Hi all,

As this is my first time posting, please allow me to introduce myself.
My name is 
Chantal, and I'm fairly new to the field of RIM. I started working last
January as an 
Information Management Analyst, writing retention schedules and records
classification 
systems for several departments of the Government of Alberta. I am also
an MLIS student at the 
University of Alberta, trying to juggle work and family commitments and
still find time 
to finish off my thesis. I found this listserve my first week into my
job, and have been 
consistently lurking ever since.

Today, however, an article came across my desk that I thought was just
too interesting to 
keep to myself. Apparently, Microsoft has filed a patent application to
link gaming 
avatars to health information. The abstract states:

"An avatar generator for a virtual environment reflects a physiological
characteristic of 
the user, injecting a degree of reality into the capabilities or
appearance. Thereby, 
many of the incentives of the real world are replicated in a virtual
environment. 
Physiological data that reflect a degree of health of the real person
can be linked to 
rewards of capabilities of a gaming avatar, an amount of time budgeted
to play, or a 
visible indication. Thereby, people are encouraged to exercise.
Physiological data that 
reflect the health and perhaps also mood also improve social interaction
in virtual 
environments. People seeking to meet and become acquainted with
particular types of 
people are not thwarted by the artificiality of avatars. The
physiological data can be 
gleaned from a third party health data collection repository, a
healthcare smart card, a 
real-time physiological sensor (e.g., blood pressure, heart rate, blood
glucose, peak 
flow, pedometer, etc.). "

Can this be for real? http://bit.ly/5sUZ7x
I was hoping to find evidence that this is a hoax, but haven't been able
to dredge 
anything up yet. I have to say that this raises some additional concerns
about 
electronic health records...

Chantal Ritcey 
Senior Information Management Analyst 
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/chantalritcey 
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