January 11, 2010
Dear Friend of the Texas Heart Institute,
A new year on the calendar marks another milestone here at the Texas Heart Institute. Our "Ask a Texas Heart Institute Doctor" web service has been up and running for a full 12 months this January and, based on the data, it's been an unqualified success:
- Nearly 100,000 visitors have come to the "Ask" website for help and the number of visitors has steadily increased.
- Almost 12,000 visited the site in November alone.
- The Google search engine led 55,000 visitors to the website in 2009. That's an average of over 150 people a day using this one tool alone to seek answers from THI doctors and researchers.
- Questions have come from 38 states and 52 different countries.
- Individuals have spent up to 95 minutes exploring information on THI's website.
- The variety of subjects means THI ranks high for hundreds of online search terms which lead people to our site. The term "heart doctor" is one of the most frequently used by internet searchers.
- Our doctors have answered more than 700 questions online, and hundreds more have been responded to directly.
A statistic about which we are most proud is that 36 THI physicians, including 29 cardiologists and 7 cardiovascular surgeons, have participated in this work. They strive to answer all the questions as accurately and as quickly as possible. Their willingness to share their life-saving, life-altering knowledge and skills this way has been inspiring.
This service is the brainchild of Dr. Mehdi Razavi, or rather of his wife, Nikta. Mehdi says many patients had requested online references to information about various aspects of cardiac disease and treatment and these are notoriously difficult to find.
"One day my wife suggested that since there are so many cardiologists at THI, perhaps we could find a platform to answer people's questions, and I believed that the reputation and quality of the THI physicians would provide an excellent foundation on which to build this service," he told me.
Dr. Razavi says he's both surprised and gratified by the success, as am I.
"It's very satisfying to be able to at least provide a general response to a person's concerns. Often those asking questions do not have access or, for other reasons, feel more comfortable posing a question anonymously," Razavi said.
"Although there is no patient-physician relationship, the responses very often have clear implications for those asking the questions. I consider this providing health awareness and education," he added. An unexpected benefit is that we've identified the most frequently asked questions and are adding new and updated information addressing those subjects on our website.
Providing those responses and educational topics, of course, is a key part of the mission of THI and it is wonderful that, through THI's website, we can do that for people around the globe–at the speed of light, and literally at the touch of a fingertip.
But, it's not so much the marvels of technology as it is the magic of a new tool to reach out and help real people in a meaningful way–and the inspiration to do it.
"We've had questions ranging from personal stories involving the sudden death of family members to those with community-wide healthcare implications, such as exercise for children and heart disease in women and pregnancy," says Dr. Razavi. "When you survey the questions, their depth and variety can be appreciated."
Indeed they can be appreciated, and so should the answers we are providing, with the help of our dedicated, thoughtful doctors–and with your generous support.
It's just one of the consumer/patient education services THI provides, online and in person. We are proud of them all. To learn more visit www.texasheart.org/hic, or to ask a question, visit www.texasheart.org/heartdoctor.
Respectfully yours,
James T. Willerson, MD
President and Medical Director
Contact Dr. Willerson
Read the previous issue of Heart to Heart about innovative treatments for life-threatening arrhythmias.
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