Note: I had stopped writing posts in 2017. Started again in late-2024, mostly for AI.
ZocDoc is a free service that allows patients to book Doctor appointments online in New York City. It started in September 2007 as a service to help people find and make dentist appointments in NYC, and has now includes other specialties too (like primary care, dermatologist, ENT, ortho, OB/GYN, allergist, podiatrist, etc.) Patients get to use the site for free- looking up physicians that...
While the conventionalists argue otherwise, there is some truth to the fact that plenty of health conditions can be taken care of without actually seeing the patient in-person. Based on that assumption, AmericanWell offers an interactive service that lets patients talk to a physician in real time, anytime. The service went live in January this year and initially focusing on Hawaii. The basic...
PharmaSurveyor is a free service that analyzes your medications to point out potential drug interaction and side-effect risks. It was founded in 2006 by Linda and Erick Von Schweber to commercialize the 'knowledge surveying' technology they have developed over the last 25 years or so. Given the fact that Adverse Drug Effects (ADE) are one of the leading cause of death in the US, there is...
As I mentioned previously, the hype of personalized medicine is breeding a new industry-direct to consumer (DTC) Genetic Testing. These companies offer to test, analyze and store your genetic information for you. Navigenics entered this arena in April'08, with some stellar credentials in terms of team, funding (KPCB, Sequoia among others) and collaborations (Mayo, Partners, Duke, Scripps,...
Consumerism is on the rise in healthcare, and MyMedLab brings that trend to the Lab testing space. With their service users can self-order wellness lab exams online and walk-in to the lab nearest to their zip code. Note that this doesn't include all possible lab tests, but only the subset that don't require direct physician order. The price they charge includes collection fee for sample draw,...
Good ideas are always simple. I'm really optimistic about the emerging simple tools that let consumers manage, monitor or understand their health issues better. ZeaLOG is a simple tracker that lets you measure anything, and report off it. The service seems pretty new and driven by a team of one, so there are some rough edges here and there. Most of the ZeaLOGs started are around profound topics...
Healthcare applications of Twitter keep surfacing everyday. Qwitter (not to be confused with another application by the same name that tracks people who stop following you on twitter) is a smoking-cessation tool built by the Florida Department of Health under a 2008 campaign called 'Tobacco Free Florida'. It works like this- you tweet the number of cigarettes you smoked to @iquit <number>...
Pittsburgh-based BodyMedia makes personal monitoring devices that can help consumers keep track of their physical activity and nutrition. Their products and accessories contain innovative sensors that measure physiological data like heart rate, body temperature, calories burnt, sleep duration, etc . The collected data is then interpreted online to help wearers aim for and monitor a balanced,...
TrialX.org is an fantastic example of how the web enables linking specific demand with relevant supply. The services matches users (patients, affected individuals) to ongoing clinical trials using their submitted personal health information. What a great startup idea. Service demand can be tapped easily since users are searching the web for highly specific keywords (almost all include the...
LifeShirt is a wearable 'smart fabric' that can be used to remotely monitor multiple vital signs. It is made by VivoMetrics, a Ventura, CA based startup founded in 1999. From what I can gather, LifeShirt captures data around heart rate, respiration, posture, activity level, temperature, limb II ECG and can connect to optional peripheral devices for EEG, skin temperature, blood oxygen saturation,...