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Watch Like Device for At-Risk Patients
DigitalDame writes "At-risk patients will soon have a little help from a device worn on the wrist that can measure vital signs including pulse rate, cardiac rhythm (ECG or EKG), and blood oxygen levels. It can either store the data and transmit it to a medical center at a later time or, in the case of an emergency, transmit the information in real time using the built-in cellular phone while sending an alarm to a caregiver."
Read that as at risk patents?
This sig all sigs devours
Under the thumbnail picture there is an arrow pointing at the picture encouraging the reader to enlarge the photo. Maybe they ought to point an arrow back at the inventors and tell them to reduce the size of the device. It is enormous compared to any typical wearable wristwatch.
For many years there have been watches that will track heartbeat. Runners and bicyclists have, for a long time, used these to their training advantage by tracking their physical exertion with these light, unobtrusive wristwatches. Granted, it didn't send realtime data to a server which was monitored by doctors, but it had its uses.
I think that increasing the ability of doctors to have access to such vital information is a huge step forward if it means reducing the number of cumbersome machines surrounding the patient in the hospital. So, it would great to have patients fitted with these in the waiting room so that their metabolic status can be monitored over the course of several minutes rather than just the few seconds before the doctor sees them.
Reduce the size and improve the styling, and you could have everyone who was concerned about their health wearing these. I'd do it, if I was so concerned.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
I'm surprised there wasn't something similar enough already -- it sounds essential.
I find the pricing to be the most curious: "The price will vary, Atzmon says, according to service packages and insurance coverage."
I can understand prices varying with costs. Buy why does the "insurance coverage" matter? Shouldn't the device cost whatever it costs, regardless of what insurance someone has?
The last time I bought something at the store, they didn't say, "oh, hey -- how much insurance do you have -- I need to know that so that I can price the bag of cereal you got."
Sounds like some in-your-face price discrimination.
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
So, I assume this device will be watching these patients vital signs?
I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself...
Daar is nie 'n lepel nie
Especially since it effectively calls the cops every time you look at porn.
Maybe people that ill should be in a hospital, not walking around in the streets?
You're missing the point: Let them out from hospitals. What worth is your life if you're to spend the rest of it in the hospital bed? These people prefer to risk their lives and spend some of their time with the family, outdoors, just living, instead of being stuck in hospitals. This device lowers the risk they are willing to take anyway.
I spent a month in hospital and I was going crazy from boredom. Now think of spending all your life there... A week outside is worth more than a year there.
Anagram("United States of America") == "Dine out, taste a Mac, fries"
Maybe people that ill should be in a hospital, not walking around in the streets?
The presumption being the patient is being denied sufficient attention? As someone with actual experience with real patients I can tell you that the reality is the patients would rather not spend years of their lives living out of a hospital due to some chronic condition. We have no end of drugs and therapy that enable people to continue living with serious conditions that would have killed them in the recent past. They live among you, one pill to the next, occasionally calling in EMTs to handle the more dramatic moments, and they want to spend no more time in a hospital than you.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
"Maybe people that ill should be in a hospital, not walking around in the streets?"
I don't see myself wearing one of these things, but I could, by certain definitions, be considered "at risk."
But I am not ill, per se. I do not even vaguely belong in a hospital. Think about people with severe allergies. Bee stings, peanuts, whatever. Perfectly healthy, but at high risk of going into anaphylactic shock. There are any number of other conditions which carry extreme risks, but which don't really count as illness and for which hospitalization would be a silly waste, both for them and for the hospital.
They're risk conditions. A walking emergency if you like. A chronic condition, but with no acute symptoms requiring actual direct intervention.
I do, on occasion, wear a data recording heart monitor wrist watch that works by radio telemetry, although it does not transmit to a remote location. I guess someone could aim a receiver at me to pick up the signals, but. . .
I'm absolutely clueless as to what use this data would be to the police, and I'm one of "privacy freaks" around here.
In any case, as this is medical data it is already privileged by law.
KFG
As a trainee cardiothoracic surgeon, I see patients in both the Intensive Care Unit and in the High Dependency Unit at our hospital...and I can't tell you the number of times alarms go off needlessly for such things as minor ECG changes and decreasing blood oxygen saturations.
Causes for alarms going off:
Patient takes a deeper breath than normal
Patient moves
Patient strains on the toilet
Patient has a shower
Patient's sensor falls off
Patient's fingers get cold
And any other innumerable causes for spurious alarms.
So how do we know if a patient is really sick? Simple - look at them!
This is precisely what can't be done with one of these remote monitoring devices - I looked into setting up a remote ECG monitoring system myself about 5 years ago but I can guarantee no cardiologist will want to be woken at 3am for false alarms.
So either this device will cost one hell or a lot to run (may even be cheaper to book yourself a room in hospital for the rest of your life) or have the alarms so insensitive that a lot of people die before this fails.
-Nano.