MWC 2015 Part II – a few companies, some of potential interest

March 9, 2015 | by

The Mobile World Congress in Barcelona does, as the name suggests, cover the whole mobile world. It can come as a disappointment then to find quite how insignificant Health is when compared to items like hardware, payment or even ‘4G backhaul’ (whatever that is). There certainly now seems to be a case for a sparate health stream, as finding the pearls proved very challenging for this reviewer. Relying on the search engine on the site too often revealed a company where too many boxes had been ticked. There was also an alarming number of healthtech ‘no shows’ on the when I reached the country stands of eg Finland, Greece & Italy.

However, there were a few exciting finds. These included:

Coros which are offering incredibly low-priced wearables: washable vests that do HR, respiration, temperature & ECG. If the prices I was quoted by Ethan Wu, Sales Director of a few $10s are good, and the kit works, they’ll be struggling to meet demand.

Dr Security offers an app that enables you to track all the people in your party, call for help, find your mobile device and more. Impressive and I’d have thought most welcome particularly for teachers with school parties or those with really any large outings.

Essence is an Israeli company that has been around for 20 years that offers an activities of daily living (ADL) monitoring service similar to (more…)

MWC 2015 part 1: in search of S Health

March 5, 2015 | by | 1 Comment

2015 was this editor’s first visit to the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Though well prepared for the experience by seasoned visitors, the sheer size of the event is simply breath-taking. 15 minutes to walk fast from the entrance to the end of Hall 8.1 suggests the site is getting on for a mile long, and five minutes to walk from one end of Hall 3 to the other suggests it’s pretty wide too.

The sheer volume of people attending is astonishing – nearly 90,000 expected this year, which must be the largest single alien invasion of the city. It certainly tells, with long queues to get on the train to the Fira Gran via site in the morning, and a 25 minute wait to get on a train back for those making the mistake of hanging on to closing time early in the week, to indulge in the hospitality that breaks out on many stands as the sun passes the yard-arm.

Organisation is stunning too – there are helpful people way back in the metro system pointing the way, and throughout the site. Ask them and they’ll almost certainly know the answer, or know someone who does.

The contrast therefore with the Congress’s largest exhibitor – Samsung – is (more…)

Mole Detective still available on Google Play Store

February 28, 2015 | by

Following on from our piece on the action taken by the FTC against two melanoma apps, it has been drawn to this editor’s attention that Mole Detective is still available, for £3.14/download, on the Google Play Store.

The relevant section of the FTC press release says:

Mole Detective Settlement and Lawsuit. Kristi Kimball and her company, New Consumer Solutions LLC, developed and first marketed Mole Detective in January 2012.  U.K.-based Avrom “Avi” Lasarow and his company, L Health Ltd., took over marketing the app in August 2012.  The marketers advertised the app primarily online, where it has sold in the Apple and Google app stores for as much as $4.99.

The settlement with Kimball and her company prohibits them from claiming that a device, such as an app, can detect or diagnose melanoma, unless the representation is truthful, not misleading, and supported by competent and reliable scientific evidence in the form of human clinical testing of the device. It also prohibits them from making any other misleading or unsubstantiated health claims about a product or service, and requires them to disgorge $3,930.

The agency will pursue a litigated judgment against non-settling defendants Lasarow and his company.

Especially as the organisation marketing the app is UK-based, (more…)

Action on bad apps in the US – not yet in the UK/EU

February 24, 2015 | by

It is most encouraging to see that the FTC in the US has reached a settlement with two suppliers of “Melanoma Detection” apps: “In two separate cases, marketers of MelApp and Mole Detective have agreed to settlements that bar them from continuing to make such unsupported claims.” The FTC are pursuing actions against two other companies.

Echoing the requirements also of the EU’s Consumer Protection Directives as applied to health claims (notably the Misleading & Comparative Advertising Directive 2006/114EC), Jessica Rich, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection said: “Truth in advertising laws apply in the mobile marketplace.” “App developers and marketers must have scientific evidence to support any health or disease claims that they make for their apps.”

Sadly, despite a number of exposures of ‘bad apps’ that we have previously covered, as yet no action (more…)

The NHS, tech, and the next 10 years – soapbox, event & call for posters

February 22, 2015 | by

As a distraction from the things that, before the advent of handheld technology, little boys used to do in the school playground when this editor was young, once in a while we would engage in the pointless debate of what would happen if an irresistible force met an immovable object.

