Samsung’s $8bn Harman buy: what’s the digital health implications? (UPDATED)

November 14, 2016 | by

UPDATED Monday’s big news (other than the Dow Jones post-US election climb, China getting shirty on trade and the severe 7.8 magnitude quakes near Christchurch NZ where we hope our Readers are OK) is the $8bn acquisition of Harman International by Samsung Electronics. Those of us who are most familiar with Connecticut-based Harman in the audio area (in cars and Harman/Kardon speakers on this Editor’s bookshelf) will be surprised at their powerhouse status in the automotive industry as a technology hardware and software supplier to GM, BMW and Volkswagen. Its technology is in 30 million vehicles and is tidily profitable. It is also unusual for Samsung as they have tended to grown internally and organically, versus by acquisition. Harman will be operated as a standalone company. (Articles also point out the change at Samsung’s top, with a new generation ascending to control this family-controlled company.)

It diversifies Samsung well past the uncertainties and the maturity of the smartphone business not only into a direct supplier relationship with car makers, but also in how the relationship between man and car transportation is changing. Beyond the obvious like self-driving (piloted driving) cars where Tesla, Ford, Uber, Apple and Alphabet are playing (and the more near-term area like partial assistance in driving), there is a chicken-egg dynamic on cabin enhancements–what can be done versus what should be done. (Designer Raymond Loewy’s MAYA–most advanced yet acceptable.)

  • What connected technologies are helpful and valuable to the driver and passengers?
  • Which ones increase safety, autonomy and security?
  • Which ones add to the driver ‘load’ of distractions and increase danger to the driver and others?
    • Pilots term this a too-busy cockpit. Remember that drivers aren’t pilots and don’t go through checklists and walkarounds before and after driving. We want to turn the key, tune the radio and go.
    • Which ones can be made to be not distracting?
  • What happens when the technologies malfunction or break?
  • What happens to cost and affordability? (All the whiz-bang tech can put a vehicle out of reach for the many. It would be counter-productive and elitist to return driving to the early 20th Century decades where cars were owned by the few and wealthy–Henry Ford and Alfred Sloan had a different thought), though some would like that outcome.)
  • How seamless and secure can IoT be in a vehicle, as it is not secure at present?

All these are in the sub-text of five mega-trends noted at last week’s CES Unveiled New York by the Consumer Technology Association, notably as part of the cheerleading around ‘Transportation Transformation’ and ‘Connections and Computations’. (More about this separately in a later article on CES Unveiled.)

Let’s drill down into the nearer-term health tech aspects, where Samsung has been a leader in their phones and tablets, and what the Harman acquisition might mean there.

The first is the mobilization of what is presently in the home and phone.  (more…)

IBM Watson being trialled for diagnosing rare and hard-to-diagnose diseases (DE)

November 10, 2016 | by

The Centre for Rare and Undiagnosed Diseases in Marburg, Germany is known internationally as a healthcare resource for medical centers and physicians who suspect their patients have an unconventional and statistically rare medical condition. Often patient histories are inch-thick and replete with unstructured data such as X-rays, lab results, doctors’ notes and scans, reviewed by multiple medical professionals before reaching Marburg. How to review this data more promptly and better? The first step is to input this anonymized data into IBM Watson. The Marburg Centre will first ask patients to answer a 1,200-question digital questionnaire. This information will also include factors that may impact the diagnosis, from symptoms and family history to the environment they live in and their jobs. The data is also translated from German to English so that it can be cross-referenced to English-language medical information. For the 12-month pilot, Watson will provide Marburg’s staff with a differential diagnosis — a list of potential illnesses that fit the patient’s symptoms — which they then review. Watson can provide a percentage of possibility, which Marburg may skip as these are, after all, rare diseases. The Watson decision tool is being tested retrospectively on already-diagnosed patients. ZDNet

Digital Epidemiology: on-demand public health

November 10, 2016 | by

Guest Editor Sarianne Gruber (@subtleimpact) reviews the meta-trend of digital epidemiology, which gathers ‘digital exhaust’ information through social networks, chat rooms and other online media, analyzes it at the population level and tracks localized outbreaks of diseases like the Zika virus and flu. It even has inspired new models of vaccine delivery and patient transportation such as Uber Health and Circulation.

