McMaster iBook on anesthesia a ‘crucial resource’
Karen Raymer, a clinical professor of anesthesia at the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine, was instrumental in creating a new educational iBook called 'Understanding Anesthesia: A Learners Guide.'
With the touch of a finger, tomorrow’s doctors are acquiring knowledge about anesthesia thanks to an innovative resource created at McMaster.
Understanding Anesthesia: A Learners Guide has already been downloaded more than 1,500 times in 40 countries, and is thought to be one-of-a-kind iBook. It was designed for medical students who want to gain practical knowledge of anesthesia.
The iBook was created by Karen Raymer — a clinical professor of anesthesia at the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine — in collaboration with recent alumnus Eric Brown and associate clinical professor Rick Kolesar. Linda Onorato, an assistant clinical professor, contributed several original illustrations for the project.
The interactive six-chapter iBook features a variety of modules with videos, slide shows, review quizzes and a glossary. Specific subjects (airway management, for example) are reached by touching the topic. To return to the main chapter, one simply pinches the page closed.
The iBook received high praise from American anesthesiologist and physician Meir Chernofsky, who is in charge of educating medical students at the Veterans Affairs Medical Centre in Washington, D.C. Chernofsky called the book a “crucial resource” offering just the right amount of detail.
“I will be using the book for a variety of medical student anesthesia clerkships at Uniformed Services University, the federal medical school of the U.S. Department of Defense,” he said.
Similar praise came from Amy Murray, associate professor and program director for anesthesiology at Loyola University. “It is very useful for early learners looking to get a sharper focus on anesthesiology. The Society for Education in Anesthesia has eagerly accepted this resource and offers it to medical students and educators on our website.”
According to Raymer, what sets the iBook apart is its ability to “supersize” figures by touching a specific portion of the screen. Readers also have the ability to create their own study cards, cross-reference information through the glossary and pull together highlighted material to facilitate reviews.
Other highlights include several video anatomy presentations embedded in the iBook, a PowerPoint presentation on fluid compartments of the body and an interactive figure demonstrating the components of an anesthetic machine. An interactive quiz ends each chapter.
The iBook is available for free at Understanding Anesthesia as well as from the Apple iBooks Store. The interactive version can only be downloaded and viewed on an iPad, although a PDF version (without interactivity) is available for viewing on other devices.
In the United States, the iBook is available online through the Society for Education in Anesthesia (SEA) website.
