Investor Todd Hixon (New Atlantic Ventures) opines in Forbes about the ‘new paradigm’ of relationship medicine, with the primary care doctor at its center and responsible for the patient’s long-term health quality. He admits that the concept, in some respects, resembles the 1950s days of the local GP who knew everything about everybody, but where he posits the telemedicine ‘inflection point’ is the ability to create a link between the doctor and patient that is efficient as well as effective via virtual video consults, email, text and phone. He then jumps to the notion (more…)
Free research report on the state of mHealth apps
research2guidance has published the 2014 (fourth) edition of mHealth App Developer Economics with an in-depth market analysis on the current status and future impact of mHealth app publishing. Some findings of the global study:
- Revenue achieved $2.4 billion in 2013 and projected to be $26 billion by 2017, derived primarily on a subscription model from services.
- Surprisingly, mHealth app publishers and “wannabes’ (planning to release soon) by the numbers target chronically ill patients (31 percent) with the top being diabetes and obesity, with the greatest potential cost benefit on nonadherence and hospital readmission–then health and fitness (28 percent). The B2B market presently is composed primarily of physicians, targeted by 14 percent of app developers, but the five year outlook is that physicians and hospitals will develop into the primary distribution channel. (more…)
Digital health accelerators, anatomized (US)
A phenomenon in both the US and the UK is the digital health accelerator that ‘enrolls’ promising startups and nurtures their entrepreneurial founders with business coaching and limited funding. In the UK, accelerators cluster around universities such as Sheffield, Edinburgh, Ulster, Bristol and Bath. In the US, startup accelerators clustered bicoastally–Boston/New York-Silicon Valley/San Diego–and were dominated by Blueprint Health, StartUp Health and later Rock Health. In the past three years, they have dispersed to places like Minneapolis, Dallas, Phoenix and Philadelphia. Lisa Suennen, no stranger to the scene as a managing partner of advisory service Venture Valkyrie, has written ‘Survival of the Fittest: Health Care Accelerators Evolve Toward Specialization’, published by the California Health Care Foundation. She notes that accelerators, once meant for entrepreneurs/developers to help them bridge the gap from the kitchen table (more…)
TSA chair selection critiqued
Today’s Must Read Published today in Roy Lilley’s influential NHSManagers.net newsletter (by free subscription, click on link) is Paul Harper’s commentary on the appointment of TSA Chair Andrew Gardner. Mr Harper’s view is informed by considerable experience in the UK health services concentrating on telehealth and telemedicine. His key point is that an ‘independent chair’ should be exactly that. Moreover, standards of public governance should apply (the Nolan Principles of Public Life), as these private companies are largely doing public sector business. Your Editor will let Mr Harper state the rest; a PDF of his article is attached.
In the US, where your Editor is from, it is commonplace to have an association chair from ‘inside the industry’ whether healthcare or in other areas where I’ve worked, (more…)
Health apps presently of little use, says Australian telehealth expert
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Margelis.jpg” thumb_width=”120″ /]”Immature” and “focused on low-lying fruit such as fitness tracking and not focused on the big issues of management of disease” are also two of the compliments that Dr George Margelis of the University of Western Sydney’s TeleHealth Research & Innovation Laboratory (THRIL) has bestowed on the current state of health apps. Until the collected data ‘plugs into other digital platforms’–he mentions the Australian government’s PHR, eHealth–apps will not help those who need it the most. “Unfortunately, managing these diseases, in particular the chronic diseases that are a major part of the current burden, requires more than just tracking a few physical parameters which is what the app world is up to.” Dr Margelis called for collaboration between app developers and healthcare professionals; while he scores Apple’s HealthKit, that may be the means to make his vision come true. It should be noted that Dr Margelis (more…)
Panasonic enters telehealth, debuts On4Today
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Panasonic-on4today.jpg” thumb_width=”175″ /]Panasonic’s new Health and Wellness Solutions group has tossed their cap into the socialization ring with tablet-based On4Today. The Wi-Fi connected tablet is targeted to senior housing communities to assist residents, especially those with cognitive impairment, in staying connected and managing their daily activities. Launched this week at the LeadingAge annual meeting of non-profit housing and long-term care providers in Nashville (IAHSA internationally), the tablet features a calendar, provides reminders, receives messages and lets the user view photos, videos and video chat. It does not, at present, do any clinical monitoring. This Editor received a preview at the Aging 2.0/New York meeting in New York earlier this month showcasing Jewish Home Lifecare and Panasonic. (more…)
The sheer screaming attractiveness of medical ID theft
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/screenshot-med-25.jpg” thumb_width=”170″ /]Harry Lime Lives! It’s the 1949 Vienna of ‘The Third Man’ when it comes to the black market of medical identity theft. Data breaches are easier than heisting penicillin off an Army Medical Corps truck and far less noticeable–there’s always a lag time in discovery as more than one health system (Community Health System) found. And protected health information (PHI) has value down the line. According to a report cited by FierceHealthIT:
- Simple data comes cheap: names, birth dates and health insurance contract with group numbers fetch a pedestrian $20.
