Intro to TestCard TestCard.com is a UK domiciled startup revolutionizing the direct to consumer healthcare diagnostics market. The company has innovated a delivery mechanism that allows conditions to be diagnosed immediately in the comfort and convenience of home. TestCard enables an individual to take ownership of their health, making laboratory level information accessible and painless and thus enfranchizing the individual and ultimately democratizing healthcare. The company’s innovation is a diagnostic urinalysis (urine test) kit embedded into a postcard. The ‘TestCard’ and the accompanying TestCard app, are not only a reliable and non-invasive alternative to costly and time-consuming doctor visits; but crucially, serve as an early diagnosis tool that prompts earlier medical intervention and treatment. What is TestCard? TestCard enables an individual to take ownership of their health, making laboratory level information accessible and painless and thus enfranchising the individual and ultimately democratising healthcare. What is the TestCard solution ? TestCard is a revolutionary urinalysis system, which combines the accuracy of medical lab tests with the latest in mobile technology. The user simply applies urine to the pull-out strip (applicator) imbedded in the postcard and, using the TestCard app, holds their mobile device above the TestCard enabling the app to deliver an immediate result. Simple for the end user, effective and instantaneous. Mobile App Medical jargon is confusing and can cause further patient anxiety, therefore TestCard delivers a clear interpretation of results in language that is easily understood. Given the natural tendency of the patient/consumer to delay health monitoring and screening through conventional doctor visits, TestCard fills a growing gap in the healthcare market. Source : http://www.testcard.com/

Doctor-appointment booking app Doctolib has been valued at more than a billion dollars after raising new funding, adding to the surge of interest in health-care startups. Founded in 2013, Doctolib operates a doctor’s appointment-booking app and related management software, and has been growing services of video-based consultations and digital prescriptions, similar to Britain’s Babylon Healthcare Services Ltd., and Doctor On Demand Inc. in the U.S. Doctolib’s 150 million-euro ($170 million) round announced Wednesday was led by U.S.-based growth equity investor General Atlantic, the startup said in a statement. In France, Paris-based Doctolib is the latest unicorn technology upstart in a club that includes cloud storage supplier OVH Groupe SAS, car-sharing app Blablacar, and music streaming service Deezer SA. The latest round is Doctolib’s third in just over two years, after the company acquired Lagardere’s online medical platforms in France and expanded to Germany. Fewer small businesses raised money in the EU last year compared to 2017, but the size of the average round got bigger, according to a data compiled by Tech.eu, which tracks VC activity. There were 2,975 funding rounds, for a total amount of 24.7 billion euros, the data showed. Doctolib said it receives 30 million online visits from patients every month and has partnered with doctors and hospitals in France and Germany. Existing shareholders Eurazeo SA and French state-backed fund Bpifrance participated in the new raise, Doctolib said in its statement. The company will use part of the money raised to expand to new countries. Source : https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-20/french-ai-health-care-app-doctolib-hits-1-1-billion-valuation

Navigating the new digital healthcare landscape is challenging for everyone. The global healthcare landscape is rapidly changing with digital technologies becoming increasingly normalised into the everyday delivery of healthcare. But how does this change how healthcare organisations provide and deliver care? In the future, the digital landscape might span everything from patients to wider healthcare delivery organisations (Figure1). Patient-facing technologies are at the centre, reflecting the impact that this new ecosystem of self-monitoring and decision support will have on their experience and quality of care. Other technologies are broadly categorised as professional-facing and organisation-facing depending on their primary user and value in enhancing individual patient care or improving care systems. The electronic health record straddles the system as a whole, reflecting the pivotal role it plays in any digital strategy. It is the foundation upon which many of the other applications are built. Navigating this new landscape is challenging for organisations and their leaders and there are many pitfalls. There is no doubt, however, that technological transformation will be one of the major differentiators between successful and unsuccessful providers over the next decade. The pressures of cost and expectations of quality mean that doing nothing is not a sustainable option. Deploying information technology in healthcare The history of health information technology (IT) has certainly not always been smooth. Examples of spiralling costs, slow take-up and elusive productivity gains are found in virtually every health system around the world. Why has healthcare delivery been so resistant to digital transformation, and when big investments have been made, why have strategies so often failed to pay off? Based on my experience at both local and national levels, perhaps the most important lesson of all is that becoming a digitally enabled healthcare provider isn’t about replacing analogue or paper processes with digital ones. Where implementations have failed, technology has often simply been layered on top of existing structures and work patterns, creating additional workload for healthcare professionals. For me, the technologies that have released the greatest immediate benefits have been carefully designed to make people’s jobs or the patient’s interaction easier, with considerable investment in both the design of the tool and the redesign of ways of working. A pattern I’ve seen time and again is the great expectations of new technology clashing against an initial period of frustration and reduced productivity. Benefits eventually materialise — often after two or more years — but weathering this ‘digital dip’ is an important hurdle that has led to many transformation strategies being scaled back or even abandoned. A case in point is electronic health records (EHRs). These are an essential foundation to any digital strategy, but rarely do they produce any immediate benefits to the frontline. In reality, most organisations see an initial phase of added inefficiencies before the tools that work off the EHR (patient flow management, e-prescribing, automated alerts and data transfer) are developed, implemented and get to work. The unexpected pain of the initial EHR implementation has caused many providers to get stuck in the dip — unable to roll back to previous systems, but unwilling to invest further to get the benefits. Seven lessons on realising opportunities I have found that substantial gains in terms of productivity and health outcomes are possible — and have been demonstrated — from specific areas of health IT. As the history of frequent disappointment and failure shows, however, digital technologies will not deliver these improvements on their own. Through my digital transformation experience with healthcare providers around the world, I have identified seven key lessons from those that have successfully realised the benefits and overcome the setbacks. Seven opportunities to drive improvement Looking at the highest performing and most digitally enabled healthcare providers around the world, as well as ‘frugally’ innovative organisations in emerging economies, seven improvements in productivity and quality of care stand out. The way ahead for technology in healthcare – a 10-year view Computing will be much more ubiquitous, but much less visible Much less time will be spent by staff on administrative tasks and routine communication, as automation, voice recognition and natural language processing become more commonplace New roles and competencies will be added to the managerial cadre as the shift to digital healthcare continues — most importantly advanced analytic capabilities Organisational and professional boundaries will be far less visible, as integrated information technology systems dissolve many of the current divides between primary, secondary and tertiary care. Source : https://www.worldhealthcarejournal.com/newsdit-article/a8e44e3d25d77722d64fd0ae337ca864/?fbclid=IwAR2et2bWodHKuHRGfF05R6iGFWDDamgUSjeM4N1eSQaSg_jCbwQA8ZekBxE

