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One Startup is Using Phone Calls and Other Inexpensive Means To Save TB Patients (microsoft.com)
Tuberculosis (TB) is one of most common causes of death globally. In 2016 alone, more than 10.4 million people fell sick to TB and 1.7 million TB-related deaths were reported. The WHO says India, in particular, and developing markets, in general, lead the count for the occurrence of TB in the world even as the local authorities provide free and effective medications to anyone who is ill. From a report: "One of the biggest barriers to recovery from TB is medication adherence," explains Microsoft Researcher Bill Thies, who is also the Chairman and Co-founder of Everwell Health Solutions, a Bangalore-based healthcare start-up. "Patients have to take daily drugs for a full six months, or else they do not fully recover, and are at risk of developing drug resistance. While medication adherence might sound like a simple problem, it turns out to be an enormously complex and heavily studied multi-disciplinary problem. If patients start feeling better after a few weeks, how can we convince them to take toxic drugs for another five months -- especially if patients have little or no understanding of germs and antibiotic resistance?"
The popular recommended practice to ensure medication adherence is Directly Observed Treatment or DOTS, which involves the patients going to a healthcare centre where they ingest the medication in front of a health worker. As it was implemented at the start of their work, patients needed to visit the centre three times per week for the first two months and once a week for the remaining four months. The system involves an unnecessary burden on the patients, who are typically from low-income groups -- every visit means travel expense and loss of work. There are ways to ensure that a patient has taken medication on time -- we have things like smart pills, and you can send texts to people to remind them about the pills -- but in places like India, these solutions are beyond the reach of people. So in 2013, Thies and his colleagues, along with Microsoft Research Program Manager and TEM collaborator, started a project called 99DOTS to explore if any low-cost tech solution could be employed. They did find one, and it involves making a "missed call" to people. Here's the fascinating story of what happened next.
The popular recommended practice to ensure medication adherence is Directly Observed Treatment or DOTS, which involves the patients going to a healthcare centre where they ingest the medication in front of a health worker. As it was implemented at the start of their work, patients needed to visit the centre three times per week for the first two months and once a week for the remaining four months. The system involves an unnecessary burden on the patients, who are typically from low-income groups -- every visit means travel expense and loss of work. There are ways to ensure that a patient has taken medication on time -- we have things like smart pills, and you can send texts to people to remind them about the pills -- but in places like India, these solutions are beyond the reach of people. So in 2013, Thies and his colleagues, along with Microsoft Research Program Manager and TEM collaborator, started a project called 99DOTS to explore if any low-cost tech solution could be employed. They did find one, and it involves making a "missed call" to people. Here's the fascinating story of what happened next.
For those who read the summary and not TFA, the solution ultimately involves putting a toll-free phone number where you have to open each pill to read it and having the patients call that number for free to confirm they took their pill, otherwise someone follows-up with them. Cheaper than having the patients have to come somewhere to get their pills on a schedule from someone who records they took it.
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
It was her turn! Also, use a fucking timer OP shit.
On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
And yet Trump will die in prison. Sad? Sad! :D
"developing markets, in general, lead the count for the occurrence of TV."
I am disgusted by the thought of developing TV
Don’t you dare to use that type of bait links *ever* again!
This is a solved problem. Just add a little Morphine into their pills, and they'll be SURE to finish every single one. In fact, they'll be begging for more!
Seriously though, the pills can come in daily blister packs (like contraceptive pills), and the Morphine dosage can gradually reduce so they'll no longer be addicted by the end.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
"..especially if patients have little or no understanding of germs and antibiotic resistance" - surely this is the biggest problem that needs solved. prevention being better than a cure, after all.
"Hillary for KKK President!"
Trump will win that too.
At first I read Tera Bytes... and I thought these phones are not iPhones...
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
Why not have pills INCLUDE something to make people feel back. Chemotherapy is not as bad today but it used to be a horrible experience people just suffered thru because they had to do so to possibly get better. People did it despite it not being a sure thing.
I see nothing wrong with having the treatment cost in some suffering and not tell the general public... even if they find out, you will also find out that you will not be cured if you stop taking the drugs early.
Addiction drugs actually make the most sense but only if you have a better way to avoid a serious addiction than we have today. Less extreme drugs exist which could be used. Caffeine is pretty harmless and quite addicting... the users are likely stuck on coffee already. (combine it with advice you can't drink coffee with the medication.)
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For /. Users of a certain age who remember payphones will remember this way of making free calls that transmitted information. Need a ride home from the movies? Call home, hang up after two rings. Get dime back from pay phone and ride shows up. An older variant was, IIRC, to send a postcard with postage due since you could read the card and then mark return to sender, who would know you got it. People were hacking messaging long before cell phones.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Consumption be done about it? Of cough, of cough.
It's not the cough that carries you off. It's the coffin they carry you off in.
I'm surprised to hear phone calls are cheap. Every doctor's office I've been to lately has replaced their phone system with an automated one. Usually I get reminders via text message, and am rarely able to talk to a person. Apparently receptionists are too expensive.
I've been looking for a new doctor with a real receptionist, apparently they are going extinct.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
India, in particular, and developing markets, in general ...
When the phrase "developing markets" is used to describe the context for a story about a health crisis, then you know the corporatists are winning. Yeah, I know, it's 'just a turn of phrase' - but consider the implications, then ask yourself if you even stopped to question the wording while you were reading TFS.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.