Figure 1为什么火：15%的美国医学院学生都在用这款应用

    友情提示：在移动应用程序Figure 1中找到的照片可能会让你感到有点反胃。这些照片包括（要是描述医疗伤害让你作呕，请直接跳到下一段）一个被烟火炸伤，最近刚做完修复手术，呈血肿形状的大拇指；一只17岁少年被电烧成焦黑色的脚；一条刚刚从患者肛门拉出的蠕虫。是的，确实够恶心。

    哪怕医疗专业人士也不是每天都面对如此惊悚的画面，这也正是他们争相下载这款照片应用程序的原因所在。自两年前推出以来，这款看似不起眼的应用已经获得了极大成功，现在拥有约12.5万名受众。Figure 1公司预测称，15%的美国医学院学生正在使用这款应用。这可能是投资者对其感兴趣的原因之一：8月6日，这家总部位于多伦多的初创公司宣称，该公司已经募集了由合广投资(Union Square Ventures)领衔的风投机构提供的400万美元资金。

    Figure 1其实是一种可视化的速记方式，其目标用户是寻求交流意见的专业医务人员。在财富英文网站《影像的未来》专栏(The Future of the Image)的开篇，我着重阐述了为什么随着人们越来越多地用照片来代替文本，视觉认识能力(visual literacy)将变得日益重要。这种趋势将对企业产生巨大的影响。随着图片逐渐替代文字，帮助专业人士拍摄和比较照片的工具将在企业中发挥越来越重要的作用。

    目前，许多软件应用正在兴起，以顺应这种趋势。比如，Architizer邀请建筑师上传和共享项目。Foko为工商界提供了一款私人企业照片共享应用，其客户包括全食超市(Whole Foods)。

    也难怪医疗专业人员会如此热情地拥抱这样一款类似于医生版Instagram的应用。医学，毕竟是一个讲究高度可视化的行当。经典的教科书充满了各种图表照片，而医生要想了解所有类型的疾病，再精确的描述也永远比不上一张色彩斑斓的疾病照片。

    重症监护医生乔舒亚•兰迪曾经在2012年夏天，以访问学者身份在斯坦福大学(Stanford University)从事在线医学教育研究。就是那段时间，他第一次看到了一个照片共享工具的潜力。他的调研结果显示，医生们已经开始使用智能手机和其他设备来互发照片，或者查找医学文献。返回多伦多之后，他与软件设计师理查德•彭纳和前记者格雷戈里•利维合作推出了一个平台。在这个平台上，医疗人员可以安全地共享照片，不会泄漏患者的隐私。

    任何人都可以在Figure 1上给照片“评星”，这是一种类似于“点赞”的功能。但只有专业医生才能发布照片和评论。（大约三分之一的用户是医生，另外三分之一是其他医护人员。）为了遵守《健康保险流通与责任法案》（HIPAA）的要求，用户每次上传一张照片时，必须签署一份弃权声明书——这个签名流程设计得非常优雅，只需轻轻一击，即可完成。此外，Figure 1禁止上传脸部照片，还对其他可能危及病人隐私的细节进行了模糊处理。

    许多图像引起了跟诊断相关的讨论，尽管它并非这款应用的设计目的。用户根据解剖学（下肢，脑）和专业类别（心血管内科，小儿科）对这些图像分类标记。比如，数张配有一段车祸过程详细说明的颅骨骨折照片引发了热议：这位患者是否系了安全带？（他系了）安全带断裂的频率究竟有多高？（非常罕见）还有一张脊柱弯曲部分的图像，其说明文字显示，这位患者是一位34岁的女性，患有步态障碍和膀胱功能障碍，上传者邀请用户们发表评论。在7则留言中，有人建议再照一次X射线，另一位评论者则怀疑这可能是血管瘤（一种良性肿瘤）。

    随着更多的专业医护人员开始接受源自工作的图像，Figure 1很可能将面临竞争压力。已经有几家初创公司开始提供面向医生的社交网络工具。【一家名为Doximity的医生社交网络声称，它的用户数量比美国医学协会(American Medical Association)还要多。】但Figure 1的创始人显然眼光不错，他们识别出了一项正迅速发展的趋势。

    《影像的未来》是Jessi Hempel为《财富》不定期撰写的专栏，旨在探索技术如何促进视觉沟通。（财富中文网）

    译者：叶寒

    A word of warning: the photographs found on the mobile application Figure 1 may make your stomach turn. They include—and you should skip to the next paragraph if descriptions of medical injuries will nauseate you—a swollen bloody thumb, recently reconstructed after a fireworks injury; a 17 year-old’s foot charred black by an electrical burn; and a worm pulled from a patient’s anus. Yes, really.

    This is the stuff that medical professionals don’t see everyday, which is exactly why they’re flocking to this photo-sharing app. Though tiny, it has proven extremely popular since it launched two years ago. The app now counts an audience of 125,000, and its parent company, which shares its name, estimates that 15% of medical students in the United States use it. Which may be one reason why investors are interested: on August 6, the Toronto-based startup will announce that it raised $4 million in funding led by Union Square Ventures.

    Figure 1 essentially offers a visual shorthand for healthcare professionals looking to compare notes. In my opening essay for Fortune‘s The Future of the Image series, I made the case for the rise of visual literacy as people increasingly substitute photos for text. This trend will have a huge impact on business. As pictures replace words, tools that allow professionals to take and compare photos have an increasingly important role to play in the enterprise.

    Already, a host of software applications are emerging to support this. Architizer invites architects to upload and share projects, for example. FoKo offers a secure, private enterprise photo-sharing app designed for companies and counts Whole Foods as a customer.

    It’s no surprise that healthcare professionals would embrace an Instagram for doctors. Medicine, after all, is highly visual. Classic textbooks are teeming withdiagrammed photos, and for doctors trying to learn about all types of ailments, descriptions are never as good as seeing a malady in all of its splendor.

    Joshua Landy, a critical care physician, first saw the potential for a photo-sharing tool while researching online medical education as a visiting scholar at Stanford University in the summer of 2012. In surveys that he distributed, he found doctors were already using their smartphones and other devices to text each other pictures, or to look up medical references. Back in Toronto, he partnered with software developer Richard Penner and former journalist Gregory Levey to launch a platform that allows medical professionals to share photos safely without compromising the privacy of patients.

    Anyone can join Figure 1 and “star” photos, which is the equivalent of liking them. Only medical professionals can post photos and make comments. (About a third of the users are doctors, and another third are other types of health care workers.) To comply with HIPAA regulations, users must sign a waiver—an elegantly designed one-click, one-signature process—every time they upload a photo. Figure 1 also blocks faces and obscures other details that may compromise patient privacy.

    Many of the images draw diagnostic discussions, though the app isn’t intended for this purpose. The images are user-tagged by anatomy (lower limb, brain) and specialty (cardiology, pediatrics). For example, photographs of a fractured skull with a caption detailing a car accident prompt a conversation about whether the patient was wearing a lap belt (he was) and how often belts break (rarely). An image of a curved portion of a spine accompanies a caption that identifies the patient as a 34-year-old female with gait disturbance and bladder dysfunction and asks for thoughts. Of the seven comments, someone suggests additional x-rays while another commenter asks if it could be a hemangioma, a benign tumor.

    Figure 1 will likely have competition as more medical professionals embrace images on the job, and several startups already offer social networking tools for doctors. (One, the physicians’ network Doximity, now boasts more member physicians than the American Medical Association.) But its founders have clearly identified a trend that is sure to gain momentum.

    “The Future of the Image” is an occasional series written by Jessi Hempel exploring how technology facilitates visual communication.