December 24th, 2011 by Felasfa Wodajo, M.D. in Interviews
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Orca Health has had quite a year. Launching their first app in in 2010, they now have a suite of ten apps with–we are promised–even more on the way. By combining stellar art work, three-dimensional interactive graphics and high-end native programming for the iPad, they have created and may well be en route to cornering the market for perioperative patient education apps.
Recent milestones for the company include winning the startup competition at Health 2.0 Europe, having two apps, EyeDecide & FootDecide, included in the iTunes App Store’s Apps for Healthcare Professionals. Until recently, Orca Health’s EyeDecide was ranked as the #1 downloaded free medical app on the App Store, and three other other apps (FaceDecide, BreastDecide & ENTDecide) are in the Top 25. To top it off, the iTunes App Store just included EyeDecide among the best the iPad / iPhone apps in its App Store Rewind 2011. It is interesting to think about the different places, and there are many, they could go from here.
Orca Health was among those selected for the StartUp Mobile Health Pavilion at the recent mHealth Summit (check out our full coverage), along with about two dozen other great mobile healthcare companies. There, I got to meet CEO & founder Matt Berry and publicist whiz Jake Lybbert (follow on Twitter). I talked with Matt about the (short) history and future of Orca Health, and his thoughts on the potential for tablets to improve the patient experience.
First, I have to ask – why the name Orca? Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at iMedicalApps*
December 9th, 2011 by Dr. Val Jones in News, Patient Interviews
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There aren’t too many grandmothers developing mobile health apps these days, but I met a charming one (Jill Campbell) at the mHealth Summit yesterday. Jill is a 60 year-old woman from Texas who has been actively concerned for the safety of herself and her daughter over the years.
“My daughter took a self-defense class,” Jill explained, “And she was taught the ‘fight or flight’ response to escape harm. I’m 60 years old. I’m not good at fighting and not very fast at fleeing. So what’s my third option?” Jill created the WatchMe 911 app to provide the solution.
“I first started thinking about a personal alarm system before smart phones even existed. I saw that there were car alarms and house alarms, and wondered why there weren’t personal alarms. At the time I imagined that the personal alarm would go through an answering service system, but since smart phones were created, it can all be tied together in an app format.”
Jill demonstrated the WatchMe 911 app to me during our interview. It contains features such as a panic button that can be armed in advance. Two taps on the smart phone screen and a circle of friends and 9-1-1 are contacted immediately with your GPS location and an alert message. The panic button is a favorite for women who are concerned for their safety when walking late at night or in dimly lit parking lots or alleys. Read more »
September 15th, 2011 by KerriSparling in News
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I’m not hooked on Apple products (I refuse to get an iPhone because I’m addicted to my Blackberry), but Chris and I do love that foolish iPad. And I love seeing apps for diabetes devices stocking the virtual shelves in the iTunes store. Makes me feel like we’re busting in to the mainstream, as a community.
Which is why I’m excited to see the first app from Dexcom. (And it’s free … as these apps should be, in my opinion.) While I’m hopeful that future apps include a way for the Dexcom receiver to transfer data to Mac products (because running parallels on my Mac is wicked annoying), this is a great start for people who are looking for introductory information on the Dexcom system. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Six Until Me.*
September 13th, 2011 by Iltifat Husain, M.D. in News
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Group Health, a Seattle, Washington based nonprofit healthcare organization has launched a medical app for their members that offers a wide variety of features — even allowing members to directly e-mail their physicians.
This should come as no surprise to those who have been following this revered Health Co-op. They have been featured by the NY Times, CNN, and other medical publications due to their innovative approach to patient care — such as embracing electronic medical records before everyone jumped on the bandwagon.
Some of the other interesting features this app will offer their patients: mobile access to medical records, which means a member can check their test results, making appointments, check immunization histories, view summaries of past visits, get routine care reminders and view their allergies and other health conditions.
Additionally, Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at iMedicalApps*
August 27th, 2011 by Iltifat Husain, M.D. in News
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Fujifilm Synapase Mobility is now available in the U.S., and not just on the iPhone, but for the Android and iPad as well. Fujifilm makes a variety of medical images devices, from ultrasound devices to computed radiology devices (x-rays).
If you use their backend server (Synapse PACS and Synapse RIS), you can now view your images on your mobile devices. What’s really interesting about their mobile suite is that it’s browser is independent, scalable, and doesn’t just display static images.
Currently the system isn’t FDA approved, but with the amount of business Fujifilm already has in the medical ecosystem, one would think this would happen sooner than later.
..It provides Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at iMedicalApps*