The Internet has a rather detailed picture of the health of the population, coming from digital sources through all of our connected devices, including smartphones. This is digital epidemiology: the idea that the health of a population can be assessed through digital traces, in real time. Digital Epidemiology: Tracking Diseases in the Mobile Age. M. Salathé, J. Brownstein et al.

As a Harvard Medical School Professor and the Boston Children’s Hospital Chief Innovation Officer, the plights of patients and the hurdles in care are Dr. John Brownstein’s starting points for questions and discovery. When the Community Transportation Association study reported “an estimated 3.6 million patients the United States miss at least one appointment due to lack of access to transportation”, Brownstein was determined to make this challenge his own. This fall, he launched the first customizable patient-centric digital transportation system – Circulation – a new vision for non-emergency medical transportation. As a Klick Health Muse attendee and having had the privilege to speak with John Brownstein, Ph.D., co-founder of Circulation, I would like to share what I learned about his journey as an epidemiologist, public health educator, and innovator.

Social Media’s Big Data: Preventing Epidemics and Tracking Drug Safety
Digital epidemiologists think in terms of “digital phenotype” to understanding the health of individuals. Uncovering critical information about what is happening at the population level is collectively called “digital exhaust”. These digital traces that are left behind, help track local outbreaks around the world. “In fact, you don’t need surveys, just mine what people are saying online. We combine social media to get real insights as to what is happening on the ground: facts and sentiment. The ability to understand risk and population health is fantastic with these emerging technologies,” opened Dr. John Brownstein at the 2016 New York City KlickMuse event.

Social media mixed with disparate sources of health data was how Brownstein began solving public health risks. (more…)

The Theranos Story, vol. 23: Walgreens drops the $140 million contract breach hammer

November 9, 2016 | by

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/upside-down-duck.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]Walgreens Boots Alliance has finally sued Theranos in Delaware Federal Court in for breach of contract.  Walgreens is seeking $140 million, supposedly equivalent to their amount invested, according to sources cited in the Wall Street Journal article. Not many details are available, since Walgreens moved to seal the civil suit under their mutual non-disclosure agreement.

Allegations are flying, of course. Walgreens is officially mum, but according to the WSJ‘s ‘close to the matter’ sources, Walgreens claims that Theranos misled them about the state of their technology during their three-year partnership and even after the blood-draw centers were closed in June, which put their customers at risk. This sounds like the fraud and misrepresentation cited by Partner Fund Management, which moved in October to get its $96 million back like Lee Marvin as Walker in Point Blank. Earlier reports confirmed that patients did not learn for weeks or months, often not until forced to, that their Theranos test results were unreliable. There are reports that at least 10 patient lawsuits have been filed in Arizona and California.

(This Editor notes that their Theranos agita hasn’t soured Walgreens on funding health tech. They are a substantial investor in TytoCare, an all-in-one vital signs device with retail potential, and MedAvail, a kiosk dispenser for prescription and OTC medications)

Theranos has, no surprise, said a great deal, aggressively–the trademark of their legal supremo David Boies. They claim to be the aggrieved party: “Over the years, Walgreens consistently failed to meet its commitments to Theranos. Through its mishandling of our partnership and now this lawsuit, Walgreens has caused Theranos and its investors significant harm.” Theranos has exited the blood-testing business and is supposedly refocusing on developing technology to sell to outside labs. Also MedCityNews ‘coughs’, The Verge.  See here for the 22 previous TTA chapters.

Health Wildcatters Pitch Day event

November 8, 2016 | by

Wed 16 November, 2:30 PM – 5:00 PM CST, Dallas Texas

Texas accelerator Health Wildcatters is presenting its Pitch Day 2016 featuring 10 early-stage companies: Amity Cloud, ClinicalSolutions, Endogenesis, Friendly, HealPal, HealthNextGen, KnKt’d, MediBookr, Optologix, and Oqulus. More information and tickets ($10–if you book same day they are $20) can be booked here. This includes a reception afterwards at Health Wildcatters’ offices nearby. Hat tip to HW CEO and co-founder Hubert Zajicek via Twitter

Chubb upgrades fall detector to identify, cancel a false alarm (UK)

November 8, 2016 | by
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Chubb_07112016_Comm-Care-independent-living-image-wrist-fall-2.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]Chubb Community Care on Monday announced an upgraded fall detector which can both identify and if appropriate, cancel a fall alert alarm. “During the first 20 seconds of an incident, cutting-edge algorithms perform silent analysis of the situation, recognising if an individual is back on their feet,” according to David Hammond, general manager, in describing how the system differentiates a fall from a false alarm.