Patient portals and personal health records (PHRs) have both received considerable praise for their role in increasing patient engagement. However, distinguishing between the two forms of health IT tools can often be difficult, due to nebulous definitions and overlapping features. Patient portals give users an online view of their health data, as do PHRs. And by giving patients access to this information, both tools put the patient at the center of care and help incorporate them into their own care team. But a closer look reveals some subtle differences that are nonetheless important for keeping these different options straight in the minds of patients and providers. Here are some of the key features of each of these technology types and a breakdown of what each term really means. TETHERED PERSONAL HEALTH RECORDS VERSUS PATIENT PORTALS A tethered PHR, as defined by the ONC, is an online interface tied to an EHR with which patients may view and sometimes interact with their health data. “The patient accesses the information through a secure portal,” ONC says. “Typically, patients can view information such as lab results, immunization history or due dates for certain screenings. These are called tethered PHRs or connected PHRs. When a PHR is connected to the patient’s legal medical record it is protected under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Rule.” The ONC’s definition of a tethered PHR is very similar to the definition that the agency provides for patient portals: A patient portal is a secure online website that gives patients convenient 24-hour access to personal health information from anywhere with an Internet connection. Using a secure username and password, patients can view health information such as: Recent doctor visits Discharge summaries Medications Immunizations Allergies Lab results Some patient portals also allow patients to: Exchange secure e-mail with their healthcare teams Request prescription refills Schedule non-urgent appointments Check benefits and coverage Update contact information Make payments Download and complete forms ONC appears to use the terms interchangeably, as have other healthcare organizations, including AHIMA. In a 2015 report, AHIMA researchers indicated that tethered PHRs were no different than portals. “Tethered PHRs, also known as patient portals, allow patients to access relevant medical information from their provider,” the team wrote in its abstract. The California Health Care Association likewise considers tethered PHRs and patient portals one in the same, stating the following of patient portals and PHRs: Is a secure website through which patients can access a PHR Often contains information from a patient’s EHR Is usually “tethered” to a healthcare organization with applications that build on an EHR Enables users to complete forms online, communicate with providers, request prescription refills, review lab results, or schedule medical appointments Can enhance patient access and increase administrative efficiency and productivity Tethered PHRs and patient portals offer several benefits to patients, typically including patient-provider communication through secure messaging capabilities and access to care through online appointment scheduling. Secure messaging capabilities offer just as many benefits to the provider as they do the patient, allowing the provider to build a relationship with their patients while streamlining their workload. “Providers are trying to have relationships with these individuals and be able to effectively communicate with that population” using online portals, says Zach Wood, Cerner’s Director and General Manager of Member Engagement. “Having bi-directional messaging between the patient and provider, not only is convenient on both sides, but it saves an administrative burden as well,” he continued. “And being able to show that health record to the patient enhances the communication lines and provides self-service which is great for the patient and the provider.” These tools are becoming increasingly necessary for providers looking to improve patient engagement. According to a report published by AHIMA, patients who access their health information via any form of personal health record can improve their health literacy, giving them the power to make their own health decisions and engage in meaningful conversations with providers. “Patients who have accessed their medical records have reported a broader knowledge base of their own health concerns, the ability to communicate more effectively with their physicians, initiation of efforts to improve their health, and decreased utilization of healthcare services,” the report says. “PHRs can help make patients aware of their health conditions, which could initiate changes in their healthcare plan.” Other studies have also indicated that patient data access via PHR or patient portal can help improve outcomes. Patients who can review and revise clinician notes can see better patient safety outcomes, for example. WHAT IS A STANDALONE PERSONAL HEALTH RECORD? The ONC defines a standalone PHR as: “[A system where] patients fill in the information from their own records and memories and the data is stored on the patients’ computers or on the internet. Patients can decide whether to share the information with providers, family members, or anyone else involved in their care. In some cases, information can be downloaded from other sources into the PHR.” Patient data management is the major distinguishing factor associated with standalone PHRs. The system is entirely patient-controlled, and providers can only view the data when their patients provide them access. This may help to ensure that sensitive data stays within the user’s control, but managing a standalone PHR can be an immense undertaking for patients. Patients are in charge of aggregating all of the data included in their standalone PHR, as well as coordinating how much data they’re going to share and with whom they will share it. According to one article published in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, this important patient responsibility can be extremely burdensome. “An individual’s PHR can only be useful if the person understands the importance of maintaining and coordinating health-related documentation and activities with health care providers,” the article authors wrote. “Consumer-related interface, technology, and access issues specific to PHRs are not yet well understood.” Standalone PHRs also lack the provider interaction that often leads to meaningful patient engagement, a missing link that may have led to the downfall of Google’s and Microsoft’s PHR offerings back in 2012. Google launched its standalone PHR, Google Health, back in 2008 as health IT began to gain traction through government incentives. However, the company failed to spark consumer interest, and eventually shut down the product on January 1, 2013. While there were multiple factors that may have led to Google Health’s demise, limited provider interaction with the data and few motivational components were arguably most significant. “[Google] basically offered a place to store data,” said Adam Bosworth, an original Google Health developer, in a 2012 interview with TechCrunch TV. “Our data shows people don’t really want a place to store data, per se,” Bosworth continued. “They want to do something fun and engaging. If it’s not fun, if it’s not social, why would they do it? Yes, they want to be healthy, but they need more than that. They need the encouragement and even the pressure of friends. They need the constant pressure, constant reminders.” More current PHRs have started to address these issues. Although standalone PHRs still require patients to take the initiative to involve their providers with the technology, tethered PHRs/patient portals allow the patient to interact with the provider. PHRS, PATIENT PORTALS, AND INTEROPERABILITY HURDLES Standalone and tethered PHRs offer several of the same patient engagement benefits, and they also suffer from several of the same disadvantages. With all of these data storage options and ongoing industry struggles with interoperability,there are many opportunities