Boomers:Healthcare Technology

Voluntary - and fun!- ubiquitous monitoring: new uses for that cell phone.

Last night I attended Connected Healthcare: The $34 Billion Dollar Market, an event sponsored by SmartSilvers Alliance (Leveraging technology to foster active aging TM") The evening ended too soon: speaker and panelists could easily have presented much more on this compelling topic to the packed room.

The intro by moderator Richard Adler effectively framed the evening, harkening back to the 3 pound, $3999.00 "first mobile phone" created in 1983 by Martin Cooper, and citing present day penetration of cell phones in Italy at 108% (see my earlier blog entry on cell phones as a fashion accessory).
The sharpest dividing line between the generations is the proclivity to use one's mobile phone to receive or send "text messages."
Who besides me is wondering why in heavens name the advances in voice recognition are being ignored in favor of keyboards for those with tiny fingers and stacatto prose??

Featured speaker Donald Jones VP Business Dev/Qualcomm (who has recently added the founding of Wireless Life Science Alliance to his list of accomplishments) touted a myriad of new uses for mobile phone chip sets, ranging from "smart bandaids" (peel and stick disposable sensors) to sensor-wear for health and fitness. {Phillips is currently testing a "heart attack detector" in Singapore.....}

Citing that administrative costs claim 35 % of every healthcare dollar, Jones emphasized breaking institutional resistance to "patient monitoring". In virtually the same breathe, in order to "sell" these monitoring devices the speaker exhorted UI folks to create a user experience that promoted:
*peace of mind (trust)
*guilt reduction
*hope
*fun
The trick is getting the INSURANCE folks to reimburse for devices and convincing CONSUMERS that such devices REALLY assist them in self-care. (or is a placebo effect enough, say, for peace of mind/hope and fun?)....Disappointingly skimpy data on effectiveness was presented. A hopeful hint was interjected by Peter Borland of BeWellMobile.com regarding asthma related emergency management reports
One practicing medical doctor in attendance cited the superabundance of data as not being helpful to the physician in patient care. A panel member responded that data analysis systems that "pre-analyze" monitoring data is a money maker http://www.visicu.com.

The ubiquitous chip set promise does not shine equally bright. A cameraphone application wherein the user "photographs" their intended meal back to a subscription service that records and reports their "caloric consumption" seems to reduce the user to a gullible and dull witted automaton with more gadgets than good sense. Lest we think the entertainment and media industries are gonna stop at pictures of pizza in blog after blog, there are, not suprisingly, a surfeit of new gamesdesigned for continuous play. [Prompting an audience member to inquire "when are we gonna solve dropped calls?"...].
The haunting social issues of more data but less human contact is a shadow behind the growing panoply of monitoring devices.

Back to text messaging ---the "reach out and text someone" was reported to have worked in a "quit smoking" campaign in New Zealand- quitters who received at least 6 text messages per day of "support" had a greater chance of being stopped 6 months later.
As one who saw Sleeping Beauty in a Drive In movie in upstate New York (wearing my one-piece yellow flannel pyjama- with- non-skid-bottom- feet): I want to pre-pay for text-support........
"cellphone cellphone
from the mall,
who's the fairest of them alll?????"