- Add Social Security (SSI) numbers, banking and credit card information, and these ‘kits’ fetch $1,500. These can be used for financial fraud of multiple types or alternate identities.
- Add medical data, and direct marketing data brokers and pharmacy benefit companies are willing to pay. They use it for legitimate (but annoying) purposes, such as targeting those with specific diseases.
- Add physical identification, and the value goes through the roof for fake passports, driver’s licenses and visas.
The ways PHI can be accessed are many: EHRs, paper records, stolen laptops, CDs, accounting systems, provider, insurer and supplier systems, and simple ‘friendly fraud’ (more…)
Roundup: data breaches ’round the world
Following on our review of recent articles on why medical identity theft is so attractive, here’s our review of data breaches in the news, including a new (to this Editor) report from Europe.
- It’s not Europe, blame the UK! That is one of the surprising findings of a meta-review of all types of data breaches released earlier this month by the Central European University’s Center for Media, Data and Society (CMDS). While not specific to healthcare, it is the first study this Editor has seen on EU data breaches and is useful for general trends. 229 verified incidents were analyzed by the CMDS across 28 EU member countries plus Switzerland and Norway, 2005-3rd Quarter 2014, and includes unusual healthcare breaches such as Danish HIV patients’ personal information included in a PowerPoint presentation later published online. Key findings:
- 57 percent of breaches were due to insider theft, mismanagement or error; 41 percent were hacker-instigated
- It’s common: “for every 100 people in the study countries, 43 personal records have been compromised”
- In terms of impact, the UK by far, then Greece, Norway, Germany and Netherlands were the top five countries for incidents and numbers of records breached (report page 9) (more…)
Tuesday’s Alert: Telehealth and Telecare Aware Updated
Our adoption of a new Alerts emailing system is not yet complete, so we are unable to send out the usual Alerts email today (see apology above). We appreciate your patience. In the interim, please spread the word by retweeting our Alert.
Tuesday’s Alert: Telehealth and Telecare Aware Updated http://t.co/1SzVQbsc80 @deetelecare #telecare #telehealth
— telecareaware (@telecareaware) October 21, 2014
Highlights:
Home telehealth projected to outpace ‘telehospital’ by 2019
(Pick your forecast!)
Telehealth for Motor Neurone Disease
(Sheffield Institute trial patient monitoring report)
Last week in TTA:
Ebola and health tech: where it can help, where it failed (updated)
Life expectancy up, but so is death from falls (US)
Google testing telemedicine program via Helpouts
12 percent of US veterans now using VA telehealth services
Faux Glass: not just a knockoff, but a sendup
TSA appoints new chair (Heraclitus’ comment a must-read)
Telemedicine getting out of the waiting room–perhaps
Three seminars on negotiating IP licensing, IT procurement and services (US)
Home telehealth projected to outpace ‘telehospital’ by 2019
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/sales_profit.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]2019 share of the market 55 percent for telehome versus 45 percent for telehospital. If it’s October, there’s some new research for sale out there. BCC Research of Massachusetts is projecting a global $43.4 billion total market for both by 2019. Home telehealth, or what they call ‘telehome’, would lead the way with growth from $6.5 billion in 2013 to nearly $24 billion in 2019 with a 24 percent CAGR. ‘Telehospital’ clinical services, defined by the study as those provided within or between hospitals, clinics or other healthcare providers–which would include telemedicine and clinical monitoring–would grow at a 12 percent CAGR to $19.5 billion in 2019. Even allowing for differing ‘what is telehealth’ definitions, this is far more expansive than earlier estimates, and is interesting more for the trend than for the hard numbers. (more…)
Ebola and health tech: where it can help, where it failed (Updated)
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/keep-calm-and-enter-at-own-risk-3.png” thumb_width=”150″ /]Ignore the sign…come on in, we can be quarantined together! Everyone is on Ebola-overload, so we will keep it short and sweet. The Gimlet Eye (recovering after an argument with a box, see below) advises a calm, adult-beveraged, low-media weekend with Mantovani, Bert Kaempfert or Percy Faith on the stereo.
- Yes, digital health is addressing the needs that Ebola screening and care are generating. MedCityNews spotlights Medizone International’s AsepticSure peroxide/ozone aerial mist sterilizer which was originally developed to kill MERS and MRSA in field hospitals, to be tested by Doctors Without Borders in a 40-bed unit. Startup AgileMD launched a free mobile app for clinicians containing the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Ebola prevention treatment guidelines (for what anything from CDC is worth….) Text message alerts used first in Sierra Leone are being expanded to seven West African nations for use by the Red Cross and Red Crescent (also BBC News). Sanomedics International has the TouchFree InfraRed Thermometer which is being used at US airports which are screening for passengers originating in West Africa, and Noninvasive Medical Technologies is promoting their ZOE fluid status monitor because it applies electrical currents externally to determine hydration levels.