for data to become siloed. For standalone PHRs, interoperability can cause issues for patients who want to offer a provider access to their data. A patient’s PHR may not work well with a provider’s EHR, making it impossible for the provider to access a full view of the patient’s health record. As of 2013, only 60 percent of clinician EHRs could connect to PHRs, according to data from the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange. This problem can also occur with patient portals. A patient may have one portal for their primary care physician, as well as two more for their optometrist and dermatologist. The portals for all three of these providers may not be interoperable, causing a problem if the PCP needs to view the medication history from the dermatologist. Health IT developers are working on overcoming these interoperability barriers.Some vendors, such as Epic Systems, have made significant progress integrating patient portal information from multiple providers. “In the past, if you had two MyCharts from two different Epic providers, you’ve had two different MyCharts,” said Epic founder and CEO Judy Faulkner. “You can use a single sign-on for them, but the charts have been separate. And if you have another vendor’s patient portal, you have three different portals, and so on.” “We have now changed MyChart so that everything is all together no matter how many iterations of the portal you have – or if you have a portal from other vendors,” she said in a 2016 interview with HealthITInteroperability.com. “So you, as the patient, can see all your appointments, no matter where they’re from, and all your meds and everything else all together, which is very neat.” Both standalone and tethered PHRs present issues with patient-generated health data. Providers express trust issues with PGHD, stating that potentially inaccurate patient data can inform a detrimental treatment plan. “Providers are wary of the legal implications of PHRs,” said researchers in the aforementioned JAMIA article. “For example, courts might apply negligence standards in cases where practitioners rely on inaccurate patient-entered PHR information to make suboptimal decisions about care.” According to one recent study on PGHD and PHR integration, health policymakers need to create a standardized system for using the data. This will make PGHD use more manageable at the point of care and mitigate some concerns regarding liability for PGHD use. It could also allow providers more time to verify data accuracy before using it to determine treatment. “Designers should focus on easy-to-use interfaces, automated [PGHD] collection, and communicating PGHD only when directly relevant to a given patient visit,” the researchers concluded. “Finally, policymakers and clinical leaders may need to better demonstrate clear clinical usefulness or provide other incentives for practices to routinely incorporate [PGHD] in EHRs.” While patient portals and PHRs do have their differences, they both still drive users towards the overall goal of improving patient engagement. Determining which technology is better for achieving better patient engagement may be in the eye of the beholder. Different patients and providers have different preferences, making them predisposed to preferring one system over another. By understanding the differences between patient portals and PHRs, as well as patient preferences, providers can better decide which tool could be a better fit for fostering patient engagement. This article was originally published on February 17, 2017. Source : https://patientengagementhit.com/features/how-do-patient-portals-and-personal-health-records-differ

Thanks to dystopian books and movies, the world’s robotized future appears both fascinating and terrifying. There can be a fine line between a symbiotic human-robot coexistence in peace and a Matrix-like catastrophe, but many advances of robotics give humanity hope to thrive alongside robotic companions, caregivers, and guardians. It’s no surprise that medical software development is one of the areas accelerating robotic science implementation, with IDC’s Worldwide Healthcare IT 2017 Predictions study anticipating 50% increase in the use of robots for delivering medications, food, and supplies by 2019. In the meantime, the human side of healthcare stagnates. WHO reports that the global shortage of healthcare specialists will make more than 14 million in 2030. Introducing robotics in healthcare with wider applications can compensate the shortage in the human workforce. If applied at major pain points, robotics can improve care delivery without threatening existing workplaces. Real world examples of Robot-Human synergy in Healthcare Currently, robots can support and extend the service health specialists are providing, automating a range of repetitive tasks. Among medical robots used today, there are rehabilitation and therapy support robots, diagnosis-assisting machines and even technical administrative personnel. Friendship Ex Machina Being equipped with touch sensors, cameras, and microphones, these pals were created to alleviate loneliness, support medication adherence and ease stress from unpleasant experiences. JIBO Jibo is an adorable stationery social robot, sending a few WALL-E vibes with its sense of humor and dance moves. Yes, it broadcasts music and dances to it too, no need for either hands or legs. Jibo is an amazing partner for people who live alone and need more socialization in their lives, especially when feeling depressed. Jibo uses facial recognition, NLP algorithms, touchscreen, two speakers and an advanced animation system to identify voices, turn to them, greet the owner, simulate body language and build a unique character to match the owner’s personality. Moreover, this robot can take pictures, share interesting facts, cite news, tell the future and even locate monsters nearby, according to its developers BUDDY While Jibo feels more like an entertaining personal companion, BUDDY’s capabilities allow it to become a health and safety assistant for the whole family. BUDDY helps parents educate their kids in a gamified manner: it can tell bedtime stories as well as offer spelling and counting challenges. This feature can be especially useful for children with mental health disorders. The robot also supports scheduling, planning and reminding features to ensure that each family member will get to their appointment on time or will remember about significant life events. For older people, BUDDY offers medication reminders, fall detection and unusual inactivity detection, easy social interaction and continuous connection to their relatives via video calls and photo sharing. Moreover, the robot can protect the home by sensing smoke, flood, and temperature changes. In case of any unusual situations, it will send alerts to predefined family members and preset contacts. PARO While pet therapy’s stress-relieving qualities have been recognized by some of the largest health systems, including Mayo Clinic, not all hospitals or extended care facilities can create a suitable environment for animals to live next to patients. PARO is an FDA-approved fluffy interactive robo-seal that allows patients to get the benefits of pet therapy in clinical settings. Covered with artificial fur and being able to differentiate stroking from hitting, the baby seal emotionally reacts to each contact with a person under treatment. It learns the patient’s personality and gradually develops a character that its owner likes. PARO seals can be used for pain distraction, easing stress during a procedure and reduce the feeling of loneliness, especially in patients with dementia. Early steps in robotized diagnostics and treatment During the hospital stay, patients need to endure many procedures and undergo a certain treatment plan. Regardless of the chief complaint, giving blood and taking pills are the basic activities for inpatients. But, simple as they are, these procedures bear higher risks of human errors (such as mislabeling and misdosing), which can be reduced with the help of robotics. VEEBOT Veebot is a robotic nurse that automates venipuncture to cut the blood drawing time up to just one minute. Veebot uses infrared light, ultrasound scanning, and image analysis algorithms to recognize vein patterns and evaluate the blood flow. With its unique vein-viewing system, the robot performs with approximately 83 percent accuracy in best