Which handheld should I buy?

The PDA or handheld computer, is not just a toy of the Cusper generation or for your pre-teens to use for games. It is a serious tool that has found a niche in medicine. Everyone of our residents carries a PDA and uses it several times a day. Web-based programs such as ePocrates provide them with instantaneous information on correct drug dosage and interactions. The literature already contains reports of the ability of this type of PDA-based software to reduce prescription errors. Our residents also use shareware versions of patient management software to keep track of patients on service and of individual surgeon's preferences. If your residents use ResSOLution to enter surgery case data, they will find that the new, PDA-based version shown at the recent Surgical Education Week will make data entry and transmission to the program director's files a piece of cake. The software has a long-awaited, full alpha-search capability for current CPT codes. I download my calendar and telephone files to my PDA every day so that I have everything on my office computer in the "palm" of my hand where and when I need it. Try remembering the office number of a referring physician in the middle of the night or suffering through the Muzak-ridden delays of waiting for a hospital operator to give you a specific extension and you will carry your PDA too!