NHS England announces 7 “Test Beds”

January 23, 2016 | by

NHS England has announced a series of “Innovation Test Beds” that will be used to “harness technology to address some of the most complex issues facing patients and the health service”.

“Front-line health and care workers in seven areas will pioneer and evaluate the use of novel combinations of interconnected devices such as wearable monitors, data analysis and ways of working which will help patients stay well and monitor their conditions themselves at home”, according to the NHS press release. (more…)

Australian healthcare fund takes stake in telemedicine startup

January 23, 2016 | by

HCF, the oldest of the “Big Four” Australian health funds, has bought a 15% stake in telemedicine online doctor service startup GP2U. [grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/HCF-logo.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]GP2U provide systems which helps to make remote consultations via video conferencing possible.

According to yesterday’s press release HCF will run a pilot to “ensure the service is scaled to the wider HCF membership as smoothly as possible”. In addition to providing the video conferencing platform, [grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/GP2U-logo.png” thumb_width=”150″ /]GP2U also provides a prescription service that sends prescriptions directly from the GP office to pharmacy once the GP approves it. GP2U has agreements with three Australian pharmacy chains, Terry White Chemist, Chempro and Priceline.

HCF is a not-for-profit organisation founded 80 years ago and provides health cover for 1.5 million Australians and has a turnover in excess of AUD 2 billion. GP2U is very fortunate that such a large fund has taken a serious interest in it

European Alliance for Innovation Summit, Budapest, 14-16 June 2016

January 22, 2016 | by

The European Alliance for Innovation (EAI) is holding its International Summit focused on eHealth (eHealth360°) from the 14th-16th June 2016 in Budapest, Hungary.

The summit is claimed to be a unique event bringing a 360 degree perspective on mobile and electronic health. It will gather experiences and innovative ideas from related projects and activities, to draw out the process of moving from innovative research to commercialization.

It aims to be a powerful and inspirational event that brings together industry representatives, researchers, vendors, mHealth and eHealth domain experts, clinicians, developers and others to plan, learn, network, collaborate, strategise and tap more effectively into the immense potential of the eHealth and mHealth domains. It will comprise (more…)

Free entry to UCL’s Rosalind Franklin Appathon at Wayra – Tuesday 23rd Feb

January 21, 2016 | by

UCL is delighted to invite you to join them at Wayra, London for their Prize and Tech Day on Tuesday 23rd February at 14.30-19.00 as part of the Rosalind Franklin Appathon- a national app competition to empower and recognise women as leaders in STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths and Medicine).

This free event will include some short talks from the judges, UCL Provost Professor Michael Arthur and a very special guest talk from Rosalind Franklin’s sister, author and historian Professor Jenifer Glynn. We will then hear pitches from the app finalists. Winners will be announced by Baroness Martha Lane Fox (Founder of Lastminute.com), Andrew Eland (Director of Social Impact Engineering, Google) and Dame Athene Donald (Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Cambridge). There will also be plenty of time for networking and a chance to try out some of the apps. More information can be found here .

Do join UCL in celebrating the breadth of digital talent here in the UK and the pioneering women behind some truly innovative and exciting apps by registering for the event here.

Dubai starts telemedicine pilot

January 20, 2016 | by
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/rp-vita-1-e1453251179139.png” thumb_width=”150″ /]I am somewhat baffled by the news this week of a telemedicine trial in Dubai. One of the seven emirates making up UAE, Dubai has an area of less than 1,600 square miles, which amounts to a square of about 40 miles – so not exactly far to travel from any place to any place else if you are in Dubai. Not the obvious place to benefit greatly from telemedicine. The press release two days ago said that the pilot will “significantly enhance the manner in which healthcare is delivered in the emirate”.

According to the release the project will use “robots” from In Touch Health (referred to as “RoboDoc” in the release). These are self-propelled six-foot tall units (similar to the one shown, I expect, which is from the In Touch Health website) with video conferencing capability so that staff in one hospital can consult experts in one or more other hospitals in real time at the patient’s bedside.

The full press release is available here.