vein detection, which is close to an experienced human phlebotomist’s results. SCALLOP MICROBOTS Invented by researchers from the Max Planck Institute, the microbotspioneer in precise medication delivery. Shaped like scallops, microbots have rare-earth magnets embedded in their valves. This allows researchers to control their movement in the bloodstream, lymphatic system, and eyeball fluid through an external magnetic field. Scallop bots can deliver treatment practically anywhere and in a highly-targeted way to streamline the drug action and avoid a negative effect on other body systems. INGESTIBLE ORIGAMI ROBOT Created by the bright minds across MIT, the University of Sheffield, and the Tokyo Institute of Technology, the ingestible origami robot can revolutionize gastroenterology by reducing the number of invasive procedures. The robot is made of dried pig intestine and put into an ice capsule that dissolves in a patient’s stomach. The robot then unfolds to its functional form and, navigated by a technician and external magnetic fields, can move around the stomach to deliver medications, patch up wounds in the stomach lining or even remove foreign bodies, such as swallowed toys or batteries. Next generation admin, nursing and delivery Caregiving is full of mundane tasks, such as helping visitors navigate the facility, transferring patients across wards, organizing specimen delivery and many more. The following robots are created to undertake routine activities, relieve nurses and administrative staff from time-consuming tasks and, eventually, trim a few overtime hours. PEPPER Pepper is a 1.2-meter-tall humanoid robot that recognizes human emotions and voice, adapting its behavior to a particular person it talks to. The robot understands 20 languages and detects whether it communicates with a woman, man or child. Primarily designed to be a daily companion for its owner, Pepper now also gets adoption in hospitals as a receptionist. The robot greets visitors at the door and helps them to navigate the hospital. Pepper either provides a visitor with directions for getting to the health specialist’s office or accompanies them to the correct department so that they don’t get lost. With a 24/7 happy smile on a robot’s face and a permanently friendly voice, Pepper takes over basic receptionist’s duties and leaves the human staff more time to concentrate on non-trivial tasks. ROBEAR Human care workers lift and carry patients around facilities up to 40 times a day, according to the ROBEAR creators. ROBEAR is an interactive body assistant that looks like a giant cartoon bear and can reduce the need for manual patient carrying. With the help of a depth-sensing camera to detect people in front of it, it uses sensors and actuators for softer and more precise movement to lift patients in and out of a bed or a wheelchair and assist them to stand up when needed. We anticipate the increasing popularity of robo-bears and similarly functioning robots for assisted-living facilities and senior housings to ensure proper and timely care for immobile patients. Moreover, such assistants can help transfer patients from ambulance carts to surgical tables and vice versa. TUG TUG is a solution for automating internal logistics, relieving nurses from carrying heavy loads, and saving hospitals major delivery costs. Being an autonomous mobile delivery robot, TUG can transport up to 1.000 lbs of weight. It doesn’t need any additional infrastructure, connecting to the hospital’s Wi-Fi and thus being able to open doors, call an elevator and ride it. This robot can be universally applied in hospitals by making on-demand or prescheduled deliveries, which are secured with biometric access and pin-code systems. In particular, TUG can be used to: deliver medications transport sterile surgical supplies remove trash and regulated medical waste hold linen deliver food or return dirty trays. Upon completing its task, the robot returns to the charging dock. TUGs can work around the clock, reducing the number of staff on nightshifts and offering more time for health specialists to provide care rather than deliver goods. Robots are coming to take care of our lives , but not too fast Our brains are destined to resist the change, so we are really slow to adopt any. Robotics in healthcare isn’t just a change—it is a revolution that will transform care delivery in a way we can’t even imagine now. It will have many evangelists, but even more opponents, especially in the beginning. Therefore, we shouldn’t expect fast and widespread adoption of robotics in healthcare. However, taking baby steps is fine too. It means that all robotic innovations will be well-aimed and justified. Today, we are close to adopting solutions that will remove a lot of routine in nursing, cut on invasive procedures, improve mental health treatment and automate goods delivery. Source : https://www.itransition.com/blog/the-era-of-robotics-in-healthcare-at-its-dawn

Babylon Health has become one of the breakout stars of the current class of UK tech start-ups, but several insiders have suggested that things aren't what they seem. The company, which has contracts to provide NHS services in the UK, uses, amongst its real-life medical staff, an AI chat-bot to do initial triage and basic diagnosis with patients, in an attempt to get quick results to simple cases. One current and one former member of Babylon staff have gone on record with Forbes, claiming that it misses 10-15 per cent of warning signs of serious conditions, and that a group of clinicians had gone straight to Ali Parsa, founder and CEO as recently as last Friday in an attempt to stall a planned software drop. But Babylon isn't taking things lying down and has hit back strongly at the claims that the Forbes article "used a distorted lens to magnify the views of a few anonymous individuals whilst ignoring the findings from multiple government regulators, dismissed the integrity of the hundreds of doctors who work with us and ignored the lengths we have gone to as we have shared our science with the world. "It goes on to rebuke suggestions that it was ever designed to replace the advice of a real doctor: "Our aim is to use technology to empower doctors to make more accurate decisions and to reduce waiting times for patients - after all, how safe is it to be kept waiting for medical attention? "It adds that in its own tests, the bot was bang on 80 per cent of the time, which in such a fledgeling industry, is a pretty impressive bit of neural networking magic. In the UK, Babylon offers appointments with online doctors by video call via its widely advertised GP at Hand app, as well as the initial triage by AI. NHS England said: "The DCB 0129 safety cases submitted by Babylon and GP at hand for each of the Babylon technology products used in the GP at hand service have been considered. These are the Artificial Intelligence symptom checker, the Babylon clinical portal, and the Babylon Healthcheck service. Each safety case meets the standards required by the NHS and has been completed using a robust assessment methodology to a high standard."Babylon adds: "The globe is facing a drastic shortage of doctors and for many people healthcare is simply too expensive. We are working to help improve the lives of millions of people and we are doing so whilst meeting, and often surpassing, all the required regulations. Technology can be part of the answer to these problems - our 11 peer-reviewed publications are testament to this. "Babylon's aim is to put accessible and affordable healthcare into the hands of everyone on earth and we will continue in this endeavour." Babylon is amongst a gaggle of big names who are bringing AI to healthcare. Google DeepMind, for example, works in partnership with London hospitals to monitor kidney patients remotely, to save them coming in if their vitals are normal. More recently it has started using AI for ocular screening, spotting potential problems invisible to the naked eye. The message is clear - common sense is at the heart of this whole endeavour. AI is now mature enough to work alongside the health service and holds many benefits, but if you start coughing up blood and an AI tells you it's a sprained ankle, you're probably wrong. Source : https://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/3068427/babylon-health-hits-back-at-claims-its-ai-isnt-up-to-the-job

