Tech-startups ruling the healthcare world in times of the pandemic

Aarthi N

On April 25, 2020, a government hospital in Ernakulam, in Kerala, deployed a robot named ‘KARMI-Bot’ to serve food and medicines to Covid-19 patients to minimise the need for health workers to meet the patients.  This robot was developed by ASIMOV Robotics, a company that is working under the Maker Village of Kerala startup mission.

With Covid-19 continuing to spread, many healthcare startups have come up with solutions, many of them driven by artificial intelligence, to overcome the limitations of conventional healthcare as people often hesitate to visit a hospital or meet a doctor.  Some of the startups offer apps for online consultation, easy monitoring of blood sugar, BP, oxygen level, voice sampling and wearable devices to detect Covid-19, maintaining patient records for doctors, the patient’s mental state, and speech-based interface, etc. Some of the products are so efficient that doctors have started to recommend patients to use them at home. 

Photo by Daniel Frank from Pexels

Startups bring innovation in health:

This pandemic has provided a platform for these health-tech startups to innovate and develop products that will ease the healthcare services that are provided in the country. With high opportunities for these startups, many companies and also individual college students are trying to bring in innovative methods to combat covid-19 as well as to monitor other chronic diseases.

With the improvement and a rise in technology, a lot of countries, including India has seen a definite growth in terms of technology-based healthcare startups to tackle the pandemic. For example, India was importing PPE kits and in about two months of time, because of various startups like Sure Safety based in Vadodara, 3D Usher, a design and manufacturing startup, among others, started making PPE kits and providing them to healthcare workers. And now, we are the second-largest producer of PPE in the world.

According to the Inc42 report, Indian healthcare market will reach $21 billion by 2025 with telemedicine and healthcare growth, which is only 3.3% of the total addressable healthcare market set to reach $638 billion in 2025.

Modern healthcare options using technology:

A lot of startups introduced a platform to help the healthcare system maintain the medical records of patients. This not only eased the job for the doctors, but it also provides automatic monitoring of patients even with the slightest symptoms. Roam Analytics is one such startup that is focusing on the modern healthcare system. They provide data management, patient mental states, obstacles to care, and much more which helps both the healthcare workers as well as patients.

Sense.ly is an Artificial Intelligence interface in the form of a patient assistant which facilitates a protracted and beneficial relationship with patients, especially those with chronic diseases who need long term remote care and monitoring. It employs machine learning to make suggestions for the patient’s treatment and much more. This chatbot-based platform also launched a customized web widget that features a speech-based interface that can help the patients, uses the risk algorithm based on the guidance of the UK’s National Health Service. It intends to reduce transmission risk by keeping the potentially infected people out of the hospitals, to provide digital screening and to collect broad and accurate data. This service has already been launched in Switzerland, Japan, the United Kingdom, and The United States, with over 1, 60, 000 uses till date.

Similar to Sensely, in India, BMC will start using a voice sampling method to diagnose covid-19. The AI-based voice sampling application is said to be introduced as a pilot project covering 1000 patients which will take the voice sample and compare with the patient suffering from covid-19 and provide the results in 30 seconds.  

Cloud-based technologies are in a raise too. “Time Study” is a venture which uses a cloud-based platform to track how physicians, researchers, and other healthcare workers are spending their time. More than 35 hospitals in the US rely on this medium to monitor their work.

Another such invention is “Droice Labs” which used NLU technology to find the patients’ digital health information from anywhere. This helps both the patient and the healthcare workers to monitor and track the patient’s health.

Also, various apps like Pulse Oximeter use the mobile camera to detect an individual’s pulse and oxygen levels from the fingerprint. They also track and record an individual’s heartbeat and blood oxygen levels. This helps people to check their oxygen levels at home without going to the hospitals.

Pulse Oximeter, a device, is also widely used in diagnosing and monitoring the covid-19 symptoms and this is used for screening at various places.

Telemedicine: 3x rise during the pandemic:

Telemedicine, a mode or practice of guiding the patients remotely with the doctor without being physically present with each other has provided a platform for the doctors and patients to consult, monitor, and provide medication through the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) via video calls. Major Telemedicine startups including Practo, mFine, myUpchar, Tattvan, etc., have witnessed three times jump with more number of users during this lockdown.

StepOne, a Telemedicine initiative which was initiated in Karnataka detects Covid-19 cases over phone calls.  This startup uses cloud telephony that allows callers to mention their symptoms and based on whether or not multiple symptoms were being reported by them, the system would signal whether or not the patient required having a doctor call them back. StepOne received Rs 25 lakh as funding from ACT Fund (Action Covid-19 Team) which is a collective of Venture Capitalists and Start-up founders, and Omidyar Network India.

A lot of healthcare startups are bringing in advancements by introducing various at-home facilities or apps that can detect a symptom or monitor one’s body without directly going to the hospital or consulting a doctor in person.  

Various other startups are also working on mental health too. “Ginger”, a San Francisco based startup which delivers evidence-based behavioral health coaching, therapy, and psychiatry through smartphones, raised a $50 million Series D funding round to expand its on-demand mental health services. A lot of fitness and wellness apps are rising and they are expected to reach $170 billion dollars by 2025 according to the news reports.

Though there are many innovative startups coming up, there are disadvantages too. Lack of regulatory guidelines and shortage of tech-based infrastructure in the country are the two main reasons for low funding in the healthcare industry. Before the pandemic, there were no proper guidelines with respect to the healthcare industry for startups to innovate. But on the day of the lockdown in March, the Indian government had provided certain guidelines to the telemedicine sector.

However, with the rise in Artificial Intelligence and various other technologies is expected to attract more investors to the sector.

Summary Points:

·        Recent innovations in healthcare startups

·        Telemedicine and its growth during this pandemic

·        Advancements introduced in the sector

·        AI, cloud-based technologies ruling the health-tech startups

Note: This article is written based on research and various news articles that I read online.