HealthSpot files for Chapter 7 liquidation (updated)

January 19, 2016 | by

The shock continues with HealthSpot. On Wednesday the company filed for Chapter 7 liquidation in US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Ohio in Columbus. The laundry list: assets of $5.2 million, about $3.5 million in inventory, and $23.3 million in liabilities, including convertible notes of $10 million from cable/broadband company Cox Communications, $6 million from investor Xerox and an undisclosed amount from the Ohio Development Services Agency. HealthSpot had raised close to $44 million since 2011. Their bankruptcy attorney David Whittaker cited cash flow; with only $1.1 million in revenue over the past three years, according to the filing, including $600,000 in 2015, no elaboration was needed. There’s not much left in assets to sell: 191 kiosks, mostly in storage (137) and 54 operating but shuttered at customer sites. The remaining value in liquidation (a/k/a pennies on the dollar) is dependent on whether the name, the kiosks and the IP are purchased. The last is problematic due to the current legal action by Computerized Screening [TTA 8 Jan] We hope this is not a sad harbinger of digital health in 2016, though we have already sensed that the unicorns are heading Over The Rainbow or wherever they go to pasture, but it’s not reassuring. Columbus Business First, MedCityNews.

Update: Neil Versel in his Throwback Thursday took a look at HealthSpot’s steak and salad days at International CES 2013. (See comments for this Editor’s impressions of HealthSpot at ATA 2014.) Perhaps good marketing, but symptomatic of the capital burn, doomed by a lack of sales and quite possibly, a solution that would have knocked it out of the park in 2010. As the old fighter pilot said, ‘timing and luck are everything.’

RSM hosts digital health event 25 February

January 19, 2016 | by

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/RSM.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]Recent developments in digital health 2016
Thursday 25 February 2016
Royal Society of Medicine, 1 Wimpole Street, London, W1G 0AE

Presented by the Royal Society of Medicine’s Telemedicine and eHealth Section (presided by our Editor Charles), this full day conference is open to the public and provides a global perspective from leaders within digital health. Keynoters are Mustafa Suleyman from Google’s Artificial Intelligence branch, DeepMind, and Dr Euan Ashley from Stanford University in California who leads Apple’s MyHeartCounts. Rates are reasonable: £50-115 for RSM members and £60-175 for non-members, plus 6 CPD credits. More information and registration on the RSM website here and download the flyer here.

Upcoming RSM Telemedicine events into early June:
Medical apps: Mainstreaming innovation–Thursday 7 April 2016

The future of medicine – the role of doctors in 2025–Thursday 19 May 2016

Big data 2016–Thursday 2 June 2016

Large Leeds rollout: is this NHS acceptance that apps can sometimes replace drugs?

January 18, 2016 | by

A new app that can replace expensive, side effect-prone, drugs has been developed by Yorkshire tech company ADI (disclosure which manages the admin for this editor as Managing Director of DHACA, and provides one of DHACA’s three Directors), with assistance from Harrogate-based Inhealthcare.  It is set to ease the burden on the NHS, alleviating daily chronic pain, initially available for some 7,000 patients it Leeds, making it one of the largest digital health services to be commissioned in the UK.

The app, called Painsense, will be free for patients to use. It gives them the knowledge, skills and guidance to manage their pain, which should reduce the need to visit their GP or hospital. It will be rolled out across other regions of the UK within the next six months.

(more…)

Outsourcing of retail clinics–another reason for HealthSpot’s demise? (US)

January 14, 2016 | by

Walgreens earlier this week announced another round of outsourcing their in-store health clinics to a local health system, this time in the Midwest US with Advocate Health Care. It affects 56 locations in the Chicago, Illinois area which will operate as Advocate Clinic at Walgreens in May 2016. It’s an interesting spin on the much-touted integration of healthcare services into retail pharmacies. It gives an integrated health system a prime location for community services–a clean, well-lighted place (to quote Hemingway, minus the daiquiris) with minimal overhead that provides one-stop-shopping for patient pharmacy and OTC products. It also solves part of the ‘fragmentation of care’ problem for Advocate patients as their records will go straight into their EHR. For Walgreens, it offloads the licensure and operating expenses of a clinic, gives a strong competitive advantage lent by the legitimacy of a leading provider, and attracts Advocate patients to their locations. Walgreens release  Last August, Walgreens turned over the keys of 25 Washington and Oregon clinics to Providence Health & Services in what now can be seen as a trial balloon.