The self-cancellation software has been improved to help differentiate between types of movement, for example if the person is moving on the floor where help is needed, which may apply to epileptics having seizures, versus standing up and mobile. The wrist-worn device also has a standard button alert to summon help. If an alarm happens, it has a confirmation feature that indicates that help has been called by flashing a red light and vibrating for 20 seconds. The user at that point can manually cancel the activation or let it continue. According to Chubb, the product is presently in-market.  Release.

Tender Alert: Circle Anglia–Centra seeking e-commerce provider

November 8, 2016 | by

Our Reader Susanne Woodman has once again tipped our UK Readers to another opportunity related to telecare, this one with Circle Anglia and Centra which provide telecare and housing services in the UK. Centra is looking for an e-commerce system. The value of the tender excluding VAT is £120,000. According to the tender, Circle Housing would like to conduct soft market testing w/c 5 December at its Tower View Offices with the contract to be published in January 2017. More information is here on the TED-Tenders Electronic Daily website. Email Michelle Saunders for a further information document at michelle.saunders2@circle.org.uk

Who’s raising what! Babies to pets!

November 4, 2016 | by

Our takeoff on ace direct response guru Denny Hatch’s ‘Who’s Mailing What!’ has been slightly modified from ‘getting’ to ‘raising’–we do want to be proper ;-)

  • The first big raise happens to be an Editor favorite due to its high Cute Factor–the Owlet smart sock for monitoring your baby’s oxygen level and heart rate. This latest round is $15 million, bringing their funding to $25 million. Investors included Eclipse Ventures and Eniac Ventures, plus new investors Trilogy Equity Partners, the Amazon Alexa Fund, RTP-HC, Capital Integral and Broadway Angels. Owlet is now the commercialization partner on a $1.5 million grant from the NIH to further infant health research, in addition to an earlier equal grant. Plans include a connected care feature giving users access to their data and the ability to share that data with pediatricians, scheduled for a 2017 release; retail and international distribution; two new product lines and a large infant health study. Finsmes
  • Cohero Health closed a $9 million Series A financing for its BreatheSmart lung function platform, which actively engages respiratory patients by tracking medication adherence and measuring lung function. Funding was led by Three Leaf Ventures, an affiliate of the Broe Group, with participation from Zaffre Investments, the investment arm of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, BioAdvance, and new investors GIS Strategic Ventures, Heitkamp & Thumann Group, and P5 Health Ventures. A StartUp Health company, they develop care connected devices and mobile applications that measure lung function and tracking adherence through the BreatheSmart toolkit. Finsmes, Mobihealthnews
  • PlushCare, a California-based telemedicine (virtual visit) company, had an $8 million Series A raise funded through GGV Capital with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners and Exponent. Finsmes
  • And even pet health is getting funded. PetCoach, a Pennsylvania-based digital pet healthcare platform, secured $2m in seed funding from Comcast Ventures, in addition to earlier funding from DreamItVentures and Maveron. PetCoach provides an online pet care service combining personal advice and 24/7 access to certified pet professionals. Users can leverage the PetCoach website and the app in order to interact with certified veterinarians. Finsmes

The malware siege of Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS: a preview of more? (UK)

November 3, 2016 | by

By now our UK readers are well aware of the shutdown due to malware starting Sunday 30 Oct, only resolved today, of the Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Trust hospitals: Diana, Princess of Wales; Goole and District; Scunthorpe General.

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/nhsalert-940×445.png” thumb_width=”300″ /] (NHS website via Krebsonsecurity.com, click to enlarge)

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/nhsalert2.png” thumb_width=”300″ /] (NHS website, click to enlarge)

It is estimated that it affected approximately 1,000 patients over the three shutdown days. Most patients were diverted to neighboring hospitals, according to The Guardian.