More than 40 million UK patient records will be shifted onto Amazon Web Services, as part of a wider upgrade by the dominant NHS GP IT supplier. Emis Group announced on Friday that it would be replacing its Emis Web software with Emis-X. Emis Web is used by about six in 10 GP practices in the UK and holds about 40 million patient records, including the majority of GP records. The new system, which still needs to pass NHS Digital approval, would shift billions of clinical documents and other information from the company’s own servers onto AWS. The move would mark one of the biggest shifts of NHS electronic patient records, usually stored on local NHS organisation or IT supplier servers, onto one of the three major global cloud companies (Amazon, Microsoft and Google). It would also come with the introduction of more digital patient services embedded within this core IT system used by the majority of British GPs, including video consultations via a patient’s smartphone and a chatbot digital triage service. The announcement comes after health and social care secretary Matt Hancock said last month that he expected all NHS IT services and data to move onto the public cloud, where they would benefit from “the resilience and backups of some of the most cyber-aware and heavily invested companies in the world”. NHS officials have previously estimated this shift would cost £500m. It also comes as Emis, and the other major NHS GP IT supplier TPP, face growing pressure from NHS regulators to improve their software, particularly its ability to share patient data. In September, Mr Hancock told a conference audience he’d been “appalled” by NHS staff horror storiesabout primary care IT and said suppliers that did not improve would be excluded from the NHS. NHS Digital officials have previously described the current GP IT duopoly, where Emis and TPP collectively control 90 per cent of the market, as a “market failure” and a drag on innovation. A new £400m NHS GP IT framework designed to correct this failure is scheduled to go live next year. Speaking to HSJ, Emis Group chief executive Andy Thorburn rejected the suggestion there had been a market failure in the past. “Fifty-six per cent of the market has chosen to be with us. The [current] framework has four providers on it,” Mr Thorburn said. However, he said the company also welcomed the move towards more competition for GP IT services in the NHS. The new system was part of becoming a software “platform” to support shift, including supporting competing digital services. “The models of care are changing, and we need to provide a more flexible system,” he said. “We want to [be a] key provider in this market for another 30 years.” An agreement has already been reached between Emis and AWS for the shift but the company did not give a clear timeline for when it would be rolled out. Parts of the new system, such as video consultations and more advanced analytics, would be gradually added to the existing Emis Web software, with GPs unlikely to notice the switch to AWS, the company said. Patients would be able to access new services, such as digital triage, through the ”patient access” app and website. Mr Thorburn said these patient services had been under development before the growth of digital GP services, such as Babylon or Push Doctor, in the NHS. “We are not in the business of delivering GP services, so we are not competing with those people,” he said. “We wish them well.” The company said Emis-X would be hosted on AWS servers within the UK and meet NHS interoperability standards. Source : https://www.hsj.co.uk/technology-and-innovation/tens-of-millions-of-patient-records-to-move-to-amazon-cloud/7023934.article

11 healthcare startups, SME's and corporates have come together as the founding group of members for the Digital Healthcare Council - 1) eConsult - https://econsult.net/ 2) Zesty - https://www.zesty.co.uk / 3) DrNow - http://www.drnow.com/ 4) DrEd - https://www.dred.com/uk/ 5) Ada - https://ada.com/ 6) Index Medical - https://www.doctorfox.co.uk/ 7) Lloyds Online Pharmacy - https://onlinedoctor.lloydspharmacy.com/ 8) Push Doctor - https://www.pushdoctor.co.uk/ 9) Care UK - http://www.careuk.com/ 10) Babylon Health - https://www.babylonhealth.com/ 11) Patient.info - https://patient.info/ The Council’s stated purpose is to: 1) Advocate the benefits of technology in healthcare for patients 2) Provide a vehicle to promote ‘data does good’ to the wider system 3) Collaborate to influence policy decisions from organisations such as CQC, Department of Health, NHS England and NHS Digital 4) Explore opportunities for partnership 5) Share innovation and best The Council aims are: A) to ensure there are open lines of communication with the key stakeholders, as named above B) The Council aims to advocate for the views of members and ensure these are considered by key stakeholders when making policy decisions C) The Council aims to work with key stakeholders to ensure barriers to innovation in the system are removed The council can be contacted on digitalhealth@zpb-associates.com

Ten years ago, one doctor in 10 kept digital records on their patients. The other 90 percent made notes on paper and stored them in manila folders on shelves and in filing cabinets. Paper records had some obvious disadvantages. They took up space, they were difficult to share with other physicians, hospitals, and insurance companies. Patients switching doctors, hospitals, or places of residence could not easily bring their records with them. In 2009, in the wake of the financial crisis, the federal government acted to remedy this situation. The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act set aside $27 billion of federal funds to encourage health care providers to adopt electronic health record (EHR) systems, and more money was subsequently made available for training and assistance. All told, the federal government spent about $35 billion on bringing the U.S. health care industry into the electronic age. The program was highly successful in that it made EHRs commonplace. Today, nine in 10 doctors have adopted them. “We have made a colossal transformation in a relatively short period of time,” says Lloyd Minor, MD, Dean of Stanford Medicine. “But we have not realised the potential benefits of the data that exist in electronic health records.” Indeed, many of the benefits of EHRs have been elusive. As implemented today, EHRs have too many of the drawbacks of paper records. The promise of being able to send them easily from one office to the next has been hampered by a lack of standards and perverse incentives in the health care marketplace to hoard information. Worse, EHRs, with their cumbersome user interfaces and onerous billing requirements, have become a burden to doctors and nurses, contributing to burnout and information overload among physicians, and degrading patient care. “A clinician will make roughly 4,000 keyboard clicks during a busy 10-hour emergency-room shift,” writes Abraham Verghese, Professor for the Theory and Practice of Medicine at Stanford Medicine, in the New York Times Magazine. Although EHRs have many problems, there are reasons to believe that they will eventually start living up to their promise. With some changes in technology, regulations, and attention to training, EHRs may soon serve as the backbone of an information revolution in health care, one that will transform health care the way digital technologies are changing banking, finance, transportation, navigation, Internet search, retail, and other industries. Regulations are being put in place that will put patients in control of their own health records and facilitate the sharing of data among health care organizations. Engineers are developing artificial intelligence technology that can “take notes” for physicians, summarize the important points from a patient’s record, and assist in medical decision making. Apple’s recent app for medical information, which gives third-party developers the ability to pull information from health records, is expected to be the first of many developments that brings health care data to patients’ fingertips. “There are a lot of reasons to be optimistic that we will be able to have both high-tech and high-touch medicine,” says Minor.This white paper is intended to provide a roadmap for this transformation. We will explore the current state of the EHR, reporting the results of a survey by Stanford Medicine and The Harris Pollof physicians and their experiences and attitudes with EHRs. Most important, we will offer some concrete suggestions for solving the problems that physicians confront today with regard to EHRs and how the medical profession can fully leverage the power of medical data over the next decade. We will distill the key ideas from a symposium of health care industry professionals, hosted by the Stanford University School of Medicine on June 4, 2018, including a vision of how EHRs could contribute positively to health care and medicine by 2028, how to exploit the best ideas from the tech industry to make it happen, and immediate and practical steps that health care professionals can take towards this vision. Click here to read the report in full ... Source : http://med.stanford.edu/content/dam/sm/ehr/documents/SM-EHR-White-Papers_v12.pdf