What is surprising is how few Walgreens have clinic services–400 of over 8,100–over nine years of operations, starting with the acquisition of former travel industry executive Hal Rosenbluth’s 25 or so TakeCare Clinics around Philadelphia back in 2007. Yet further clinic expansion has been difficult as many locations have no physical space, there are restrictive state laws and the competition is everywhere between over 1,000 CVS Minute Clinics and local urgent care clinics. CVS also recently acquired 80 Target pharmacies and walk-in clinics. It’s reported that profitability has been a challenge for Walgreens in the clinic biz. Expect to see more of these arrangements to grow Walgreens’ clinic network.

Why might this be a contributor to HealthSpot Station’s end? A change of direction and a need for cost cutting that wasn’t there a year ago.  (more…)

Care Innovations’ Slovenski, 23andMe’s Schwartz move to Healthways

January 13, 2016 | by

Breaking News: Healthways, an online wellness program company based in Nashville, this morning announced that two executives well known to many of us in digital health have joined them. Sean Slovenski, CEO of Intel-GE Care Innovations, is now their President, Population Health Services. Steve Schwartz, their new SVP Strategy and Corporate Development, joins the company from VP Business Development and Strategy, 23andMe.

Mr Slovenski’s track record in 2.5 years at CI certainly impressed this Editor (formerly with the developer of their behavioral telemonitoring system bequeathed from GE Healthcare, QuietCare) with turning around the company from an outpost of Intel and GEHC having difficulty transitioning from ancient technology (remember the Intel Health Guide?) to a telehealth platform dubbed Health Harmony. He also put together a team that engineered multiple academic and health system alliances, along with an interesting turn into home digital health certification. While he came to CI from health insurance giant Humana in Louisville Kentucky running their behavioral health and wellness businesses, his prior experience includes both entrepreneurial turns at his own company and with smaller companies. He most recently engineered a Louisville outpost of CI [TTA 14 Oct 15]. Since Mr Slovenski is still listed on the CI website as CEO, this may have been a quickly executed move.

Mr Schwartz’s business development background includes long stints at two large healthcare companies, Allscripts (EHRs and practice management software) and LabCorp (lab testing). He weathered 23andMe’s FDA troubles and headed up their B2B sales area. Healthways release

Unusually, Healthways is a NASDAQ traded company that closed at $12.11 today in a down market. It’s old (in our terms) having been founded in 1981, becoming publicly traded ten years later. Its last round of venture financing was $20 million from CareFirst BlueCross Blue Shield in October 2013 (CrunchBase). Healthways has a fairly new CEO as well, who joined last August and obviously feels comfortable adding to his team.

Lessons learned from rural telehealth in Pennsylvania

January 13, 2016 | by

Several years ago, CJ Rhoads, a business professor at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania and CEO of consultancy HPL Consortium, asked Editor Steve and Donna for some background information on telehealth. According to her note last month to us, the results of her research were reported to the Pennsylvania legislature and The Center for Rural Pennsylvania (a legislative agency of the PA Assembly), in 2014 and now have been published in a more readable form by CRC Press-Taylor & Francis Group. An excerpt from their summary:

Improving the quality of healthcare, while increasing accessibility and lowering costs, is a complex dilemma facing rural communities around the world. The Center for Rural Pennsylvania believed that telehealth, the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical healthcare was a viable solution so it recently provided grants to conduct a thorough investigation into the factors involved.

Telehealth in Rural Hospitals: Lessons Learned from Pennsylvania reports the outcome of this year-long investigation. Illustrating telehealth implementations in rural settings, it supplies an overview of telehealth as well as an assessment of its economic impact.