Those debates came to mind when Graham De’Ath kindly drew this editor’s attention to the recently published Labour Ten Year Plan for Health & Care. Now Telehealth & TelecareAware knows better than to indulge in politics, however the document was notable in that it did not make any significant reference either to the demographic reality of the next ten years, or the likely role of ‘technology’ in assisting with the resultant increase in care required (the word is mentioned just once, in the commitment to: “Set up a wide–ranging review of NICE which will look at reforming the  NICE technology  appraisal process…” [actually already underway by the NIB]).  The Labour Party is far from being alone in this – readers with long memories will recall our amusement as the RCGP’s ten year forecast of the changes in GP practice where the biggest role technology was expected to play in 2022 was in remote delivery of test results.

The reality, TTA believes, will be very different: (more…)

Will there be more remote consultation pilots than BA has, as well?

February 15, 2015 | by

News comes via Prof Mike Short of another remote consultation pilot planned – this time the ELECTOR project involving Denmark, UK and the Czech Republic. As it seems to have no website yet, we can only offer a Twitter handle. There’s also info on the Brit in the video on the above link, Dr Anthony Leeds, on the University of Surrey website, (explaining that he has recently been appointed a Visiting Professor at the University of Copenhagen).

This information comes a few days after the previous remote consultation pilot we covered that was featured in Pulse. Is this reviewer being unduly pessimistic in wondering whether we are about to suffer the same pilotitis that afflicted telehealth that led to the original “more pilots than BA” jibe? If so, what can be done?

Well one obvious cause of the problem is (more…)

Widespread remote GP consultations getting closer; no shortage of implementation advice

February 10, 2015 | by

Following our previous item on the topic, on January 16th, Tim Kelsey made it very clear to this editor at a PICTFOR event that the £1b promised to GPs for premises improvement included a strong requirement that GPs also invest in electronic support, including remote consultation technology.

It is therefore particularly pleasing to see in yesterday’s Pulse Today, an item on a Skype trial in Central London that both patients and GPs seem to love. Some key quotes:

Almost all patients surveyed about their experience of the remote consultation service said they ‘would use it again’ (95%).

Although patients were warned that ‘the security of Skype isn’t 100%’, 83% also said (more…)

UK’s Best SME Mobile Health App Competition – finalists announced

February 9, 2015 | by

This reviewer participated as a judge in the first round of this competition, sponsored by Patient-View, myhealthapps, techUK and the Department of Trade & Investment. From this, four finalists were chosen who will go forward to the second part of the competition at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona (“MWC 2015”) in the first week in March.

The twelve competitors were:

11health – an app and device for determining when an “’ostomy” bag is full and needs emptying. Blue-toothed to a mobile or nurse station. It has transformed the lives of patients that have to use these and continues to save nursing time too.

23 Ltd – a website builder that has diversified into behaviour change to stop smoking. Ingenious business model though as yet (more…)

What can the US learn from the UK’s approach to healthcare?

February 8, 2015 | by

The Guardian article recently published an article entitled “What the NHS can learn from the US Obamacare system” which disappointingly spends almost all of its text talking about the challenges of implementing Obamacare, and just a few sentences espousing three very weak lessons, the first of which  is:

…Obamacare had a clear overarching goal: reduce the number of uninsured. Who can stand up and make such a clear case for the Health and Social Care Act 2012?

The rest are (go to DHACA website to read more)

UK’s Best SME Mobile Health APP Finals on Monday 2nd February

January 30, 2015 | by

The shortlist judging for the above, entries for which we sought in December, will take place on the afternoon of Monday 2nd February from 2pm to 7pm in St Bride, St London. Attendance is free, and offers an unparalleled opportunity to listen to the pitches of what are considered the twelve best SME mobile health apps in the UK. Details are here – do be sure to scroll down to click the ‘book now’ button as places are limited.

The judges (disclosure: of whom this editor is one) will select those SMEs to go forward to the finals at the MWC in Barcelona in the first week in March.

The event is sponsored by UK Trade & Investment, techUK, and PatientView/myhealthapps

A tale of two chessboards

January 28, 2015 | by | 2 Comments

Things happen ever faster on the second half of the chessboard. No sooner had the ink dried on our predictions for 2015, and Dr Eric Topol told the story of the first patient to call him with a smartphone diagnosis than Alivecor announced that they now have CE certification for their AF-diagnosing app.

