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Category: Health Tech

One Drop’s Minimally-Invasive Biosensor Is Coming (!) & It Nestles Into an Expansive Data Platform

By JESSICA DaMASSA, WTF HEALTH

There’s been a steady drip of announcements coming out of One Drop in recent months about their data capabilities (28 billion biometric data points to be exact), the predictive power of their platform (remember blood glucose predictions and blood pressure insights) and NOW a partnership deal with top-of-the-line smart device manufacturer, Withings. What is this all adding up to? How about some HUGE NEWS?! Rachel Yap Martens, One Drop’s SVP of Commercial Strategy, stops by with a big reveal about the cohesive strategy behind these moves, and how they are all leading to One Drop’s launch of a first-of-its-kind, minimally invasive BIOSENSOR that will bring “continuous health sensing” to the market in the next year or so.

Health tech die-hards will remember One Drop’s acquisition of Sano Intelligence’s sensor technology in April 2020, but that was only the beginning. That sensor tech has been evolved, adapted, and refined, and works by detecting analytes in the body’s interstitial fluid, which – if you look it up – holds important things like glucose, salt, fatty acids, calcium, potassium, magnesium and more. Jump ahead to the 15-minute mark in this interview if all you want to hear about is this, BUT word to the wise: the really compelling part of the sensor is how it will plug right into all the other biometric data collection points in the One Drop ecosystem. Says Rachel, the goal is to help One Drop members “to know what is happening with their bodies right now, to know what is going to happen to their bodies next, and to know how to take action.” Exciting interview!!

THCB Spotlights: Shahram Seyedin-Noor, GP of Civilization Ventures

Today, Matthew is back with another THCB Spotlight, this time with Shahram Seyedin-Noor, GP of Civilization Ventures. In this interview, Shahram tells us about how he got into venture and what he was doing before that, as well as his thinking around the focus of Civilization Ventures in catering to a new type of life science entrepreneur.

Digital Health Investor Larry Leisure’s Picks for the Next Hot Areas for Healthcare VC Investment

By JESSICA DaMASSA, WTF HEALTH

Digital health continues to gain a lot of attention from investors, so we’ve checked in with one to get some perspective on what’s hot (and what’s not) midway through the sector’s largest funding year yet. Larry Leisure, of Chicago Pacific Founders (whose enterprise health benefits company, Jiff, was acquired by Castlight Health) weighs in on the exuberance investors are showing for the health innovation space and whether or not it will last.

Are valuations and funding rounds a little overblown? Are investors concerned about some of the recent complaints of ‘digital health fatigue’ that employers and health plans are starting to vocalize as they wade through an expanding portfolio of point solutions? Larry brings us in on some of the closed-door conversations he’s had with payers and employers about the health tech startup scene, and how their thinking is starting to shift his own ideas about where to place his bets next. Healthcare navigators…care-plus-behavior-change platforms…underserved markets…the digital front door…the end of the per-member-per-month business model and SO MUCH MORE. Love getting a high-level look at the field of play!

THCB Spotlights: CJ Wilson, CEO of MyHealth.US

Today on THCB Spotlights, Matthew Holt interviews CJ Wilson, the CEO of MyHealth.US. MyHealth.US provides wearable QR codes for instant access to emergency health information, as well as a digital platform to track your health data and house medical records. CJ shows us some of their offerings and explains how they’re working with unions and schools in NYC along with the company’s future plans for funding and growth.

THCB Gang Episode 63 – Thurs July 22

Episode 62 of “The THCB Gang” was live-streamed on Thursday, July 22nd. Matthew Holt (@boltyboy) was joined by regulars: patient safety expert and all around wit Michael Millenson (@MLMillenson); fierce patient activist Casey Quinlan (@MightyCasey); and futurist Ian Morrison (@seccurve).

We got into it on delta variant, medical debt at $140bn, the NYPD vaccination rate being 20 points below the state average, diversity as structural problem in medical school and beyond, and whether we could give everyone in America concierge primary care (the numbers add up! Almost…)

Then video is below. If you’d rather listen, the audio is preserved as a weekly podcast available on our iTunes  & Spotify channels.

Next week #THCBGang is off on vacation!

Health Care Should Go (Micro) Nuclear

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By KIM BELLARD

I think of hospitals as the healthcare system’s nuclear power plants.  They’re both big, complex, expensive to build, beset with heavy regulatory burdens, consistently major components of their respective systems (healthcare and electric generation) yet declining in number.  Each is seen to offer benefits to many but also to pose unexpected risk to some.

Interestingly, there’s a “micro” trend for each, but aimed towards different ends.

Micro hospitals have been with us for several years.  They usually have only around ten beds, along with an emergency room, lab and imaging.  Dr. Tom Vo, CEO of Nutex Health, says: “We position ourselves between urgent care and a big hospital.”  A micro-hospital Chief Medical Officer admits: “We still partner with our larger hospital partners for patients who might require surgery or intensive care.” 

