Interesting introduction in this Armed with Science article from the US Department of Defense describing DARPA’s ‘Warrior Web’ or ‘mech suit’ that is a soft, lightweight exoskeleton designed to help the average warrior humping 100-lb. equipment loads in rough terrain. In the Army, ‘for realsie’ means advanced prototype testing, this by the Army Research Laboratory Human Research and Engineering Directorate (ARL HRED, another one of those acronyms) in a five-month series of tests to evaluate multiple prototypes. Real progress and adoption here will have knock-on effects for advancing civilian development of assistance devices for the disabled and elderly. Includes 0:17 demo video. Warrior Web Prototype Takes First Steps
Harvard frets on 40,000 unvetted health apps–should we?
The Harvard Health Letter rails on that there is still no ‘trusted provider’ or vetting of consumer health apps. It sternly wags its finger to us on lack of regulation and no proof, beyond user reviews or forums, of effectiveness. There was the promise of Happtique to ‘curate’ health apps directly for consumers which is either permanently or temporarily on hold. Health Tap still has not yet filled the gap [TTA 31 May]. According to the HHL, trackers and calculators are the safest road to this kind of information. The article turns a decidedly dim eye on diagnostic tools such as phones for telederm consults. Consumers also should look at the brand–who produces the app, how often the app is updated, and if it provides references for the information it offers. The rest of the advice is fairly standard: consumers should buy well-known health brands, such as government agencies and research universities, and non-diagnostic usages. Hopefully most consumers will get the picture and we won’t have to fret on them. Some health-related apps should be avoided (Chicago Tribune.)
Robots with your face
Better than ‘Eyes Without A Face’ though… The RP-VITA robot developed by iRobot (the Roomba company) is moving beyond telepresence robots which have to be actively directed or pushed, to individually and automatically self-navigate via a combination of embedded hospital maps and simple iPad instructions to go to a particular department or room. The face is the doctor’s and less work for him directing the robot. Robots with your face want to invade workplaces and hospitals (Fortune) Hat tip to Toni Bunting, reader and TANN Ireland editor.
Earlier in TTA on RP-VITA: One big step for iRobot, one small step for doctorkind, Your robot news for an Olympics weekend
Google Glass-type extra help for the vision impaired
Developed by Israeli startup OrCam, these glasses promise a boost for people with impaired vision in a Google Glass-type form factor. The glasses conceal a minute audio/visual pickup, connected to a pocket-sized PC which can read “text in the wild” such as bus numbers, newspaper articles, and traffic lights. OrCam can also be set up to recognize faces, products and places which are pre-programmed, or can store new ones such as family, friends and credit cards, by the user shaking it or waving a hand, then following directions for storage. Google Glass for visually impaired reads street signs aloud (PSFK). (Hat tip to TANN Ireland Editor and TTA reader Toni Bunting) Ed. note: suddenly, any glasses-type wearable is compared with a product that is barely out!
Concussion monitoring in test in NY high school (US)
Following our coverage of CTE and mTBI (mild traumatic brain injury) at the GCRI presentation last week, a small-town football team is one of the first to pilot, albeit for three days, a new concussion detection technology developed by i1Biometrics. The Middletown, NY high school tested their Impact Sensing Mouth Guard that measures hits to better assess the likelihood of cumulative blows and outright head injuries. The mouth guards recognize cheek tissue for activation, and function as a standard mouth guard plus accelerometer and gyroscope to detect the hard-to-determine rotational acceleration. Data is then transmitted wirelessly to a monitoring station (laptop) where trainers can analyze the data. The i1Biometrics system will be further tested this fall at Purdue and the University of South Carolina. Article (Times Herald Record); i1 Biometrics website.
Doctors wild about…what works
In the first half of the following blog item the author makes some valid points about doctors being quick to adopt mobile devices but that they were also quick to discover that the available apps are not much use in their work. The second half turns into a ‘knock Apple and big-up Windows 8 on tablets’ session. But then, as the author is Bill Crounse, MD, Senior Director, Worldwide Health at Microsoft, it would be surprising if he didn’t take that opportunity. Doctors wild about….. what works Hat tip to Bob Pyke.
