Can Apple, Google and other tech giants find gold in mobile medicine?

The annual medical expenditure in the United States is as high as $3 trillion, accounting for nearly one-fifth of GDP. The revolution to revolutionize medical science with technology has only just begun. Of course, the giants will not miss this huge gold mine. They all have their cards and hope to participate in this vigorous revolution.

Apple launched HealthKit last year. It wants to integrate the data collected by all intelligent hardware. The unified format storage, in addition to let consumers better understand their health, is more hopeful? Can help doctors diagnose or monitor patients. This year's Apple Watch also carries a huge health mission, capturing data such as heart rate. Google, Microsoft, and Samsung are also eyeing this field, each with its core products and platforms.

However, how much can they harvest from these huge amounts of capital and energy? Medical care is a well-known and regulated industry, and digital healthcare companies face multiple barriers ranging from consumers to doctors, from policy controls to support from EMR vendors.

First of all, the most critical people - the doctors' response is not very enthusiastic. Many doctors believe that consumer health products such as smart bracelets are only high-end toys, and they cannot play a decisive role in diagnosing patients. For example, they don't believe it? Those things can cure diabetes. In fact, the mobile phone diabetes app such as WellDoc has appeared on the market, becoming the first FDA-approved mobile app treatment program, which can be opened to patients by doctors. Clinical trials also prove that diabetics using the wellDoc mobile phone program are in the third place. Blood glucose decreased by 2.03% during the month, while the uselessness decreased by only 0.68%. However, diabetes is still only a market after all, is it worth the giants to dig?

Second, consumers are not as keen on their health data as digital healthcare entrepreneurs imagine. Surveys, including Cambridge Endeavour Partners, show that one-third of wearable users stop using these products after six months. Consumers are more likely to be able to collect health data intelligence products, like controlling diet and going to the gym, only three minutes of heat, can not persist.

In addition, most of the consumers who use these smart products are high-end users who have high incomes, are highly educated, and are sensitive to health. Low-income people are often obese, but they have no money to buy these expensive products.

Also, "Many doctors say they don't want that much patient data." Bill Hanson, chief information officer at the University of Pennsylvania Health System, said, “such as hourly weight, blood pressure, pulse, etc.” One of the biggest problems with home health monitoring is that doctors don’t see the actual situation when data is collected and cannot be accurately interpreted. "If the patient is in front of me, I know that his high blood pressure is due to nervousness, but if the intelligent hardware tells me that a patient's weight suddenly rises, it may be because he ate too much food, causing water in the body, and can't explain anything. ."

EMR (Electronic Case Record) is another wall. Although Apple and Google both said that their system is not to replace the existing EMR system, but only to supplement, but it really depends on large EMR vendors. ? Last year, MayoClinic, the top hospital in the United States, and Epic, the largest EMR manufacturer in the United States, launched a patient-oriented app that allows patients to contact their doctors via the app, make appointments, and view test results. It also integrates Apple's HealthKit, allowing patients to share health information collected by smart hardware, such as blood pressure, diet, activity, and more. But according to Mayor's medical professor Ommen, so far, there are very few patients using this function.

The final challenge comes from the regulation of policy. ? Although the FDA does not regulate hardware devices that collect health data purely, devices that collect and read steps, blood pressure, body temperature, weight, etc. do not require FDA approval to be marketed directly, but when it comes to medial-grade Medical-grade devices, such as smart devices that can diagnose sleep apnea, arrhythmia, etc., require a heavy checkpoint and are approved by the FDA before they can be marketed.

Despite these obstacles, we believe that the prospects for digital healthcare are still relatively optimistic. Many doctors admit that although not optimistic? Ordinary smart health products are used for therapeutic diagnosis, but these products are still helpful for patients with chronic diseases. ? Once patients with chronic diseases leave the hospital, they often need to go back to do various tests to prevent the disease from getting worse or worse. Smart health products can help with home monitoring. For example, once blood sugar or blood pressure suddenly rises, the doctor can immediately intervene, such as telephone to inform the patient to adjust. The dose is prevented from evolving into a more serious condition.

Since 2012, the United States has implemented a program to reduce the rate of hospital visits. The government has hard indicators for each hospital every year (except for some hospitals, including cancer treatment, rehabilitation centers, etc.), which requires a reduction in the rate of returning to the clinic every year. If not, it will be subject to economic sanctions and reduce the cost of hospital fees. In October 2014, the US government imposed penalties on 2,610 hospitals, 39 of which will reduce the payment of $428 million in medical expenses from the government from October 1, 2014 to September 30, 2015. Officials of the US Medicare (National Health Insurance for the Elderly over 65 and disabled) said that 2 million Medicare patients had returned to the hospital after leaving the hospital last year, causing $26 billion in government spending, and the government hopes at least 17 billion. The dollar can be avoided.

Digital medical care will undoubtedly help to reduce this kind of expenditure. Through home monitoring, it can detect early signs of disease progression, and thus intervene in advance to prevent the disease from worsening, reduce the rate of return, and reduce medical expenses.

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