for iPhone and Android phones, as well as for iPad and iPod touch.
DocbookMD is available
free of charge in Texas only to TMA and county medical society members. The Texas Medical Liabil-
ity Trust is a sponsor of Doc- book MD. The Austin husband-and-
Physicians can access DocbookMD on iPhone and Android phones, as well as iPad and iPod touch.
wife team of Tracey Haas, DO, and Tim Gueramy, MD, developed the app and launched the flagship ap- plication in January 2011. Dr. Haas, a family physician, says the app eliminates the need for unnecessary and often costly hospital or lab visits when an image of an x-ray or wound, for exam- ple, would suffice.
The app allows physi- cians to:
“I heard about DocbookMD through a colleague. I tried the app, and before long several of my colleagues at Dallas Nephrology Associates became users. Patient-related messages pop up imme-
• Prioritize outgoing text messages, • Confirm receipt of text messages, • Search a local pharmacy and hospital directory for up-to-date contact infor- mation, and
• Search a medical society directory to locate area doctors by name or specialty or by facility or group with which they’re affiliated.
Austin King, MD
Cristie Columbus, MD
54 TEXAS MEDICINE November 2012
DocbookMD supports up to one phone (iPhone or Android) and one oth- er device (iPad or iPod touch) per user account. Dr. Gueramy says that the app helps physicians enhance patient care, im- prove their practice efficiency, gain and
give referrals, and avoid mistakes. “DocbookMD allows you to look up another doctor at the point of care. You can then either call the physician or send a text message with room num- bers, medical record numbers, and even pictures. And all of this is sent securely and in a way that meets HIPAA require- ments,” he said.
Anywhere, anytime
Drs. Haas and Gueramy set to work creating the app after a “medical emer- gency” interrupted their first wedding anniversary dinner.
Even though it turned out not to be
an emergency, Dr. Gueramy, an orthope- dic surgeon, had to go to the hospital, where he remained for hours to help with other cases. The couple developed an app that allowed Dr. Gueramy to see an x-ray on his phone. Determined to ease hassles and improve communi- cation for physicians, they developed DocbookMD within a year-and-a-half of starting the project.
The couple’s technological brainchild flourished. DocbookMD currently has more than 10,000 users and is available in 28 states and more than 200 medi- cal societies, including all of the county medical societies in Texas. And in late August, the company released version 4.0 of the app, which the physician cre- ators describe as “faster, more stable, more intuitive, and easier to use.” The new version features threaded messag- ing, message forwarding, and quicker message downloads. Version 4.0 gives users the option of enhanced notification, which sends phy- sicians an email and a text message if they fail to open a message from Doc- bookMD within a specified time. “Our reason for developing Docbook- MD was that we wanted to connect phy- sicians. This way, physician users can securely get test results and other in- formation on a patient while they’re at dinner, traveling in another country, or watching a baseball game. They can be reached anywhere, anytime,” Dr. Haas said.
She and her husband had an opportu- nity to test the capabilities of Docbook- MD while they volunteered their medical
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