CNN’s “The Next List” to Profile mHealth Tech


“I’m continually interested and fascinated by how much atheletes, patients, everybody wants their own data because they want to learn and do better and get better outcomes”
Dr Leslie Saxon, University Southern California’s Centre for Body Computing

“If you can get this information all the time in real time what do you think about that?”
Dr Sanjay Gupta, Chief Medical Correspondent, CNN

“It’s amazing where technology is taking us man!”
Nick Swisher, Cleveland Indians

“I’m Doctor Sanjay Gupta meeting an innovator who’s saying checking your vitals should be as easy as getting your email”
Dr Sanjay Gupta, Chief Medical Correspondent, CNN

“I can take this app and then simply apply my fingers to the back and what we get is you are seeing my ElectroCardioGram (ECG)”
Dr David Albert, Inventor, AliveCor

“Wouldn’t it be great to get a call from your smartphone to tell you that your Doctor needs to talk to you about something you don’t even feel yet?”
Dr Leslie Saxon, University Southern California’s Centre for Body Computing

“Wireless Health and Dr Leslie Saxon this Sunday on the next list”
Dr Sanjay Gupta, Chief Medical Correspondent, CNN

The show is set to feature the following technology:

The iPhone ECG case from AliveCor:

Dr Dave Albert on CNN

A CRT-D (Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy Defibrillator) from Boston Scientific, Corventis’s NUVANT Mobile Cardiac Telemetry System (PiiX adhesive sensor) and Zephyr’s Hxm Bluetooth Low Energy (Smart 4.0) Heart Rate Sensor

Leslie Saxon profiling Mobile Connected BioSensors on CNN

Under Armour’s Bluetooth Low Energy (Smart 4.0) Heart Rate Sensor:

UnderArmour Bluetooth Low Energy Sensor

My thoughts:

Great to see more high profile mainstream coverage of mHealth like this

As even the biggest companies in Mobile – the newest trillion dollar industry – continue to struggle to understand their role in mHealth I think it’s hard to overestimate the importance of mainstream news coverage (and the consumer interest in mHealth that clearly underlies this) as I think it is key to persuading them to properly apply themselves to mHealth opportunities.

What’s with calling it Wireless Health instead of mHealth?

Surely anyone can see that the only reason any of this gear is going mainstream isn’t because it’s wireless but because it’s converging with MOBILE the newest mass media and a device that is the most popular consumer gadget in the history of mankind.

I hope this isn’t another sign of ill directed self interests of big firms that clearly don’t know what they’re doing in this new area?

Data OR information

I’m not sure Leslie Saxon is appreciating the subtle difference here. I don’t know think patients want all their data in the same way that motorists don’t want to have all the data their cars are processing. As with our cars we don’t want a supply of the gigabytes of data that these machines compute every minute BUT we do want to be signalled with information in a timely and actionable way.

Do we really want our Smartphones calling us?

Dr Leslie Saxon Calling

I really hope that Leslie Saxon has been misquoted as even before you start considering how patients will filter the screening business opportunists I think it’s a terrible idea to have Patients getting a call from their smartphones to tell them that their Doctor needs to talk to them about something that they “don’t even feel yet”.

Perhaps I’m very biased because of our work here at 3G Doctor but I think this would be a very disappointing conclusion as to where this is all leading because while I appreciate that Doctor numbers are short and their time is valuable for most patients I feel there’s a big difference between the value of “My Doctor sending me a Video and being available for an informed Video Consultation” and my “Smartphone Calling me to tell me that I need to talk to them”.

I think that once more of us are leveraging patient access to the internet to make a step change in the effectiveness of Doctor/Patient communication it’ll become obvious that there is still huge value in the Educational Moment even if that moment is increasingly happening outside of what we today would consider to be a clinical setting.

I look forward to catching The Next List on Sunday at 18:30 pm (London/Dublin)

The Next List

HatTip: Neil Versel at MobiHealthNews

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