They’re not trying to reinvent hospitals so much as to support them and offer more convenience to patients.  Not so with micro reactors; they’re looking to revitalize their industry, which is in trouble.

According to the U.S. Energy Administration (E.I.A.), there are 94 U.S. nuclear reactors, at 56 nuclear power plants, in 28 states.  Only one new reactor has gone active in the U.S. since 1996, while almost two dozen are in various stages of decommissioning and only two new ones are under construction.  Overall, the U.S. gets about 20% of its power from nuclear reactors, while 13 countries get at least a quarter of their electricity from nuclear, with France leading the pack at 75%.     

We talk a lot about transitioning away from using fossil fuels to generate electric power, but none of the renewable options currently offers a realistic path towards replacing them.  Nuclear power is the proven alternative, but, as Dan Van Boom wrote in CNET, nuclear power has a PR problem.  No one wants a nuclear power plant in their backyard, no matter how big that backyard is.

Continue reading…

Matthew’s health care tidbits

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Each week I’ve been adding a brief tidbits section to the THCB Reader, our weekly newsletter that summarizes the best of THCB that week (Sign up here!). Then I had the brainwave to add them to the blog. They’re short and usually not too sweet! –Matthew Holt

In this week’s health care tidbits, Shannon Brownlee and her fellow rebels at the Lown Institute decided to have a bit of fun and compare which non-profit hospitals actually made up for the tax-breaks they got by providing more in community benefit. A bunch of hospitals you never heard of topped the list. What was more interesting was the hospitals that topped the inverse list, in that they gave way less in community benefit than they got in tax breaks. That list has a bunch of names on it you will have heard of!

Given how many of that list run sizable hedge funds and then do a little health care services on the side, perhaps it’s time to totally re-think our deference to these hospital system monopolies. And I don’t just mean making it harder for them to merge and raise prices as suggested by Biden’s recent Executive Order.

THCB Gang Episode 62 – Thurs July 15, 1pm PT- 4pm ET

Episode 62 of “The THCB Gang” will be live-streamed on Thursday, June 17th at 1pm PT -4PM ET. Matthew Holt (@boltyboy) will be joined by regulars futurist Jeff Goldsmith; policy expert consultant/author Rosemarie Day (@Rosemarie_Day1); Suntra Modern Recovery CEO JL Neptune (@JeanLucNeptune); and medical historian Mike Magee (@drmikemagee).

If you’d rather listen, the “audio only” version it is preserved as a weekly podcast available on our iTunes & Spotify channels a day or so after the episode — Matthew Holt

Meet Wheel: The Mysterious, White-Label Telehealth Startup Bolstering ‘Next-Gen’ Virtual Care

By JESSICA DaMASSA, WTF HEALTH

Stealthy telehealth startup Wheel just closed a $50M series B and CEO Michelle Davey is here to reveal the mystery behind the company’s very behind-the-scenes approach to selling white-label virtual care. The business model is built on a network of clinicians that Wheel has curated and credentialed specifically for virtual care delivery – for a rotating cast of clients, under any brand, at any time. Unlike the market-leading incumbent telehealth co’s that also sell virtual care infrastructure, Wheel does NOT have a patient front door, isn’t angling for one, and is so protective of its clients’ brands that Michelle won’t even name names about who her company is working with. She simply describes her clientele as those in the biz of “next gen” virtual care: retail players, care-plus-pharmacy-delivery startups, asynchronous care providers, labs, remote patient monitoring companies, and so on.

Wheel experienced 300% year-over-year growth — and 1200% growth from Q4-2020 to Q1-2021 — but is it sustainable as the pandemic wans and other plug-and-play telehealth infrastructure services also gain market traction and funding? And, what about the common criticism that telehealth is too transactional and that both patients AND physicians prefer the opportunity to build deeper relationships? Do providers really want to practice for multiple companies at the same time? We get a look inside Wheel’s 90% clinician retention rate to see what else might be satisfying the clinician’s need to connect, and talk about areas for growth now that the company’s received fresh funds.

THCB Gang Episode 61 – Thurs July 8

On Thursday’s #THCBGang Matthew Holt (@boltyboy) was joined by regulars, employer health expert Jennifer Benz (@jenbenz); patient safety expert and all around wit Michael Millenson (@MLMillenson); THCB regular writer Kim Bellard (@kimbbellard);  privacy expert and now entrepreneur Deven McGraw  (@HealthPrivacy); and–we were thrilled to have back–fierce patient activist Casey Quinlan (@MightyCasey). Lots of discussion about Casey’s latest patient experience as she continues to undergo the #METSparty.

If you’d rather listen than watch, the audio is preserved as a weekly podcast available on our iTunes & Spotify channels