Mind you, whilst Dr Topol might welcome this, it seems that others are still on a different chessboard: under the heading “Doctors fear that new health tech is turning UK into a nation of “worried well””, a recent survey of UK doctors showed that “Seven out of ten (76%) GPs said they had noticed a marked increase in number of patients “self-diagnosing” from the internet over the past twelve months” suggesting, in the words of 1066 & all that, that technology is a Bad Thing. What, this reviewer wonders, will be the reaction to (more…)

Can the NHS be in crisis when they want to waste money like this?

January 16, 2015 | by

The Guardian had a headline yesterday: “GPs to be offered £1bn in new funds if they improve access and elderly care” Upon reading further it transpires that £250m pa is to be offered for the next four years. A clue to the rationale and preferred direction of the monies is:

“NHS England believes using the £1bn to transform existing GP surgeries and build some new premises will help reduce the pressure on hospitals buckling under the strain of unprecedented demand.”

Telehealth & Telecare Aware believes that this is totally the wrong approach. Given the huge increases in the popularity of remote consultation as we covered in our review of our 2014 predictions, surely the right focus for additional funding is to provide substantial incentives to get GPs using existing technology to consult with patients remotely? This should be allied with an advertising campaign to point out the benefits to patients of not having to visit a surgery or exchange germs with others in the waiting room plus offer reassurance that face to face appointments will always be available if the doctor thinks one is necessary.

One way to start might be for the NHS to do deals with organisations like GP Access to offer technology like their askmygp to all GP surgeries for free and give large financial incentives to GPs conducting remote consultations with more than an agreed percentage of the patients on their books by year end…then raise that percentage every year for the next four years. That has got to be far cheaper than building works that will anyway become redundant soon because attitudes are changing and people will be preferring remote consultation shortly anyway! It would be much quicker to implement too.

In mitigation, the article also mentions that surgeries, apparently also “will also be expected to make much better use of technology to monitor patients’ health as a way of reducing their need to seek direct care from a doctor.” However that sounds more like a tepid endorsement of telehealth than encouragement to be radical.

Hat tip to Mike Clark

The demise of Google Glass

January 16, 2015 | by

Well we predicted only a few days ago that there would be some major wearable casualties this year, little realising that the first was about to hit us: Google’s decision to stop selling Glass “in present form”.

Donning this editor’s retrospectacles, the campaign to embed Glass into the world’s technology infrastructure has always felt a bit forced: much more supplier push than customer pull, with wearers, except in circumstances like surgical operations, given a wide berth by many non-wearers. It was pricey too.

Clearly though, the ability to record video and to access information in hands-free mode will continue to be an important requirement for many health & care workers, and social attitudes will likely change too, so there can be little doubt that perhaps a less obviously intrusive version will return in due course. (more…)

NHS seeks pioneering healthcare innovators – yes really!

January 15, 2015 | by | 2 Comments

When this editor first read about the scheme, his thoughts went to headlines like “NHS seeks oxymorons”, as that organisation is not noted for its cherishing of innovators. (Indeed at a recent event in Manchester I was told by a speech & language therapist who was saving the NHS two orders of magnitude in lower costs in helping stroke victims to swallow again by using remote consultation vs in-patient hospital stays that her boss had told her there was no place for her in the NHS.)

However it seems they seek innovators outside the NHS to enable it to adopt innovations at scale and pace: “NHS England is inviting healthcare pioneers from around the world to apply to develop and scale their tried and tested innovations across parts of the NHS.”

“Applicants should be experienced innovators in healthcare who are currently leading or working on new technologies, services and processes that have the potential to make a real difference to patient outcomes.”

Details of the NHS Innovation Accelerator Programme are here, and the Digital by Default news item, here.

Something for (almost) everyone – a digital health gallymaufry

January 13, 2015 | by

The Association of British Healthcare Industries (ABHI) is looking for companies to share the British Pavilion at the CMEF trade show from 15th – 18th May 2015 in Shanghai, China. It is apparently the the leading Healthcare trade show in China and is now the largest Medical Equipment exhibition in the Asia Pacific region attracting over 60,000 visitors. Details here.

Still need to see some more predictions for 2015? – try these 12 for telecoms, which does include the odd interesting nod towards subjects we cover, including interconnection of wearables and connected homes.

Prompted by our mention of V-Connect in our review of our 2014 predictions, MD Adam Hoare has pointed out that his company also won the Medilink ‘partnership with the NHS’ award for their renal project with The Lister Hospital in Stevenage. Congratulations!

Accenture has produced an interesting (more…)