The Health Services Journal (paywalled) broke as an exclusive the NHS‘ high priority warning to providers around the country. Yet it seemed equivocal. According to The Sun, while NHS Digital marked the message as ‘severity: high’ and warned that “… we would like to remind all users of the need for proactive measures to reduce the likelihood of infection and minimise the impacts of any compromise.”, it was tempered with “We have no evidence that this is anything other than a local isolated incident but we will continue to keep health and care organisations informed.” Also according to The Sun, the Department of Health has noted that this has not been the first incident.

As our Readers know, US and Canadian hospitals and healthcare organizations have been subject of late to malware and its latest iteration, ransomware, with a large outbreak this summer. (more…)

Teaching Morse code via Google Glass passive haptic learning

November 3, 2016 | by

The Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) has been experimenting with several methods of passive haptic learning (PHL). In this test using Google Glass, they taught subjects Morse code in four hours. The method: having the subjects play a game while feeling vibration taps between their temple and ear that represented the dots and dashes of Morse code. This passively taught them code through their tactile senses, even while they were distracted by the game. The test group received a voice prompt for each corresponding letter, while the control group did not. When tested on the Morse alphabet, the test group was nearly perfect, while the control group was accurate only about half the time. The vibrations were generated in Google Glass through a lower than 15 Hz signal played very slowly and below hearing range through the bone-conduction transducer. “Does this new study mean that people will rush out to learn Morse code? Probably not,” said Georgia Tech professor Thad Starner. “It shows that PHL lowers the barrier to learn text-entry methods — something we need for smartwatches and any text-entry that doesn’t require you to look at your device or keyboard.” Georgia Tech News  Hat tip to former Northern Ireland Editor Toni Bunting

Carephone calling for beta tester partners

November 3, 2016 | by

From reader Stephen Westley, the sales director of The Carephone, well-known in the UK as one of the long-time telecare companies supporting carers via technology that enables older adults and the disabled to live more independently, is a call for beta tester partners (UK and Ireland only) of the new home sensor kit (see photo below, click to enlarge) Smart Sense.

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/carephonekit.jpg” thumb_width=”300″ /]

Stephen may be reached at 0800 849 9254, email swestley@thecarephone.com  More on Twitter @thecarephone

 

Avizia over-subscribes its Series A by $6 million

November 2, 2016 | by

Telemedicine startup Avizia announced an unusual bonus on what was thought to be a closed Series A with a $6 million additional investment. There was also an unusual investor–the New York-Presbyterian health system. The add-on was led by HealthQuest Capital. Also reported was an extension of Silicon Valley Bank’s agreement for $3 million in debt financing and a $1.5 million line of credit. In July, the first part of the Series A had $11 million from Blue Heron Capital, HealthQuest Capital and five other investors. Total investment is over $22.7 million. From a start in telemedicine carts using Cisco Telepresence, Avizia developed software and apps for mobile devices, including secure messaging for doctors within hospitals. The new funds will be used to upgrade its engineering capabilities to build new capabilities into its telehealth platform, integration with electronic health records and the ability to monitor the battery life of remote diagnostic devices. Also unusual is that they market in the US, UK and Australia covering 400 health systems, including 1,000 hospitals. MedCityNews, Crunchbase

Tender Alert: Simulation for Digital Health (SimDH) and A2i needs CRM supplier (UK)

November 2, 2016 | by

London South Bank University (LSBU) is seeking a supplier for Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems for its A2i and SimDH initiatives. This will house “reporting functions that can measure progress, achievement of target outputs/results and both intended and unintended impacts….The CRM system will provide end-to-end management for all SMEs participating in the projects.” The contract is valued up to £20,000. More information on the contract tender is here on the Gov.UK site. Act quickly–it closes 10 November. Hat tip to reader Susanne Woodman.

Virtual care stops germs dead in their tracks! (Who would have thought it?)

