StartUp Health Blog

The StartUp Health Blog has moved! To catch up with our latest posts and stay up-to-date with us, please visit our new blog location here!

Last month, StartUp Health participated in an eHealth panel at the Biotech Showcase in San Francisco, along with Jack Young from Qualcomm, Ben Chodor from Happtique, and Eric Elenko from PureTech Ventures. Check out the free webcast now!

Learn to Navigate the NY Health Tech Landscape

Join StartUp Health’s Steven Krein on Tuesday, February 19 from 6:00 to 8:30pm EDT for a NY Social Media Week panel: Navigating the Funding and Resources of Health Tech Innovation in New York. Meet and learn from StartUp Health, New York Digital Health Accelerator, Health 2.0, Partnership for New York City Fund, Blueprint Health, and NY eHealth as they discuss the wide variety of financial, mentorship, and infrastructure support resources available in NY to enable promising eHealth startup companies. Learn more & register here!

Healthy Living: How Behavior & Patients Can Fix Healthcare 

Attend a special NY Social Media Week session on Thursday, February 21 from noon to 1:30pm EDT, moderated by GigaOm’s Ki Mae Heussner and featuring Dr. Jay Parkinson of Sherpaa, Derek Flanzraich of Greatist, and Unity Stoakes of StartUp Health. Discussion topic: How Behavior and Patients Can Fix Healthcare. New technologies allowing for quantified-self and the wider reach of social media have presented new options for health, but how are these best applied and do they really work for the wide array of patients that exist? Sharing more personal data with the institutions, experts, and with other people via social technology is enlightening or even fun, but will it allow for innovations shaping the medicine of tomorrow? At the root of these discussions, it seems clear that the patient will be the one to ultimately lead change and improvements to the cost, access, and quality of healthcare. Learn more & register here!

Are you a creative designer or developer who wants to change the world? Start with New York! 20 million New Yorkers are anxious to have access to their health records – the New York eHealth Collaborative is building the infrastructure and platform and they want you to create an incredible user experience!

In partnership with Health 2.0, they’ve launched the Patient Portal for New Yorkers Design Challenge to invite designers and developers to submit prototypes for a secure portal that will present patients with their individual PHR while educating them about health data privacy rights. Developers have a chance to win $25,000 in prizes, connect with healthcare leaders and investors, and help 20 million New Yorkers be more informed about their health.

When the submission period for the Design Challenge ends on April 11, 2013, all New Yorkers will be invited to vote on the best design prototypes from April 11-21. This competition is an opportunity for developers and designers to contribute to a tremendous cause that can positively impact millions. 

To learn more about this unique initiative and view details on how to submit a prototype, please visit: http://www.health2con.com/devchallenge/new-york-state-patient-portal-challenge/

See more on GigaOM: Health tech’s monthly checkup

And on StartUp Health Insights

10 Questions with…

Alan Blaustein, Founder & CEO, CarePlanners
StartUp Health Academy Healthcare Transformer

Alan’s passion for healthcare solutions began with his thymic cancer diagnosis in 2005. Frustrated with the limited resources available to effectively navigate the healthcare system, he leaned on his longtime friend Dr. Nancy Snyderman, NBC’s Chief Medical Editor, for support. After Alan’s recovery, the friends realized there was a need for a service to help patients and caregivers make better decisions amid the healthcare system’s many complexities. In June 2012, they launched CarePlanners (@careplanners) to provide patient and caregiver navigation, coordination and organization solutions through a nationwide team of healthcare experts (e.g. – registered nurses, social workers, Medicare experts, insurance and billing specialists, and other healthcare advocates) and a sophisticated set of online decision-making support tools. CarePlanners is headquartered in New York City. Alan, an attorney to the burgeoning Internet marketplace in the late 1990s, was also one of the Internet’s earliest entrepreneurs, holding senior leadership positions at About, Flexplay, and OpenSky.
                                         

Describe your company in 140 characters or less.

Patient and caregiver concierge service to help them be more confident in their ongoing dealings with the healthcare system.

Why are you passionate about transforming health tech?

Because I was a patient and experienced first hand how impossible it is to navigate the healthcare system; you spend more time dealing with doctors, employers, insurance companies, prescriptions, hospitals, and everything else than you do healing and getting better.  We all need help. 

Professions have developed around other complex systems.  You turn to your lawyer for legal issues.  You turn to your accountant for tax issues.  Now you turn to CarePlanners for healthcare challenges facing yourself or your loved ones.

What was your biggest “a-ha!” moment?

When I realized everyone in the healthcare system is as confused as I am. There’s not a single one of us who doesn’t think the healthcare system is incredibly inefficient — which creates great opportunities for entrepreneurs and people who want to approach the challenge differently.

What is one piece of advice you’d like to share with other entrepreneurs?

Trust your gut, but surround yourself with advisors and team members who have been through it before.   

What is your super power?

Getting businesses and people from point A to point B; I view building as a series of steps that require a really good project manager.  

Who inspires you?

Anyone who is passionate about what they do.

What innovation will transform healthcare most in the next 24 months and why?

True coordination of care — it is the only thing that can truly improve outcomes and reduce cost. And our system is not set up in any way, shape or form to yet allow this to happen (yes, the ACA points us in this direction but it will be years before healthcare consumers really feel the benefits).

What is your mantra?

If my three kids are not proud of what I did in a given day, then I did not have a good day — it is a very simple litmus test that governs everything we do.

What do you do for fun?

My kids.

Answer a question you wish we had asked.

Hazel.

Learn more about Alan and CarePlanners and follow them on Twitter: @careplanners.

The shift towards team-based healthcare is giving rise to a large group of professionals sometimes called “healthcare extenders.” On the front lines of healthcare, these non-MD professionals work with and on behalf of patients. Their fast-growing numbers include nurses, nurse practitioners, health educators, registered dietitians, certified diabetes educators, and social workers.

HealthEd Academy asked 155 of these non-MD healthcare extender professionals how they are using technology to educate patients. Some interesting trends to note:  

• • The majority of healthcare extenders refer patients to credible websites.
• • Two thirds of healthcare extenders have a smartphone, but only a quarter of them use their smartphone to interact with patients.
• • 3 of every 10 healthcare extenders have a tablet (higher than the overall US population), and 2 of these 3 people uses a tablet for interacting with patients. Of the remaining 7 out of 10, all but 1 wish they had a tablet to interact with patients.
• • 77% of healthcare extenders who use apps report that technology improves the quality of their interactions with patients.

For more information, visit HealthEd Academy and download their full report.

February 19, 2013 | 6:30 – 8:30pm

Calling all startups! Join StartUp Health’s Steven Krein on Tuesday, February 19, for a NY Social Media Week panel: Navigating the Funding and Resources of Health Tech Innovation in New York. Hear from organizations including StartUp Health, New York Digital Health Accelerator, Health 2.0, Partnership for New York City Fund, Blueprint Health, and NY eHealth as they discuss the wide variety of financial, mentorship, and infrastructure support resources available in NY to enable promising eHealth startup companies.

Learn more: http://socialmediaweek.org/newyork/events/?id=54480#.URATGGdp6Sq