At first, I was skeptical of whether such devices would even occupy the PDA niche, let alone carve its own niche. An article from eWeek seems to think so, though it lightly sketches over the details of how physicians and nurses can use the Origami. They quote a UCSF MD-Ph.D: “I do think there's a lot of interest by physicians and nurses for ultraportable PCs, especially for physicians who split their time between inpatient and outpatient settings and need something that can travel in and out of the hospitals and offices with them.”

Here's what the Origami has against it:

• Spartan battery life. I believe some physicians still hold long, long hours in the ER or the delivery room. A device, like the Origami, that survives only for 2 or 3 hours would require frequent charges and be more of an annoyance.
• High price. A feature-rich Palm or Windows Mobile device is cheap at the $200-$300 price range.
• Nearly the same functionality as a PDA. Palm and Windows Mobile devices have wireless, bluetooth, and cellular capabilities, and most physicians would use these devices to record observations and review patients' charts.
• Lack of a usable default interface. Windows XP is great for the desktop, but in a fast-paced environment, regular Windows XP user interfaces with their tiny cluttered toolbars and small text just won't cut it. Companies need to come up with a responsive easy-to-access user interface so that physicians don't waste the patient's precious 15 minutes by fiddling around with the Windows.

But, here's what it has going for it:

• A high-resolution screen. This makes it easy to review patients' charts at a glance, rather than scrolling up and down a chart on a tiny screen. Again, this is speculation, but this would be great for on-the-go radiologists who want to view X-rays.
• A bigger screen. For older physicians and nurses, the bigger display area will definitely help with screen readability.
• Windows XP. Windows .NET already exists, which makes the cost of programming applications much lower than programming specialized Palm or Windows Mobile applications, and allows developers to share much of the same code base with desktop versions of the same application.

I won't even mention research environments, since a lot of labs (at least, those at the UC) are strapped for cash.

My personal take on this is that it'll be awhile before any of this new technology is fully adopted in hospitals. Aren't paper charts still being used?