The book skillfully intertwines the research and academic aspects of telehealth with helpful insights from the author.

From the table of contents, it appears to be an exhaustively researched book on telehealth and its impact in rural healthcare. It’s available to purchase on CRC’s website. Thanks to author CJ Rhoads for the heads up!

Tunstall acquires Hawaii monitoring service, tracks wandering in Australia

January 13, 2016 | by

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Big-T-thumb-480×294-55535.gif” thumb_width=”120″ /]Tunstall Americas has made a second acquisition of a home monitoring service and distributor in Hawaii, Lifeline Hawaii Services. Based in Honolulu and providing monitoring throughout the Islands, it appears from a statement by CEO Casey Pittock that the 15-year-old company will be merged with an earlier acquisition, Kupuna Monitoring Systems. Monitoring services will be provided on the mainland in New York City and Rhode Island. This marks the eleventh acquisition of local monitoring services Tunstall has made since late 2014. A caution to Mr Pittock: Editor Donna having some experience with a mainland company managing a significant Hawaii presence, albeit in a different industry (Avis car rental), the kama’aina (local) market prefers on-island presence and service, the more personal the better. One of the biggest challenges will be when that Hawaii emergency call comes in, to understand local expressions and to know that on the Big Island, Hilo is not around the corner from Kona but nearly two hours away; even on Oahu outside of Honolulu, help can get far away quickly. Hawaii News Now (Tunstall release)

Down Under, Tunstall maintains a steady level of activity unlike their US brethren who are hard to find at industry events. They began distribution before Christmas of the latest version of the wander alerting Find-Me Carers Watch for the cognitively impaired which just received a AU $3 million investment from local VC OneVentures. Retirement community Living Choice has also contracted with Tunstall to update their emergency call systems for five villages. Since last July, they have transitioned  and customized 700 units across five villages. Residents now can access the National Home Doctors Service and 24/7 monitoring by Tunstall’s centers in Australia and New Zealand. Australian Ageing Agenda Technology Review

The King’s Fund Digital Health & Care Conference

January 13, 2016 | by

5–6 Jul 2016; The King’s Fund, London W1G 0AN

Advance notice for The King’s Fund annual Digital Health Conference. The theme this year is exploring how the better use of technology and data can support and enable the key developments needed to reshape and improve the health and care system. Website information is just beginning to be posted here. Exhibiting opportunities are also available with information on the Exhibition tab.

Last year’s Congress is featured in video highlights and with links under the Presentations tab, including those in the T2D breakout session chaired by Editor Charles (Ms Murphy, Dr Smith, Ms Guthrie). TTA was a 2015 supporter.

Blood biomarkers to diagnose mild TBI; more studies on TBI, concussion

January 13, 2016 | by

An abundance of studies pointing the way to digital health opportunity. A surprise on the early morning radio news in NYC was mention of a report on a blood biomarker that could confirm a diagnosis of concussion, published in the Journal of Neurotrauma. Once found, it wasn’t exactly as advertised but the research is worth reviewing. First, it applies to mild TBI. The biomarker is the extensively studied glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) versus another biomarker, S100β. The key finding by the central Florida-based team is that in a general trauma population, GFAP out-performed S100β in detecting intracranial lesions as diagnosed in CT scans. Scrolling down in the article is a link to the abstract of a meta-study of 11 biomarkers in concussion, by the same lead researcher and another team. The current featured articles in Neurotrauma are a stunning review of studies around concussion and TBI, including two very interesting articles on why air evacuation can do more harm than good (unless absolutely necessary) for TBI patients (altitude lowers oxygen levels) and how mild TBI suffered by retired NFL players has long-term negative metabolic and pituitary effects. All paywalled unless you have library access or a friend with subscription access; however some of the citation articles are open access. But for health tech developers looking for problems to solve better, cheaper and faster, here it is–a lot more promising than yet another me-too wearable. 

