Digital Health Insights - 2015

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1/2015

1/2015

DIGITAL HEALTH DIGITAL HEALTH

INSIGHTS INSIGHTS

HEALTH TO GO The future of quantification Interview with John Nosta

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Measuring Health Interview with Peter Ohnemus

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A high-maintenance monster called diabetes (Scott K. Johnson)

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mySugr user experience

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Outlook

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About us

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Who am I in numbers? It is possible to measure and track all kinds of data. But what data gives us an insight to our health status? What kind of data is relevant for doctors and insurance companies? In this spring edition of the Digital Health Insights, we have invited founders and experts to discuss the medical relevance and urgency of data acquisition and analysis. Furthermore, true tracking champions share their stories of how a simple tool helps them deal with a chronic conditon every

day. The benefits, they say, are not in digitising paperwork, but in finding new, individual solutions that integrate easily into their daily life. For three weeks, I quantified myself, using the Withings Activité Pop. It comes in all kinds of colours, ranging from a neutral “wild sand” (the one I used, very elegant), to “bright azure”. I liked the stylish approach and I am a fan of smartwatches anyway, Every day I wear a wrist watch, but I do not carry my phone everywhere. So I am one of those people who prefer having a wearable to having your phone include all kinds of sensors and abilities. The Pop can potentially track activities such as walking, running and swimming, it monitors your sleep and it includes a vibrating alarm clock. It is connected to the Health Mate App via Bluetooth 4.0. So far, so good. The first couple of days, the smartwatch felt too big, but I soon got used to that. If you share your bed with another person, the silent alarm is one of the greatest inventions for couple’s sanity. Unfortunately, I never figured out, how to turn it off, neither on the watch (I do not think that is possible), nor in the app. But it always stopped at some point and I should not

complain about the watch’s intense enthusiasm to wake me up. On a normal day, one should take around 10.000 steps to lead a healthy life. The watch indicates your progress with a small display, showing a clockhand moving from 0% to 100% and resetting at midnight. If you hit a goal, for example more than 10.000 steps a day, you get rewarded with a badge in the app. These badges are neither truly beautiful, nor meaningful enough to show them off, but they made me prouder than I would want to admit. I had no problem in reaching the goal of 10.000 steps even though I have an office job. However, I am sure that I had never met this goal before I was wearing the Pop. The tracker made me more aware of how sedentary my day is and I tried squeezing in some extra steps. I was no longer too tired to go for a walk, or too lazy to take the steps - I wanted to move to hit my goals. This awareness has stayed with me even after I have stopped using the Pop. The Pop also helped discover why I never feel relaxed, no matter how long I sleep. Having the proof after every night, that my sleep pattern does not include long enough phases of deep sleep, motivated me to make some changes and care about my health. Before, I found many reasons why I could not sleep and tracking narrowed it down to an experiment. New blinds - one hour more of sleep; different cushion - half an hour less of sleep; relaxing music in the evening...and so on. It was fun to experiment and see immediate results. Results, which I did not feel yet, but that became apparent when I took a look at the app in the morning. There is only one point of criticism: the clock was always off. Laura Beyer, XLHEALTH

www.XLHEALTH.de/en

The future of quantification: Interview with John Nosta, Digital Health philosopher Which kind of data is most valuable for an individual’s health? Data has to be defined in the context of disease. If I am losing weight, then probably the most important parameter is my weight or my BMI. But if I am of normal weight and have a risk of cardiovascular disease, cholesterol is my most important parameter. Therefore, the ability to track data is maybe less important than to customise data to our needs. I believe that we will find, through big data, new unseen patterns that will emerge to give us fundamental insights into health and humanity.

If we look at someone with high blood pressure, for example, collecting blood pressure data may not be the answer to an improved health through tracking. However, by tracking this parameter, the person may come to the conclusion, that the high blood pressure is related to sleep.

or his walking pattern, limps, or falls. It is not the overt acquisition of data, but the passive acquisition of data that will be the standard; therefore we should not call it quantified self, but quantified life.

Data has to be defined in the context of disease

It is a new and an important step forward. I believe that we all have a condition called information overload. The condition impacts all the stakeholders in medicine and health, not only patients and caregivers, but also clinicians and the pressure to be current with data and health information is immense. It is almost impossible to keep up, so what choices do patients and clinicians have, but to step to an information source that is curated. One of the problems with information overload is, not only is it a tsunami of information, but how do you know if it is correct. For example dietary guidelines concerning food with cholesterol have just been changed. How do you keep up with this shift in nutrition? The information on the internet may be outdated, correct but not validated, or wrong, but articulated by someone in the position of authority.

In another example, a person might find that the constant migraine is related to nutrition. So what is the most important thing to track? It is defined by our clinical needs. New windows into the self will be opened and we will come to the startling revelation that what we think we should do may not be true. Will we see Digital Health solutions integrated in all areas of life?

About John Nosta John is a thinker entrenched in the world of science, medicine and innovation. He is also the founder of NOSTALAB - an amorphous, selforganizing neural network dedicated to the advancement of Digital Health. www.nostalab.com

www.XLHEALTH.de/en

Yes! The question is not if, but when. The emergence of sensors and passive data acquisition will become the standard. Take cars as an example. Modern cars have 70-100 sensors, which we do not notice and do not worry about. We have no sense of awareness until that check engine light is on. Digital Health can function as the check light for our body. Yet, I do not believe, that future data will be acquired through wearables or other portable sensors. Instead, passive collectors like your bathroom mirror, will track for temperature and an EKG, your toothbrush will scan for cavities, and toilets will be used for chemical analyses. And even carpets will be used to analyse gait, giving a signal to an emergency contact, when an elderly person suddenly changes her

What influence will the added health facts have on Google search?

We all have a condition called information overload At the moment, we experience a tradeoff between expertise and innovation. In a way, we know about trending topics, for example via twitter, but at the same time we do not know the depth of data and its value. I think it is

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