Digital Health Coffee Time Briefing ☕ 

Your morning summary of digital health news, information and events to know about if you want to be “in the know”.   

???? News 

???? Healthtech business Evergreen Life has been named Growth Award winner at the recent HealthTechX Summit in London. The HealthTechX awards honour emerging market leaders in the health technology sector that are using technology to advance healthcare and support patients, providers, payers, and pharma in delivering more efficient care for better outcomes. Evergreen Life uses digital solutions and AI to empower people to improve their health and lifestyle by connecting them with more effective, joined-up care through NHS primary and secondary care providers. 

???? Elsevier Health has launched a generative AI-driven version of its flagship clinical decision support tool, ClinicalKey, in partnership with AI company OpenEvidence. The latest add-on module offers core and new content in an advanced conversational search interface to help doctors more quickly find the information they need. ClinicalKey is used by thousands of health systems and medical schools globally. 

???? Butterfly Network, a medical device company focusing on imaging, launched its third-generation digital ultrasound in the US this month—and has significantly broader ambitions in fully remote patient monitoring and beyond in the coming years, reports Fast Company. Butterfly’s third-generation device (dubbed the iQ3) builds on its predecessors’ semiconductor chip-based technology to produce high-quality ultrasounds. Traditional ultrasounds rely on crystal-based technologies in their probes. The probes emit ultrasound waves transmitted into your body that bounce back, which are then used to create computer-generated images of your organs. 

???? Magentus, a global healthcare technology leader, has selected Google Cloud to develop generative AI (gen AI) solutions that help medical specialists safely maximise the value in their vast amounts of clinical data. Under the agreement, Magentus is building a centralised and secure foundation for customer data on Google Cloud, which will make it easier for clinicians to access the information they need quickly. Magentus will then help medical professionals leverage Google Cloud’s gen AI solutions and large-language models (LLMs) like Gemini and MedLM (a family of foundation models fine-tuned for the healthcare industry) to radically simplify how they extract insights from complex, often unstructured medical data – including clinical notes, observations, and other written records saved in multiple file formats. This will ultimately assist with patient diagnoses, treatments, and outcomes at scale.  

???? Royal Philips and Swedish magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) software solutions company Synthetic MR have announced the launch of Smart Quant Neuro 3D – which provides objective decision support for diagnosis and therapy assessment of brain disorders like multiple sclerosis (MS), traumatic brain injury (TBI), and dementia. Accurate measurement of the volume and distribution of different tissue types in the brain is important for diagnosing brain disease. However, visual assessments of MR images are often subjective, and lack the necessary accuracy while measuring tissue volume from 2D image slices is virtually impossible. Smart Quant Neuro 3D leverages the power of AI to provide fully verified automatic and precise 3D segmentation and volume measurement of brain tissue such as white matter, gray matter, cerebrospinal fluid, and myelin. When interpreted by a trained physician, these measurements can provide useful information in determining diagnosis for patients.

❓ Did you know that 

Clue, the female-led menstrual and reproductive health app, revealed shocking results from its recent survey of its members affected by endometriosis ahead of Endometriosis Awareness Month (March). The survey polled over 1,200 Clue members with endometriosis and found that 74% of respondents felt their symptoms were dismissed by healthcare providers, indicating a gap in diagnosis and support. In addition, 92% reported experiencing symptoms by the age of 30, but for 46% of respondents it took over five years to get diagnosed after first seeking help from their healthcare provider. However, almost 30% overall, and 40% of respondents under the age of 25, said Clue played a role in securing their diagnosis – demonstrating the value of cycle and symptom tracking. 

???? What we’re reading 

Healthcare technology innovation is poised to revolutionise the medical landscape. At the forefront of this transformation lies biological digital twin (bio digital twin) technology, which involves the replication of the human body in software models. Healthcare providers can use the models to test drugs and therapies with unprecedented speed and accuracy, reducing risks for both patients and physicians, CIO.com reports.  

???? This week’s events 

7-8 March, online – Nuffield Trust Summit 2024