February is Healthcare Startup month, so let’s talk about some great startups.
As we often say here at Singola, healthcare should be about putting the patient at the center of every decision made. This week, we want to highlight new companies that follow our golden rule and work to make healthcare better for patients.
It’s a well-known problem that patients have a high chance of contracting diseases in a hospital, just as it’s well known that by washing their hands frequently, care providers can cut down that chance. Swipe Sense automatically monitors how often healthcare workers practice proper hygiene through contact between their personnel badges and soap dispensers located throughout the hospital. The technology checks both individual and unit compliance and make suggestions for improvement. This simple idea can lower rates of hospital-acquired infections and make patient visits that much safer.
Another company makes healthcare better for patients by allowing them to easily and quickly provide feedback about their healthcare experiences directly from their mobile phones. Rate My Hospital then takes that feedback and analyzes it so that hospitals can quickly offer service improvement or allocate resources differently. After all, what good is patient feedback if a hospital does nothing with the information?
Other startup companies take their cues from social networking by opting to provide extreme convenient for healthcare consumers and make it easier to engage online communities or use new health technology like wearable devices. Omada Health offers what it calls “digital therapeutics,” behavioral medicine that is designed to foster specific healthy habits in consumers that will lower their risk for preventable diseases.
We could go on and on and on. New consumer-facing companies form every day, and we know they will improve the state of healthcare. The exciting part will be watching them grow.
Think we missed a new company to watch? Find us on Twitter to tell us about them and why you think they’re worth watching.