UPDATE: related item, thanks to Toni Bunting: Health apps won’t reach core NHS patients (The Guardian). An NHS commissioner, writing under a pseudonym, also bemoans the lack of focus on appropriate apps and/or their use in the NHS. What the author focuses on is that the majority of NHS users are “the elderly, deprived and poorly-educated” and these people are less likely than most to be wielding and using smartphones.
The UK has a problem with the cold
Each year, thousands of people die preventable deaths because of cold weather and a 56 page report by James Lloyd for The Strategic Society Centre teases out the issues and makes some policy recommendations. It is thoroughly done and even contains a recommendation for CCGs to use telecare to monitor people (particularly those with dementia) at risk from cold. (Pages 5/45/52) Excess Winter Deaths, Winter Fuel Payments and the UK’s problem with the cold (PDF download) Hat tip to Melissa Daniells, Portsmouth.
ATHENE tutorial at Design4Health
The Assisted Technologies for Healthy living in Elders: Needs Assessment by Ethnography (ATHENE) project, funded by the Technology Strategy Board under its Assisted Living Innovation (ALIP) Programme, will be running a tutorial session at the Design4Health conference in July. The session “will be of value to people involved in the design and development of assisted living technologies, health and social care professionals involved in planning, management and delivery of assisted living services, CSCW and social science researchers, and commercial researchers and consultants working in the field. Comprehensive notes will be provided and other relevant material will be available on the ATHENE website. The presenters – from Queen Mary University of London, Warwick University, Lancaster University and Barts Health NHS Trust – are particularly associated with developments in methodologies for the study of domestic environments and practices associated with the participative design and co-production of technologies.” To participate, register for the Design4Health conference.
Design 4 Health Conference 2013 (UK)
3-5 July 2013 Sheffield Hallam University, UK
Design4Health 2013 will bring together designers and creative practitioners with researchers, clinicians, policy makers and users to discuss, disseminate and test their approaches and methods. They will explore creative approaches and perspectives to enhance understanding and experience, and improve efficiency of health and wellbeing services and products. Info and registration.
Smart vests, ‘granny pods’ and robot friends: future living for older people
Here’s a rather odd article that was published in the UK’s Financial Times’s weekend supplement: High-tech devices to meet housing and care needs of older people. It is odd because it’s an eclectic compilation of examples of tech and a ‘granny pod’ for older people to live in (from the ‘States). As a result, the article lacks a coherent vision based on current trends for living independently with tech support. Heads-up thanks to Charles Lowe.
WebRTC may revolutionise communications for older people – quietly and soon
Real time communications over the internet (WebRTC) already happens via applications like Skype and other messaging services but what if anyone using a web browser could just switch on their microphone and webcam and talk to someone else? The proposition that setting up the applications with their accounts and quirky interfaces is a barrier for non-techie people, particularly older ones, is quietly demolished. Care-related communications and the reduction of social isolation becomes a whole lot easier. Well, those readers using Chrome and the latest Firefox beta browsers already have that capability and a long article (6 web pages) in CIO.com speculates that other browsers (with the exception of Apple’s?) will not be far behind. With WebRTC, Real-Time Communications Come to the Browser. The article gets very techie half way through but, for the context of care, there is an important point towards the end – the WebRTC protocol requires the user to give permission for the browser to access the microphone and webcam, which will allay concerns about breaches of privacy. Hat tip to Sande Olson.
Telekinesis to help paralysed people – gets closer
Happy to add another ‘tele-‘ to our range of interests when it’s as interesting as this…a relatively untrained volunteer controls a flying model helicopter drone my means of thought via an electrode cap, a computer, and wifi. Article about it here. Heads up thanks to Toni Bunting, TANN Ireland.
[This video is no longer available on this site but may be findable via an internet search]Related item, also thanks to Toni: Use Universal Gesture Control From Any Room In Your House.
