How bliss is ignorance?

Apparently the Health Blogosphere has been scammed. For anyone that has heard of or knows of someone affiliated with the website Wellsphere, you may want to visit Dr. Val over at Get Better Health.

It seems that some health bloggers (approximately 1700) have been duped into losing content rights of their published blog content.

Please read more on this scam below.

Better Health » How The Health Blogosphere Was Scammed

A very big thank you to Dr. Val for providing this important information!

Carpe Diem

SandSurf over at Life in the Fast Lane has created a cornucopia of information for the directionally challenged blogger in this web 2.0 blogosphere. It’s a great list of resources for new and seasoned bloggers alike. Interested in finding other medical bloggers? Take a stop on over to his post.

Image Source: Deviant Art

Carpe Diem

My time in the blogosphere has been short. While I have been here I have met some absolutely wonderful people. I may not have met anyone in person, but I feel I have a good ‘sense’ of how you may be in person. My blogosphere is saturated with good-hearted genuinely nice individuals from many walks of life.

I have been blessed with some of the most friendly, self-less, and overly positive bloggers and web 2.0 connoisseurs.

I guess it was only a matter of time to have a negative experience.

I won’t give any details, just that I had a negative experience as a blogger, and I was upset, angry, speechless, pissed, etc.

I admit it. I wanted to respond with an overly loud, bitter, FLAME of a blog post. I know it would have felt good. I wanted to bark my side of the story dammit!

But thanks to a very good blogger-friend who disguises herself as wise sage and my beautiful wife I have seen the error in my poor judgment.

The funny thing is, this is what I blog about. Most visitors and readers who stop by my blog see my pseudonym and of course my avatar and automatically assume I’m all about physical strength. But the reality is I blog and pursue overall mind/body/spirit wellness and health. To be strong MENTALLY as well as physically.

Well, today I was tested.

And, I think I would have failed had they not come to my rescue.

I guess life is just one hard pill to swallow sometimes.

I guess that’s what it’s all about. Learning as we go along.

What does not kill us will make us stronger. Heh heh

Thanks for listening (uh… reading)

Carpe Diem

As a new blogger to the Blogosphere, I see this as an opportunity to help out your fellow blogger, as well as discover a blog or two outside your normal realm or internet reading.

Can you spare time to read one extra blog a week?

What could it hurt?

Click the link below and halp a blogger’ out.

How You Can Help End the Problem of Blogs With Great Content and No Readers

Carpe Diem

I believe some of my fellow med-blogger’s have touched on this subject from more than one direction. Phil Baumann, a fellow RN, touched on the gravity of our actions and what subject matter we discuss when using Twitter. Other med-blogger’s, including Not Nurse Ratched, PixelRN, and Emergiblog have shared their insight and opinions concerning this issue as well.

And then last week fuel was added to the fire when 2 employees from a New Mexico Hospital lost their respective jobs after they took pictures of patients receiving treatment and then posting the images to a social networking Web site.

In an ironic twist of fate, at work this week we were doing some ‘Fall’ cleaning in our unit and we stumbled across some very old photos. Photos of the department from years ago. I’m talking everything from 2 yrs ago up to maybe a couple decades at least.

One particular photo stuck out. It was a photo of a previous staff nurse on the job. And in the photo was the nurse at one of the bed stations, and in the far background of the photo was a picture of a patient.

It was a harmless photo. From the looks of it, I think they were simply trying to burn off the last pictures of a roll of film and just started snappin’ photos. (I’ve done this more times than I can remember) But the gravity of that picture hit me like a ton of bricks!

Do you think that picture would have been taken in this day and age? Do you think the camera would have even been near the patient bedside?

It made me reflect on the subject at hand.

Internet – Blogosphere – Medical Profession- HIPAA – Identity

I’ve been listening to the voices, and reading the posts lately and I still have the same opinion I did when this all originally surfaced.

Your actions as a professional in the (Virtual) electronic world should reflect your actions as a professional in the  (sorry…)  REAL world.

You already know how to act in a prudent, ethical and responsible manner as a professional. You get an annual reminder from the facility that employs you. I know I do!

After you’ve been working in the medical profession long enough you develop a sort of sixth sense for what is right and what is not. For what is within the limits of the law, and what is breaking the law. You intuitively know WHAT you can and cannot say, WHERE you can or cannot say it, and TO WHOM you can or cannot say it to.

How can being on the internet make things so gray and vague? How does pushing buttons on a keyboard or clicking a mouse change the rules?

It’s very simple.

We all know the arms of HIPAA extend past the walls of our employer. You must act as a professional in a professional manner even when you are not on the clock.

So.

Whatever it is you are sharing or typing, where ever you may be located on the world wide web, and with whomever your sharing it with. If you are at all confused or unsure of the legality of your actions.

Ask yourself this one simple question:

Would you be doing it if you WEREN’T on the internet?

Then don’t do it AT ALL.

Nuff’ said.

Carpe Diem