- Even crowdfunding’s getting into the act. Researcher Erica Ollmann Saphire and her colleagues at Scripps Research Institute (more…)
Life expectancy up, but so is death from falls (US)
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/gimlet-eye.jpg” thumb_width=”175″ /]The Gimlet Eye falls outside the box, and is writing this from recovery. Our companion in curmudgeonliness, Laurie Orlov, whacks us upside the head with first the good news then the bad. US life expectancy is up: if you are 65 today, on average you will live to 83 (men) and 86 (women), even with the rise in chronic conditions that affect quality of life, such as diabetes and heart disease. But the bad is that death from falls is also up. This is despite all the systems and gizmos the Digital Health Industry has concocted to detect falls beyond 1970s PERS technology. Once upon a rose-colored Telecare Time we thought we could infer falls purely by sensors detecting lack of activity (the basis of QuietCare, GrandCare, Healthsense, the late WellAWARE). Then with accelerometers, fall detection would be automatic, (more…)
Google testing telemedicine program via Helpouts
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/google-doctor-video-chat1.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /]If Sergey and Larry don’t get your data one way…they will another. Google has quietly devised another use for Helpouts, its languishing live video help service. In given (but not disclosed) markets, you may be searching for information on a medical condition, and get the option to connect to a live doctor for a virtual visit. It was enough under the radar that it was stumbled upon; a developer searched via Google for ‘knee pain’ and found this (left), posted it to Reddit and it was later confirmed by Engadget. The cost is free (for now). According to iHealthBeat, via Modern Healthcare (subscription required), Scripps Health and One Medical Group are the reported participants. The Washington Post adds that not every medical-related query (more…)
12 percent of US veterans now using VA telehealth services
The US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has some good news (for a change)–that during the just-closed Federal FY 2014, 690,000 veterans, or 12 percent, used telehealth services. This was a 13.3 percent increase over FY 2013 (608,900). While this report is preliminary (beware!), we see a slowing of growth in the number of veterans accessing telehealth and a concentration–not dispersal–of telehealth services in rural areas (+ 10 points). This chart compares the numbers:
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/VA-2014-vs-2013.jpg” thumb_width=”350″ /]Chart: EIC Donna. Please note that percentage of telehealth users add up to over 100 percent due to usage (one patient could access two or three forms of telehealth. FY14 telehealth user breakout is estimate based on FY13 percentage, to be eventually compared to official figures.)
Telehealth as defined by VA: (more…)
Faux Glass: not just a knockoff, but a sendup
[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/gI_147093_Faux-Glasses-Sample-Picture-Spotlight-On.png” thumb_width=”150″ /]Need to impress your Silicon Valley/Alley buds, but the exchequer is low? Didn’t get to be a Glass Explorer on the first round? Fret no more! Faux Glass is here. It’s missing a few things that Glass has–like a phone, photo/video camera, a GPS, internet search access smack in your eye–but does have a magnifier, a spotlight and eight LED indicator lights which light in sequence to a “crack me up” command, like Where the Faux (the product’s built in GPS to nowhere), Faux-to Shop (for fixing photos never taken), and What the Faux (for general searching). All on Indiegogo for $1,480 less than Glass! “They’re not fake anything; they’re real Faux” says Faux-In-Chief Robin Raskin (who’s also a tech journalist, author and founder of Living in Digital Times and FashionWare). The full court press on Faux Glass is of course leading up to International CES in January and their conferences including the Digital Health Summit. Ms Raskin through this also reminds us that crowdfunding and digital tech is not to be taken too seriously. PRWeb release. Website.
Of course there’s the possible faux that presents itself as seriously real, or what’s been dubbed ‘scampaigns’ on crowdfunding sites like…Indiegogo. (more…)
Telemedicine getting out of the waiting room–perhaps
Will reimbursement by insurance payers and private employers (presumably self-insured) and a greater comfort level with the video consult mean that telemedicine will finally step out of the waiting room? This Economist article (free registration may be required) with high points from a recent Rome conference seems to not be able to make up its mind, though it tries to be positive. Taking a comparative view, Israel leads with ‘relatively lax guidelines’, with doctors able to e-prescribe and perform referrals to specialists online. China’s health-care reform focuses on telemedicine“, but Peteris Zilgalvis, a health official at the European Commission pointedly states “If you have a chaotic system and add technology, you get a chaotic system with technology” (Editor’s emphasis). The US is somewhere in between (more…)
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