Dyson has filed a patent for an interesting new wearable gadget and some are predicting it will become the next big trend in health tech. Dyson is known for its powerful vacuum cleaners and, more recently, its air purification technology and apparently the company has aspirations to weave that technological prowess into a wearable device that doubles as a pair of headphones. At this point the potential product appears to be in the thought bubble stage, but the company has filed a patent for the idea in the UK, Bloomberg reported this week. The business publication confirmed the product idea, with people close to the project confirming it would be targeted consumers living in big cities, especially in Asia where air pollution is particularly bad. The patent was for a “wearable air purifier” with the potential to include headphone capabilities, according to the anonymous sources. Officially, a Dyson spokesperson said the company “never comments on technology we may or may not be developing.” A recent study by the World Health Organisation and Berkeley Earth showed that breathing in air pollution in big cities has similarly deleterious health effect to smoking cigarettes. In Kanpur, India — the most polluted city — breathing the outside air amounted to smoking about 7.8 cigarettes a day, in terms of toxins. Comparatively, Australian cities were roughly the equivalent of smoking a third of a cigarette a day. Since moving aggressively into the air purifier market, Dyson is quick to point out the health problems associated with air pollution. There are already wearable purifier products on the market that retail mostly in Asia. But quite frankly they look a little ridiculous and most Australian consumers wouldn’t be caught dead wearing such a face or neck gadget in public. This wearable purifier from company Airvida was promoted on website Groupon in the UK recently. But some are predicting big things for the wearable air purifier. Reports about the Dyson patent come just a week after London based research analyst Paul Bremmer wrote a blog post stating: “Wearable air purifiers are the next Fitbit in health tech — and Dyson will lead the way.” In his article he combined analysis of patent data and the growing scientific research and consumer awareness of the harm caused by air pollution to suggest that wearable air purifiers will become an increasingly popular gadget in the coming years. “Consumer awareness of air pollution has also been growing through 2018, with stories published on the link between air pollution and cognitive intelligence, air pollution and heart problems, air pollution and asthma, air pollution and dementia, the list could go on,” he wrote. “With more than 54.5 per cent of the world’s population living in cities, this is a problem faced on a global scale.” With companies like Dyson keen to push consumer awareness about the harms of air pollution, he thinks consumers have been “primed” to adopt such a device. “I predict that Dyson will release a wearable air purifier in the next 18-24 months, and that wearable air purification devices will be the next ‘big’ health-tech trend,” he wrote. In any case, if they do become a thing Australia won’t be the target market. Speaking to news.com.au in August when the company launched its new home air purifiers, Dyson engineer Jessica Rowley noted that bad air quality isn’t a major concern among Australians. “In China and South Korea there’s a real awareness about the air quality problem,” she said. “But in countries like Australia, there isn’t really that sort of market space where outdoor pollution is really bad.” Source : https://www.news.com.au/technology/gadgets/wearables/could-this-really-be-the-next-big-trend-in-health-tech/news-story/1fc8b8354171c1081b7681e50f636188

Some of the biggest and most famous tech companies are making big bets on health care. The blue chips of Silicon Valley have announced they’re interested in disrupting an industry that has bedeviled us with rising costs and inefficiencies for decades. I’d like to explore the why, what and how and leave us with a few thoughtful questions. Headlines are just part of the story Let’s peek at the headlines: Amazon is setting up a partnership with JPMorgan Chase and Berkshire Hathaway to create a non-profit healthcare company. Apple is planning a line of (surely sleek and minimalist) medical clinics. Google’s sibling under the umbrella company Alphabet, Verily, is looking at the Medicaid market. Uber wants to disrupt ambulances… and there are many more headlines that pop up almost daily that may be more creative than factual. It may be too early to start imagining a world where health care is truly owned by Big Tech — you order prescription drugs with your Amazon Prime account, see a nurse at the Apple Clinic, get your benefits statements from Google, and call an Uber instead of an ambulance when you need to go to the hospital. But something is happening here. The lure: big hairy problems The tech giants see a system rife with administrative inefficiencies, opaque prices, and customer dissatisfaction. In other words, a huge opportunity. Health care is incredibly backward in its use of information and consumer technologies and there are ample opportunities to improve patient care while reducing cost. Healthcare is a $3 trillion+ industry wrought with waste and middlemen. Two insurers, UnitedHealth Group and CVS Health, are among America’s largest firms by revenue, bringing in $200 billion and $185 billion respectively in 2017. That is more than any tech firm except Apple. (And an interesting note, shares in the two insurers fell by 4% on the news of the new Amazon-led health venture) They are riding a number of key industry trends More employers are self-insuring A rise in high deductible plans The explosion of administrative overhead A focus on consumerization Entering the health care market offers potential synergies with existing businesses They can start with a clean sheet of paper Ego – these are big hairy problems; the type Silicon Valley likes to solve Users/customers love them – how many people “love” their insurers The problems healthcare faces are too big, too important and much too personal to their users for them to ignore. Next generation health Imagine enabling capabilities that are common place in other industries, like price transparency, unified customer records and customer ratings of providers, ported to health care. Imagine applying telepresence and artificial intelligence to deal with physician shortages and improve access to care. Consumer technology companies are bringing analogous capabilities to other sectors of the economy that are long due for application to health care. Each tech company is taking its own approach, betting that its core business strengths could be leveraged to ultimately improve people’s health — or at least make health care more efficient. All five firms have secretive health-care skunk works, are hiring medical talent and are buying or backing external health-care startups. And reporters, market research firms, analysts and vendors are spending an undue amount of time speculating as to what’s really going on. Let’s take a look at each in a bit more detail… Apple Apple is leveraging its consumer products position to play in the healthcare market. Their approach is focused on hardware - using its popular iPhone and Apple Watch to turn its devices into trusted, secure channels through which medical data can flow, to help consumers better track and manage their health. Clinical Trials In 2015, Apple introduced new software, called Apple ResearchKit, for health researchers. Out