Las tecnologías digitales presentan grandes oportunidades para mejorar la calidad de la asistencia sanitaria, así como la gestión del conocimiento médico. La expansión de los dispositivos conectados a Internet, capaces de monitorizar la salud del paciente, o la recopilación y análisis de grandes cantidades de datos mediante técnicas de inteligencia artificial son algunas de ellas. Estas tecnologías permiten evolucionar hacia sistemas de atención sanitaria personalizados y centrados en el paciente, algo que resulta cada vez más necesario a medida en que aumenta el envejecimiento de la población y los pacientes con enfermedades crónicas.
Nokia has today announced that it is acquiring Withings, the company behind a range of connected health products, including watches, fitness bands, sleep-trackers, thermometers, and scales.
Founded in 2008, Withings had raised a little more than $30 million in equity funding and claims 200 employees across Paris, Cambridge (U.S.), and Hong Kong. Today’s acquisition values the French startup at €170 million ($192 million).
Virta Laboratories, the healthcare security startup spun out of the University of Michigan, today announced it has received a $750,000 small business innovation research [SBIR] grant from the federal government to expand its commercialization efforts. This is Virta Labs’ second SBIR grant; it snagged a smaller, phase one award in 2015.
Heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, arthritis—chronic conditions such as these account for 84% of health care spending. Yet many are preventable. An estimated 40% of all premature deaths can be attributed to lifestyle, such as smoking and inactivity. How can the health care system shift focus (and dollars) from acute to preventative care?
El grupo informático estadounidense IBM anunció este jueves un acuerdo para comprar la empresa especializada en datos sanitarios Truven Health Analytics en una operación valorada en unos 2.600 millones de dólares (más de 2.300 millones de euros).
“Con esta adquisición IBM se convertirá en uno de los principales líderes mundiales del sector de datos sanitarios”, dijo al anunciar el acuerdo la directora general de su división sanitaria IBM Watson Health, Deborah DiSanzo.
The digital health industry reached a new investment high in 2015. The past year saw nearly $5.8B invested, a small increase from the breakout year in 2014 (which itself saw more than double the funding over 2013). However, there was a more significant jump in deals, which saw a 20.6% year-over-year increase and broke the 800-mark for the first time (nearly hitting 900).
Several mega-rounds have contributed to this funding uptick, with newly minted unicorns Guahao, Zocdoc, and 23andMe among the 8 digital health deals in 2015 above $100M in size.
For the over 40 million people served by the more than 300 health systems working with startup CrossChx, checking in for a doctor’s appointment is much like unlocking an iPhone. All you need is your right index finger. Touch it onto a fingerprint reader at the check-in desk, and your identity is verified. Your driver’s license can stay in your wallet.
As well as making doctor visits simpler and preventing fraud, CrossChx’s founders say that its system can eventually help free U.S. patient records from the inefficiencies and errors imposed by the usually isolated and often outdated IT systems of health-care providers.
El Instituto de Innovación i3B de Ibermática ha desarrollado un sistema capaz de analizar el comportamiento de las personas y predecir situaciones de riesgo mediante tecnologías de inteligencia artificial. Este sistema automatizado se está aplicando a la teleasistencia con el objetivo de mejorar la atención de personas mayores y dependientes, adelantándose así a situaciones de riesgo como caídas, problemas de salud o comportamientos fuera de lo habitual.
Historically, the consumer space in digital health has been one of the most challenging categories for investors, including Rock Health. The failure to discover and build massive companies has led to fear, anchored to widely-held perceptions of the consumer relationship to healthcare.
