Your smartphone is not only your best friend, it has also become your personal trainer, coach, medical lab and maybe even your doctor.
“Digital health” has become a key focus for the technology industry, from modest startups’ focus on apps to the biggest companies in the sector seeking to find ways to address key issues of health and wellness.
“We’ve gotten to a point where with sensors either in the phone or wearables gather information that we couldn’t do in the past without going to a medical center,” said Gerry Purdy, an analyst at Compass Intelligence.
“You can do the heart rate, mobile EKGs [electrocardiograms]. Costs are coming down, and these sensors are becoming more socially acceptable,” he said.
The consultancy Rock Health estimates 143 digital health companies raised US$2.3 billion in the first six months of this year, already topping last year’s amount.
An analysis by Deloitte suggests that smart glasses, fitness bands and watches, should sell about 10 million units this year, generating more than US$3 billion and that the number of devices will hit 170 million by 2017.
The California startup MD Revolution has created a system adapted from a concierge medicine practice, which allows participants to track a variety of health indicators using mobile or wearable devices.
The company uses fitness and other tracking devices to address “imminently preventable conditions such as diabetes or hypertension,” spokeswoman Lisa Peterson said.
“We are creating a new specialty in digital health in which people can interact with nutritionists, exercise physiologists to receive a plan and coaching, to prevent or reverse chronic diseases,” she said.
Peterson said the company using existing commercial devices from makers such as Fitbit or Jawbone and plans to launch its own app for its users.
A study led by the US-based Center for Connected Health found that people who use mobile devices did a better job of lowering dangerous blood pressure and blood sugar levels.
A separate study published in this month’s issue of Health Affairs found that data collected by devices is not only useful for patients, but can help doctors find better treatments.
“When linked to the rest of the available electronic data, patient-generated health data completes the big data picture of real people’s needs, life beyond the health care system,” said Amy Abernethy, a Duke University professor of medicine and the lead author of the study.
A physician and the founder and director of the Boston-based nonprofit Center for Connected Health Joseph Kvedar said mobile technology has the potential to keep people engaged in their own care, and lessen the burden on the healthcare system.
“For the vast majority of things, you the patient are in charge and we are just the sherpas,” he said. “Engaged patients get better.”
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