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The Theranos Story, ch. 60: becoming a Cautionary Tale of Silicon Valley Ethics

It’s just weird. It’s just a bit surreal. When you see someone have this situation and pretend that everything is normal. It’s so bizarre.–Erika Cheung, former Theranos lab associate, whistleblower Will health tech learn its lesson? As in Chapter 58, we are now in Full Retrospective on Theranos, with Cautionary Tales abounding. One of the better ones is from one of the two young whistleblowers profiled in John Carreyrou’s ‘Bad Blood’, Erika Cheung. She was the young (23) lab associate who saw patient samples from Walgreens and other patients constantly fail quality controls, finally reported it to regulators when nobody... Continue Reading

The Theranos Story, ch. 59: there’s life left in the corporate corpse–patents! And no trial date in sight.

...you hunger for a deep dive into the design of Theranos’ blood analyzers that never really worked, and can appreciate that the miniLab was what “one expert in laboratory medicine called “theater … not science”, this Design World article is for you: Schadenfreude for Theranos — and satisfaction in how engineering doesn’t lie Meanwhile, back in the US District Court in San Jose, California, we learn that the trial of Ms. Holmes (now engaged to William “Billy” Evans, a 27-year-old heir to the Evans Hotel Group, which has three West Coast resort properties and who is also a techie) and... Continue Reading

About time: digital health grows a set of ethical guidelines

...mushy. From their press release: “We want this first set of ten statements to spur conversations in board rooms, classrooms and community centers around the country and ultimately be refined and adopted widely.” –Michael A. Keller, Stanford’s university librarian and vice provost for teaching and learning So everyone gets to feel good and take home a trophy? Nowhere are there next steps, corporate statements of adoption, and so on. Let’s keep in mind that Stanford University was the nexus of the Fraud That Was Theranos, which is discreetly not mentioned. If not a shadow hovering in the background, it should... Continue Reading

The Theranos Story, ch. 58: with HBO and ABC, let the mythmaking and psychiatric profiling begin! (updated)

This Editor thought that her next articles about Theranos would be trial coverage. There are court dates pending for Elizabeth Holmes and Not-So-Sunny Balwani–with the DOJ for 11 counts of wire fraud [TTA 16 June] and, for Mr. Balwani, with the SEC on (civil) securities fraud [TTA 15 March]. Instead, Theranos hits the headlines again. On 18 March, there’s the debut of an HBO documentary on Theranos. Titled The Inventor: Out For Blood In Silicon Valley (YouTube preview), we can treat ourselves once again to the SteveJobs-esque presence of Ms. Holmes, down to the unnaturally deep voice, blondined hair, and... Continue Reading

Where’s the evidence? Healthcare unicorns lack the proof and credibility of peer-reviewed studies.

...aggressive corporate announcements, and mass media hype.” The term ‘stealth research’ was prompted to the author by the practices of Theranos–ironically, a company that started and was funded in the Stanford nexus. By the time Dr. Ioannidis’ viewpoint paper was published in JAMA in Feb 2015, Theranos had ballooned to a $9 bn valuation. His paper was the first to question Theranos’ science–and Theranos aggressively pushed back against Dr. Ioannidis, including their general counsel attempting to convince the author to recant his own writing. Three years later, we know the outcome. This latest study concludes that there is a real... Continue Reading

It’s not a bubble, really! Or developing? Analysis of Rock Health’s verdict on 2018’s digital health funding.

...didn’t rate a mention) Surge of cash from new investors (rising valuations per #5–and a more prosperous environment for investments of all types) High valuations decoupled from fundamentals (Rock Health didn’t consider Verily’s billion, which was after all in January) Fraud or misuse of funds (Theranos, Outcome dismissed by Rock as ‘outliers’, but no mention of Zenefits or HealthTap) Having observed bubbles since 1980 in three industries– post-deregulation airlines in the 1980s, internet (dot.com) in the 1990s, and healthcare today (Theranos/Outcome), ‘moderately’ doesn’t diminish–it builds to a peak, then bursts. Dot.com’s bursting bubble led to a recession, hand in hand... Continue Reading

Is Babylon Health the next Theranos? Or just being made out to be by the press? (Soapbox)

...with distressed users create a sensational cast and skew the finished result. We hope Ms. Olson continues to investigate and publish like the estimable John Carreyrou with Theranos–unlike The Fraud That Was Theranos, she has an opportunity to be part of making Babylon a better company. Babylon also owes her some answers and transparency. we hope she continues to pursue the story. At this point, there’s no evidence that Babylon is vaporware. There are no non-working Edison machines and miniLabs which Theranos hid behind a veil of extreme secrecy, Silicon Valley hype, and ‘I Want To Believe’. Babylon is working... Continue Reading

The Theranos Story, ch. 57: was it Silicon Valley and Startup Culture bad practices pushed to the max?

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Rock-1-crop-2.jpg” thumb_width=”125″ /]Theranos is now formally in California insolvency proceedings (note on their website). Creditors may have enough awarded to them to go down to the local pizzeria to buy a slice or two. Hard lessons indeed for creditors and shareholders. But aside from the drama yet to come in the trial of Elizabeth Holmes and Sunny now Shady Balwani, a/k/a the Silicon Valley Trial of the Century, are there any further lessons to be learned? For those of us who have not been closely following The Theranos Story, David Shaywitz’s kind-of-review of John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood coupled with... Continue Reading

3rings assistive tech will be ringing off next March (UK) (updated)

...When you look at the truly disproportionate amounts of investment in certain hot companies with sexy tech, for instance a few ‘unicorns’–the now expired Theranos being the Poster Child–where far smaller amounts funding tech that works in real companies with real customers would do immediate good and would change things in the long term (longer than 18 months, which is the usual VC horizon), one wonders if we haven’t gone a little bonkers. Yet those of us in the industry remain hopeful. As Steve Purdham said to me in a separate note, “the market has all the tools to change... Continue Reading

The Theranos Story, ch. 56: Bye, bye Theranos…but the litigation continues (updated)

...not at Theranos, elsewhere. For Fortress, which has $36.1 billion in assets under management and now backed by SoftBank, $100 million is pocket change with a smidge of lint. One wonders what SoftBank and Fortress will be doing with that IP. Theranos will not be leaving the headlines soon, as the June indictment of Holmes and Balwani (who was pushed out by Holmes in 2016) and the sidelights produced by their ‘Tainted Love’ will provide schadenfreude for many months. Reports: Reuters, CNBC (video-Squawk Box), USA Today, TechCrunch Our 55 chapters chronicling the slow-motion crash of Theranos can be accessed here.... Continue Reading