of the gate, Stanford used it to develop an app to enroll volunteers in a heart study. In one day 11,000 people enrolled - more users in 24 hours than most medical studies find in a year. And the researchers were able to collect much more data than they could have otherwise. Millions of people around the world have already joined medical studies using this infrastructure. Diagnostics An app called mPower, built by Sage Bionetworks, studies Parkinson’s disease by getting iPhone users to perform tasks and measuring the tremor in their hands using the phone’s internal accelerometer. The data so far suggest that Apple’s platform may soon enable physicians to spot Parkinson’s digitally before it is symptomatic in a patient. We’ve known Apple to be developing a range of powerful health sensors since before the company introduced Apple Watch. In 2017, CNBC reported that Apple was quietly developing a non-invasive sensor to accurately determine glucose levels through the skin. Such a technology could work in conjunction with Apple's other physical monitoring systems to provide early screening. One could imagine both the phone and the watch to be powerful remote diagnostic platforms of the future. Health Records Apple is extending its reach into electronic health record technology. In January Apple announced its iPhone will include a feature called Health Records, which allow users to view, manage and share their medical records. Embedded in Apple’s Health app, the new feature will bring together medical data from participating hospitals and clinics, as well as from the iPhone itself, giving millions of Americans direct digital control of their own health information for the first time. By June more than 500 hospitals were connected to the Health Records app representing 50 health systems. This summer, Apple opened Health Records API to health IT innovators to enable them to create apps that utilize the data. Our industry responded in a very positive way, measuring their success against industry standards that we have struggled with for decades (per EHR Intelligence) 67% of surveyed health system executives said Apple Health Records will effectively empower patients to play a more active role in their own health and care management 58% said the EHR data viewer will help to improve interoperability. Primary Care In February, Apple launched a new subsidiary company tasked with providing healthcare clinics to Apple employees: AC Wellness. The idea makes sense; it can reduce running costs while leveraging the offer for future health insights. These moves mean Apple will have its own sandbox to test and deploy new products and solutions. And there’s plenty of speculation that Apple will eventually extend its new healthcare subsidiary to people outside of Apple. So let’s take inventory: software for medical research, new sensor technology that provides activity data and remote diagnostics, health records, medical clinics and a powerful soft asset – consumer trust. If information is power and the future of medicine is personal, ubiquitous and mobile, Apple should have a front row seat. By securely combining patient health data with sensor-based insight, a person will be empowered to manage and improve their health, and healthcare professionals will be able to access deep collections of related data to help improve treatment and diagnosis. Microsoft Microsoft, already a major supplier of software and cloud services, has also been ramping up its health business for several years. Between 2013 and 2017 Microsoft filed 73 patents related to healthcare, most of which focused on developing AI and patient monitoring capabilities. The company's work in healthcare has spanned cloud computing, cybersecurity and precision medicine. This year, the company announced an initiative, Healthcare NExT, to create products for medical providers and patients with the goal of accelerating healthcare innovation using artificial intelligence and cloud services. They are focused on creating strategic partnerships to develop a cross-company strategy for health care and life sciences innovation. In June they hired two industry veterans to build out the cloud initiative now formally known as Microsoft Healthcare: Jim Weinstein, the former CEO of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock health system joins as Head of Innovation and Health Equity Former Google Life Sciences (Verily) executive Joshua Mandel joins as its chief architect The NExT team is assembled to unlock the innovation potential in healthcare data. In the first strategic partnership for Healthcare NExT, Microsoft worked with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center to develop digital services intended to reduce drudgery for physicians and improve patients’ experiences. One project involves a virtual assistant that would take notes on conversations between a doctor and a patient, analyze the conversation and then send a summary to the patient’s electronic medical record. The medical center is also pilot-testing an app that notifies doctors when one of their patients has filled a prescription at a U.P.M.C. pharmacy. Their combination of AI, the cloud and industry expertise foreshadows a “21st Century House Call.” Google (more accurately, its umbrella enterprise, Alphabet) Investments and IP No other company in the Silicon Valley is investing so heavily in healthcare-related companies as Alphabet’s venture arm does. Since it raised its first fund in 2009, it has backed nearly 60 health-related enterprises. Their portfolio is very diverse ranging from genetics to telemedicine. Some of the more notable investments include 23andme, Oscar Health, and Doctor on Demand. If we look at patents to give us an inside picture, from 2013 to 2017, Alphabet filed 186 related to healthcare, mostly around AI and “smart” operating rooms. In general, Alphabet's healthcare investments and acquisitions tend to be more focused on AI than those of the other tech giants. It seems like a lot of well-placed investments for Alphabet, however, that’s only one side of the story. Verily Verily, formerly Google Life Sciences, was founded in 2015. Their cornerstone is Project Baseline, a longitudinal, data-collecting initiative with 10,000 volunteers, chartered with understanding what makes people healthy. Over the course of four years, in collaboration with Stanford and Duke, researchers will collect genetic data, blood samples, medical images, and other information from the study participants by using Verily’s own unique sensors. Participants will also be asked to use sleep sensors in their beds and to undergo mental health tests. Using data analytics and machine learning, researchers hope to understand health at a deeper level. AI and DeepMind Google fought off Facebook to acquire DeepMind in 2014; by that time, it was already operating as a successful A.I. platform – a very interesting story in its own right. With regards to healthcare, it is used to mine medical records to provide better and faster health services. Google DeepMind can process hundreds of thousands of medical information within minutes. There’s a 100-person division in London working on projects with the U.K.’s National Health Service. These include a mobile app to alert doctors and nurses to changes in a patient’s condition. The first potentially fatal condition DeepMind built an alert for was acute kidney injury (AKI); the mobile app is called Streams. Another project is trying to determine whether computers can analyze various kinds of medical imagery as well as experienced doctors. In collaboration with London’s Moorfields Eye Hospital, DeepMind is trying to see if AI can read retinal scans as well as resident experts. Research into such data-harvesting and machine learning is in its early phase, but Google appears to have the patience and capital to ride it out. Their aim is to help clinicians provide better, faster and safer care. To round out their strategy, Alphabet has a many notable collaborations – J&J, GSK and Fitbit are just a few. They are also playing in Silicon Valley’s quest for longevity through a company Larry Page formed in 2013 called Calico that is armed with a $1.3B budget. In February CNBC broke the news that Verily was in talks with insurers about jointly bidding for at risk contracts. And they incubated a startup called City Block that focuses on care for low income communities. In short, Google seems to be