100,000+ and counting: 3millionlives (UK)
In 2012 an estimated 100,000+ new users were connected to telecare and telehealth systems according to a 3millionlives (3ML) press release today. The figure, 3.3% of the five-year 3ML target, is based on a Telecare Services Association (TSA) survey of 80 organisations. The increase does not take into account the number of new telecare connections one might have expected without the 3ML initiative or the net change owing to ‘user churn’. But at least someone is trying to assess what is happening, which is good. Press release (PDF)
Contact sports, long term effects and CTE
The effects of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) are likely far more widespread than the National Football League (NFL) and thousands of combat soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. That evidence was presented this past Monday at the German Center for Research and Innovation (GCRI) by two leading researchers in the field: Robert A. Stern, MD of Boston University and Inga Koerte, MD of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU). The panel was moderated by Alan Schwarz of The New York Times, a freelance sportswriter/baseball stats expert-turned-concussion investigator/writer whose articles on sports concussions and long term effects are helping to change US sports safety. Update 10 June: video (1:38:00), event summary. (more…)
A selective look at health tech startups, toys and keeping it clean
Joan Justice, as Curator-in-Chief of HealthWorks Collective, always provides a quirky look at cool stuff in health tech. Her second round goes a bit afield of health, but what’s interesting: ClearMD (DIY provider videos for patients), Picmonic (medical student education audio-picture mnemonics), Cobalt Research (web-based Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT)) and Accessible Home Living (designing/remodeling for older adults/disabled needs). Health Start-Ups!: Another Round And what motivates serial healthcare entrepreneurs to be..serial? Check out her video interview with John Deutsch, current CEO of New Wave Enterprises, LLC who has been part of several EMR startups.
Ready to DIY? MIT Little Devices Laboratory is now developing MEDIkits (Medical Education Design Invention Kits) in diagnostics and therapeutics: drug delivery, diagnostics, microfluidics, prosthetics, vital signs and surgical devices. And the devices are built from–Lego parts, the internal workings of other toys with electronic parts, LEDs, and more–all to enable creative thinking in device development from a wide number of people outside traditional labs. The Little Devices Lab also has a collection of videos and press on their blog here. Can Toys Decrease the Cost of Health Care Devices? (HealthWorks Collective)
And ready to get clean? In the US, it is estimated that 100,000 people yearly die because of hospital-originating infections, largely due to poor hand hygiene. IntelligentM, a bracelet for hospital staff who are in contact with patients, reminds and checks for cleanliness. The device determines through its built-in accelerometer that hand washing and sanitizer are being used–and correctly. In communicating with RFID sensors at hygiene stations, it also reports compliance. Currently being tested at a hospital in Sarasota, Florida with two other locations shortly to adopt, and with potential uses in food service and with children. MIT Technology Review. Gizmag.
Is Silicon Valley-style thinking right for healthcare?
The always thoughtful David Shaywitz writes about coming out on the other side of the Gartner hype curve (ever so familiar to this Editor) into the ‘plateau of productivity’. He provides some anecdotal evidence from his Silicon Valley experience that you could possibly take the good parts of Hope and Hype and make them work for Health. His qualifiers lead this Editor to the following takeaways, with which Dr. Shaywitz might not necessarily agree:
- You the entrepreneur may well be thinking about changing the world with your service or device, but you might be better off focusing on solving a specific problem (or in Clayton Christensen’s terms ‘a job to be done’) and then being gratified when you do, actually, find a way to change the world and yes, you make some money for your investors. The Epic EHR started quite modestly.
- Silicon Valley observers are onto the hype cycle there– “the contrast between grandiose ambitions and disappointing delivery.” You should be too. If you’re in health tech, steer clear of the hypesters and the cocktail parties. In fact, be more like Dr. Shaywitz’s colleagues at MIT, understanding “the limitations of your work and the enormity of the unanswered questions remaining.”
- Aim for more than tweaking something existing–the incessant efficiency innovations so attractive to VCs in this ‘stuck on stupid’ economy–and “learn how to develop profoundly improved therapies, that cure – or better yet, prevent – disease and disability. ” Break out of what Dr. Christensen’s ‘broken circle.’ [TTA 9 Nov 12]
- Most startups fail, and to date there are far fewer successful exits in healthcare than in social media, which is why VCs like them ever so much more and they get the billion-dollar exits. More realistic is a modest return and a long development curve. So when seeking funding, be conservative and find alternate means.
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