November 2, 2016 | by

Here at TTA we do receive and read a lot of press releases, and most are pretty meh. (We work very hard to avoid subjecting our readers to meh, as we don’t much like it either.) Now this one takes a different tack. It backs up telemedicine and telehealth technology that enables the patient to avoid the germ-filled doctor’s office and ED. According to Zipnosis citing the Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology journal, after the standard well-child visit, there is a 3.17 percent increase in influenza-like illnesses among children and their family members within two weeks. Extrapolated, this results in more than 766,000 additional office visits for flu-like symptoms each year and nearly $492 million in annual costs. Now here is a simple, proactive improvement in outcomes that achieves savings (hear that, HHS and NHS?) facilitated by healthcare technology. (See previous article on ‘A tricorder one step closer‘)

The remainder of the release concentrates on what a bad idea it is to subject the rest of the world to your germs when down with a cold or flu. Even the CDC wants patients to stay home from work, school and errands. (That is, if you can.) The point is made that virtual care can unjam doctor offices and EDs for those less dangerous who need hands on care. The light touch of the product message is that Zipnosis provides a white-labeled virtual care platform to health systems that first uses an online adaptive interview with a patient to document the condition, provides a diagnosis and treatment plan within an hour, directing the patient to an appropriate level of care. Release.

A tricorder one step closer: Tyto Care gains FDA clearance for its digital stethoscope (US)

November 2, 2016 | by
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Mom_using_on_child_ear.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]Only a few years ago, the Star of the Future of Digital Health was the ‘tricorder’–that all-in-one vital signs device that Bones on Star Trek wielded with such élan (when he wasn’t uttering ‘He’s dead, Jim’). We haven’t heard much from Scanadu since early last year when it raised $35 million for its Series B and when it teamed with with Northern Ireland’s Intelesens as a finalist for the seemingly never-ending Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE. (Seven finalists are now in consumer testing with awards in early 2017.)

In the meantime, others have been proceeding in bringing their devices into reality far sooner, for real people with everyday health problems who want to examine a child, another family member or even themselves at home. One of these companies is Israel’s Tyto Care (picture above at left), which received FDA 510(k) Class II clearance for its digital stethoscope snap-on to the main device to monitor heart and lung sounds. The device also includes a digital imaging otoscope for ear exams, a throat scope, a skin camera and thermometer swipe. The Tyto home device includes video guidance instructions as part of the smartphone or tablet platform to enable a correct reading. It connects to an online platform to send the information, either in real time or store-and-forward, to a primary care physician the user selects. Tyto Care has been in investigational marketing in the US as well as Israel, bolstered by over $18 million in international investment. They are targeting home DTC as well as professional markets through practices, payers, virtual visit providers and possibly retail (one of their investors is Walgreens Boots). Release If you are attending MEDICA 2017 in Düsseldorf on 16 November, you can see Tyto Care demonstrated at the 5th Annual MEDICA App Competition.

Another all-in-one device is Las Vegas-based MedWand, which is still in pre-marketing. MedWand seems to feature clinic and ‘group’ packages as well as the individual device which includes a pulse oximeter. They received another round of undisclosed financing from Maxim Ventures, the venture arm for semi-conductor developer Maxim Integrated Products at end of September. Release.

Touch and feeling through a bionic prosthetic arm (DARPA-Univ. Pittsburgh)

November 1, 2016 | by
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/bionic-arm.jpg” thumb_width=”200″ /]A robotic arm with a neural interface that allows the user to experience touch has been developed by the University of Pittsburgh and University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).  The Revolutionizing Prosthetics program since 2006 has been developing advanced upper-limb prosthetics. Their first was the Gen-3 Arm System by DEKA Integrated Solutions Corporation, submitted for 510(k) in 2012. The subject for the test of the touch interface, Nathan, has been a quadriplegic from the chest down since 2004. He permitted four microelectrode arrays, each about half the size of a shirt button, to be placed in his brain: two in the motor cortex and two in the sensory cortex regions that correspond to feeling in his fingers and palm. Wires run from the arrays to the robotic arm, which has torque sensors that detect when pressure is applied to its fingers. These physical “sensations” are converted into electrical signals back to the arrays in Nathan’s brain so that he has the sensation of feeling and touch.  The sensation of touch in the bionic arm is near 100 percent natural and accurate. This research has great potential both for prosthetics and for other neurological conditions. Armed With Science.  Video