Part 2, THE GLOBAL SICKCARE SYSTEM

In part 1, we met Dr. Arlen Meyers, President and CEO at the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs and Director, University of Colorado CITI Digital Health Consortium.  He is a practicing surgeon and otolaryngologist, professor, and entrepreneur.   We met over social media as a result of reading his comments on physicians’ use of Electronic Medical Records.  He wrote “1.  Show up for the patient appointment on time.  2.  Sit down and talk to the patient.   3. Avoid using the EMR as much as possible.”

He believes that healthcare incentives should be directed more toward the consumer and understands why admission to hospital can be seen as a failure of the healthcare system.

We left off part 1 with a look into the future of healthcare devices,  including a machine diagnosis.  “As technology helps us get smarter in making more predictive diagnoses, the computer can connect the dots better than I can.  So, what is there left for me to do when it comes to diagnoses?”

Start Part 2, The Global Sickcare System

It is a bit scary when coming out of a care model (Dr. Meyers would say sickcare model) where the doctor looks you in the eyes and declares, It’s gas.  We discussed a case like hypertension.  If a watch tracks and trends blood pressure, a contact lens tracks a blood panel, add screening questions with a mobile app similar to those from one of my previous post, where does the doctor fall into making the diagnosis?  Will charges for tests be acceptable when a medical lab device returns the same results and with the same accuracy as a wearable device?  Am I comfortable with that?  Will device manufacturers start buying up wearable device companies?

Dr. Meyers, Society of Physician Entrepreneurs at Tie Rockies,

with Permission of SOPE, http://youtu.be/0FzV-pwl1z8

Remember, that’s really not the prime use for the data.  Dr. Meyers says that a prime use of the information is for the consumer to do something to prevent the condition or early detection and receive a monetary reward for doing so.  In this new ecosystem, depending on how it shakes out, I may be able to live with that cash rebate.

Dr. Meyers seeks to promote finding answers through with SOPE.  “To provide resources and advice for those who want to bring such innovations to the patient.... Our vision is to close global health disparities. Our mission is to help anyone interested in getting an idea to a patient by offering education, resources, and networks.

"SOPE was born out of anger because this needed to be done. In  my professional career, I had been involved in technology commercialization and got so frustrated with the lack of resources to do it properly that I decided with a couple of others to create something to do it myself.  Me and others created SOPE because no one else was doing it and it needed to be done.  It filled a gap.  Everyone had a good idea but no one knew what to do with it.  So we created a place.

"We are a not-for-profit global biomedical and healthcare innovation network.  You do not have to be a doctor to be a member of SOPE.  The thing that holds everything together is that everyone in the organization has an interest in getting an idea to a patient or helping someone get an idea to a patient.   We are everything from ideation to terminal deployment.  We do not do it.  We are a sandbox. We put everyone in the same place and let good things happen.  But we provide them with the education, resource, and networks.

"We are growing in dues paying members at a rate of 100 persons each month.  Our audience numbers in the tens of thousands. Our dues are only $50US per year.  We keep it ridiculously cheap to encourage people to participate.  We feel that we offer a fairly compelling value proposition.  We want to engage as many people as possible and yet sustain the organization.”

“So if a person has an idea, what should be the first thing to do?”

“Join SOPE at http://www.sopenet.org.”

“And what happens after that?"

“They have to go through a series of steps in the life science innovation roadmap. That involves fairly clear steps in getting an idea to market. Whether the idea is drugs, devices, diagnostics, digital health, care delivery innovation.  It depends on the idea.  It depends on following those steps to get to the next success factor before you can move on to the next.  Whether you need a mentor or to pay someone to commercialize your idea, you can do that.  SOPE is not the place where a person hands off an idea to just expect checks in the mail.  This is a very hands-on experience.”