going after the healthcare space from every possible angle. If we think about their current model, what will it look like if we could “google” our environment. Could this translate into an intelligent AI that follows us through the day to help us on whatever healthcare journey we’re tracking to – a la the movie “Her?” Amazon Amazon has been less public about its plans in health, but its typical playbook is 1/invest in large, upfront fixed costs, 2/bring standardization to messy systems, 3/add transparency and a platform to distribute goods and services. Amazon not only has a robust logistics infrastructure but has net promoter scores that health care vendors would die for. Pharmacy For the past year, the e-commerce giant has been exploring the use of its logistical prowess to start selling drugs online. They recently acquired PillPack (and its 40,000 customers) for $1 billion. It’s a marriage made in heaven with PillPack’s supply chain, licenses in 50 states and automation. It instantly gives Amazon its own online pharmacy and is another step towards integrating medical supplies and pharmaceuticals into its platform and distribution. Investors in pharma supply chain didn’t react well to the announcement; it sent six related stocks plunging a collective $14.5 billion in market valuation on the announcement as fear of Amazon’s disruption set in. There’s lots of speculation on what this foundation can lead to: Retail pharmacies with same-day delivery PBM – starting with employers and small health plans Pharma manufacturing license – allowing them to repackage and sell under its own brand. Medicare/Medicaid Management One other play that is harder to decipher starts with Amazon’s announcement in March to cut its prime membership for Medicaid recipients by over 50% and CNBC’s announcement that it’s been talking potential collaborations with AARP since 2015. Amazon is well positioned to bring products and services into people’s homes – let’s extend it to healthcare. By adding health functionality to the new Echo that sports a camera, Amazon can hope to get coverage from carriers to help manage home care. This year there was job posting for a HIPAA compliance lead for the Alexa team. They are rounding out this scenario with key executive hires from the healthcare industry with expertise in primary care for Medicare patients. TPA Amazon realizes that they could significantly lower the costs of administrative services by solving interoperability. By turning the TPA business into an API layer Amazon can dramatically reduce the cost structure of the activities performed by a TPA. They’re likely to experiment internally first, before opening the services to the rest of the market (per Jacob Alcauskas from Superconductive Health). But what does this all mean? One theory is that Amazon will become an aggregator to create Amazon Healthcare Marketplace for a wholesale disruption of American Healthcare. The platform, after consolidating suppliers, would eventually attract health care providers (doctors, clinics and hospitals), eliminating a number of intermediaries. And yet, there are hurdles These are businesses with a proven history of disrupting existing business models - Amazon upended retail shopping by offering an unprecedented level of selection, price transparency, and convenience. But how easy will it actually be? Several of them have made efforts in the past and failed. Google started a health-records initiative in 2008, but shut it down by 2011, citing poor adoption. Microsoft made similar efforts with similarly low take-up. Earlier attempts by Google and Microsoft to offer patients a home for their digital records obliged people to consider whether they trusted the two companies enough; most decided the answer was no. The tech world has a mindset of “move fast and break things”. This works less well when it comes to health care. One could argue that health care isn’t anything like other parts of the economy. It operates in a highly regulatory environment. There are complex interactions between insurers, consumers, and health providers that you really don’t see in other industries. It’s governed by a tangled mix of payers, administrators, providers, and manufacturers. Not to mention the patients, all 330 million of us, who have never proven very good at treating health care like any other commodity. It rarely works for firms, trying to pick up wholesale and move to a new industry. So the complexity, the opacity, the sheer scale — not to mention the existing $3 trillion industry and its many vested players, who aren’t going to stand idly by while the tech wunderkinds supplant them — are standing in Silicon Valley’s way. Are you ready? All this activity is certainly worth watching. Because if any industry is in dire need of disruption, it’s American health care. At this juncture, how do we feel about the tech giants coming for healthcare? For me as a health plan, I feel challenged, a consumer excited and a patient hopeful. At GuideWell we’ve responded by truly putting the patient at the center and are approaching our solutions with a view of consumerism and a center of excellence charged with inculcating the consumer experience throughout our culture. How does it make you feel? Editor’s Note: Dr. Tamara StClaire is vice president of enterprise innovation at GuideWell. She recently presented this topic as a keynote at the Becker’s Hospital Review Health IT and Revenue Cycle Management conference in Chicago. Source : http://www.guidewell.com/blog/tech-giants-are-coming-healthcare

Pfizer has appointed a chief digital officer because of the growing importance of digital technology in R&D and business process, as part of a boardroom shake-up. Last week Pfizer announced that Ian Read is to step down as CEO, with chief operating officer Albert Bourla taking the helm. Following the change of leadership, Pfizer is also revamping its executive team, with the appointment of new chief digital and technology officer Lidia Fonseca the most notable change. Pfizer said she will be in charge of creating and implementing a “strategy that accelerates and improves the company’s digital capabilities.” Currently chief information officer at Quest Diagnostics, Fonseca will join Pfizer’s executive leadership team in January. Lidia Fonseca Fonseca previously served as senior vice president at Laboratory Corporation of America, executive vice president of global operations and technology at Synarc Incorporated, and was promoted through the ranks at Philips Healthcare. Pfizer is following the example of GlaxoSmithKline and Novartis, two big pharmas that have already appointed chief digital officers to transform R&D and relationships with customers. Last year Novartis unveiled Bertrand Bodson, formerly chief digital officer for Sainsbury’s Argos, as its first ever chief digital officer. This was shortly after GSK appointed Karenann Terrell, previously chief information officer at Walmart, to become its chief digital and technology officer. Other changes at Pfizer include Mikael Dolsten, who will assume oversight of the chief medical officer’s role. Angela Hwang will become group president of Pfizer’s innovative business, responsible for the entire portfolio of innovative medicines. Freda Lewis-Hall will assume a new role as Pfizer’s chief patient officer, advocating on behalf of all patients who rely on Pfizer’s new drugs. John Young, group president, and chief business officer, will assume a new role, responsible for strategy, business development, portfolio management and valuation activities. He will also cover business analytics, global commercial operations and patient and health impact, among others. Pfizer’s Consumer Healthcare business will also report to Young. New CEO Bourla said: “We are at a pivotal moment in Pfizer’s history, with Ian Read having positioned the company with a strong portfolio of marketed products, a deep pipeline and the clear potential to accelerate our revenue growth. “Given this opportunity to realize this accelerated growth potential, we are creating an executive team that has a proven record of success, an unwavering commitment to the patients we serve, and a clear value creation initiative. I look forward to working with these outstanding leaders to achieve the full potential of our pipeline and deliver our next stage of growth.” Source : https://pharmaphorum.com/news/pfizer-appoints-chief-digital-officer-in-boardroom-shakeup/