HealthSpot closes the doors, shuts kiosks in Rite Aid, Cleveland Clinic (updated)

January 8, 2016 | by | 2 Comments

As we reported last July, HealthSpot, the Dublin, Ohio, based telemedicine health kiosk business which was [grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/HealthSpot-logo-1.png” thumb_width=”150″ /]carrying out a retail trial with Rite Aid since November 2014, started commercial operations in 25 locations in three Ohio areas.

In October reports emerged of a patent infringement claim that has been ongoing since April 2014 against HealthSpot by Nevada-based Computerized Screening. (More on this ongoing series of lawsuits in Ohio and Nevada is here.)

According to reports in Columbus Business First, HealthSpot has now informed Rite Aid that it would cease operations as of 31 December last year and its telemedicine kiosks are reported to have shut down in Rite Aid pharmacies. HealthSpot has also notified Cleveland Clinic that it has discontinued operations, which shuts its pilot with Cleveland Clinic in northeast Ohio.

HealthSpot’s website remains live but the last entry in the press releases section is from September 2015 and is on events at which HealthSpot was to participate in September and November. The blog page on its website is well out of date with the last update dated as far back as March 2015. (Links for locations and patient log in were inoperable–Ed. Donna)

One recent news report stated that attempts to contact CEO Steve Cashman went unanswered.

In November 2014, HealthSpot received a major investment from Xerox on top of a $18.3 million springtime round [TTA 13 Nov 14].

Updated 13 Jan (Editor Donna)

The Columbus Business First articles that Editor Chrys has linked to, as of this point, are the most informative. Neil Versel and Stephanie Baum also have related articles in MedCityNews. They also chewed it over with HealthcareScene network’s John Lynn last Friday on video (starts at 26:30) with a surprising revelation that Mr Cashman had been in touch with Mr Lynn, to be published in one of their blogs (but not yet as of this update.) Thus the mystery remains.

Xerox has issued a statement of their continued interest and support of the healthcare sector which is covered in MedCityNews above. We also noted their diverse interests in healthcare quality management, data and analytics through through their Midas+ division here last year.

According to CrunchBase, HealthSpot received $43.81 million in financing since 2011, not including the undisclosed support from Xerox, with the most recent raise debt financing of $11.56 million in January 2015. One year ago, HealthSpot looked so promising. (more…)

Rounding up best medtech in 2015

January 6, 2016 | by

Medgadget’s 2015 roundup looks at nine innovative and in some cases life-saving medtech systems. These cover ground from diagnostics to robotic exoskeletons, from hearts to eyes and ears. Some are obviously early stage research projects, others are close to market. In eyewear news, a revamped Google Glass made the news with its FCC filing; we look at the Glass reboot and rival facial tech.

  • Evena Eyes-On ultrasound/infrared goggles that let the wearer visualize the peripheral and deeper vasculature for venipuncture procedures.
    • [grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/new-glass.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]And speaking of eyewear, Google Glass 2.0 made the end-of-year news with its leaked FCC filing detailing its changes in design, including a bigger screen, hardier build, improved camera and longer battery life. It also confirmed earlier rumors that Glass’ market was now medical and enterprise. Guardian, WSJ (video)
    • Other smart glasses from Vital Enterprises, Augmedix, Pristine.io, Aira.io and a beefed up Google Glass from ThirdEye for the ER recapped in MedCityNews.
  • A brain stent with pressure activated nanoparticles to break up vessel occlusions in the brain that cause ischemic strokes, developed by Harvard’s Wyss Institute and University of Massachusetts’ New England Center for Stroke Research.
  • A combination of EKSO Bionic‘s exoskeleton with UCLA‘s non-invasive spinal cord stimulation from NeuroRecovery Technologies which enabled paralyzed men to move their legs.
  • The XStat Rapid Hemostasis System, developed for the US military, now released for civilian use, which uses small sponges to stop bleeding.
  • Three pacemakers–one fetal, another powered by light and a third from EBR Systems’ WiSE technology that stimulates both sides of the heart
  • The PolyPhotonix Noctura 400 sleep mask for treating diabetic retinopathy
  • A two-part laser-based hearing aid from EarLens where one section is placed on the eardrum