According to Health Care Management Science, in the past research in medicine would take years to finalize but now with technology, treatments and diagnoses can be derived on a much shorter timeline – some even instantly – leading to more lives saved.
Digital technology can catalyse transformation of unsustainable healthcare systems into sustainable ones, level the relationship between medical professionals and patients, and provide cheaper, faster and more effective solutions for illnesses.
Now-antiquated processes of using paper filing systems to log patient records can now streamline their patient record systems by adopting the use of electronic health records. Devices and wearable technology have improved patient engagement and adherence. Virtual Reality is training surgeons, boosting their overall performance by 230% compared to their traditionally-trained counterparts.
Israel has become one of the top innovators shaping the future of the medical and healthcare ecosystem. According to a recent report by Start-Up Nation, investments in this sector grew by about 30% in 2016 to $183m, with over 70% invested into personal health tools and health analytics companies alone.
Some interesting Israeli companies in this sector include:
Inspira Technologies is an innovative medical technology company. Inspira develops a cost-effective minimally invasive Extracorporeal Respiratory Support technology (ECRS), which the company believes has the potential to utilize oxygen to rebalance patients’ saturation levels while they are awake. Inspira’s technology has the potential to prevent the need for mechanical ventilation.
Nanox Medical researches and develops breakthrough X-ray technology that generates unique monochromatic X-rays with very high fluency.
Novocure is an oncology company pioneering a novel therapy for solid tumors called Tumor Treating Fields, or TTFields. TTFields are low intensity, alternating electric fields within the intermediate frequency range. TTFields disrupt cell division through physical interactions with key molecules during mitosis. This non-invasive treatment targets solid tumors.
EarlySense has developed a contact-free monitoring system designed to improve outcomes and reduce risk for a range of patient populations. The system can be used by hospitals, healthcare organizations, integrated delivery networks, and rehabilitation centers, and to extend care to the home using remote patient monitoring.
The EarlySense system provides continuous touch-free monitoring of a patient’s heart rate, respiratory rate, and movement, enabling clinical teams to detect and address early signs of deterioration and exacerbation as well as the impact of therapies.
The system’s real-time delivery of actionable data, paired with its cloud-based data and data-science tools, provides a range of proactive insights to help clinical staff identify potentially critical situations as early as possible. In addition, the system can be integrated with traditional asynchronous remote patient monitoring to provide a new level of oversight and proactive insights.
OrCam Technologies has developed a wearable assistive technology device for people who are blind, visually impaired, or have reading or other disabilities.
OrCam’s MyEye communicates visual information by utilizing a small, intuitive smart camera that is mounted on the wearer’s eyeglass frames and connects to a pocket-sized computer. MyEye instantly and discreetly reads any text printed on any surface through a tiny speaker positioned toward the user’s ear. The device can also recognize faces and identify products and currency.
The company is currently developing MyMe, a thumb-sized device designed to clip on a shirt or hang from a dress like a pendant. MyMe’s facial recognition technology can match the face it sees with images from the wearer’s Facebook or contact list and then display that data on a paired device such as a smartphone or Apple Watch. Its battery lasts a full day on a charge.
The company has also developed OrCam Hear, an AI-driven wearable assistive technology device for people with hearing impairment. The device was named “Best of Innovation” for accessibility by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) at the CES 2020 Innovation Awards.
Israel Trade and Economic Commission in Sydney, Australia 