BD, a leading global medical technology company, announced that it received approval for a pre-market approval (PMA) supplement from the U.S. FDA for an expanded version of its BD Onclarity™ HPV Assay. The PMA supplement includes the expansion for genotype reporting beyond HPV genotypes 16, 18, and 45 to include types 31, 51, 52, 33/58, 35/39/68, and 56/59/66 genotypes making the BD Onclarity™ HPV Assay the only FDA-approved assay to individually identify and report these genotype results.

The value of extended genotyping for cervical cancer screening and triage has been reported from large clinical studies since 2015.^1-8 Additionally, the need for expanded HPV genotyping for cervical screening has been recognized since 2016.⁹ In many cases, the reporting of HPV genotypes with the screening test result could improve risk stratification and support risk-based patient management. The April 2020 publication of the ASCCP risk-based management consensus guidelines anticipated that extended genotyping would be introduced soon.¹⁰

“BD Onclarity™ extended genotyping is data-driven precision medicine at its best, helping us effectively and efficiently manage our patients,” said Mark H. Stoler, MD Professor Emeritus of Pathology, University of Virginia Health System. Contemporary management of women with abnormal cervical cancer screening results demands an assessment of their risk of pre-cancer. An abundance of recent science clearly shows that knowing the HPV genotype of the patient provides excellent differential stratification of those risks.”^1,4-8,11-13

“It is well known that different HPV genotypes carry different risk of cervical cancer, and without the specific knowledge of the HPV genotype in a screening sample many women will be over-treated needlessly,” said Jesper Bonde, PhD, Senior Researcher and Molecular Pathology Laboratory Manager, Hvidovre Hospital, Denmark.¹² “Screening strategies that employ HPV tests with simultaneous genotyping offer a simple way to improve cervical cancer screening to the benefit of the woman and health care providers by allowing risk stratification already on the screening sample.

The reporting of HPV genotypes with the screening tests and surveillance tests will facilitate same-genotype persistence tracking and risk-based management. A recent systematic review by Bottari et al concluded that, “evaluation of the HPV genotype persistence may represent a valid option to monitor patients treated for CIN 2+ lesions, because relapses were detected only in patients with persistence of the same genotype detected at baseline.”^11,13-15

“With this FDA approval, BD can now offer laboratories, clinicians and patients access to critical information in screening for cervical cancer in the United States and other countries recognizing the PMA supplement or CE mark,” said Dave Hickey, president, Integrated Diagnostic Solutions at BD. “Our goal is to continue the global fight towards eliminating diseases and associated deaths due to cervical cancer with our comprehensive diagnostic solutions.”

About BD

BD is one of the largest global medical technology companies in the world and is advancing the world of health by improving medical discovery, diagnostics and the delivery of care. The company supports the heroes on the frontlines of healthcare by developing innovative technology, services and solutions that help advance both clinical therapy for patients and clinical process for healthcare providers. BD and its 65,000 employees have a passion and commitment to help enhance the safety and efficiency of clinicians’ care delivery process, enable laboratory scientists to accurately detect disease and advance researchers’ capabilities to develop the next generation of diagnostics and therapeutics. BD has a presence in virtually every country and partners with organizations around the world to address some of the most challenging global health issues. By working in close collaboration with customers, BD can help enhance outcomes, lower costs, increase efficiencies, improve safety and expand access to healthcare.

Mental health conditions often are under-diagnosed and under-treated. Screening for conditions in the primary care space can be helpful for detecting struggles or concerns that patients may not immediately feel comfortable voicing, or that are important but not the main agenda item for the patient and clinician.

THE PROBLEM

Data shows that at least 1 in 5 people has a diagnosable mental health condition. But in most cases, there is a mismatch between demand for services and their supply.

When the Froedtert & Medical College of Wisconsin Health Network instituted routine depression screenings, it knew that it needed to have options to help its providers meet the mental health needs of patients.

It had looked to SilverCloud as a major player in the digital mental health space, which provides a scalable way to help meet the demand for services, and could be used either as a primary strategy or as a supplement or bridge to in-person treatment by a specialist, said Dr. Bradley Crotty, chief digital engagement officer and an internist at Froedtert.

“As a clinical enterprise, we needed a way to manage the ordering, monitoring and data flows for our formulary of digital therapeutics,” Crotty explained. “SilverCloud represented our initial use-case. Clinicians wanted visibility into how their patients were progressing in the application. Technology from Xealth provides a way for clinicians to order and for patients to seamlessly be enrolled in the digital service; for clinicians to be able to view patient progress through their current workflows in the electronic health record; and for data to flow back to the Epic EHR.”

PROPOSAL

SilverCloud provided a way for patients to work toward improvement in terms of their mental health needs in a way that can be scalable, and to meet needs in the time/space that works best for the patient, Crotty said.

“Broadly, we needed to have a system-wide approach for managing our formulary of digital therapeutics,” he said. “Our requirements were to enable ordering and monitoring within the usual workflows for patients, to enable recommendations for clinicians to sort through and find the most appropriate tools based on the needs of patients, and to enable selected data to flow back for clinical care analytics.”

MEETING THE CHALLENGE

Clinicians currently can go to the digital health formulary, located directly within the Epic EHR, through the Xealth implementation to identify appropriate digital health tools and “prescribe” within the electronic health record. This enables the organization to curate and provide to clinicians with evidence-based tools and to monitor engagement and clinical results.

“We look at digital therapeutics as a way to help influence and nudge behavior, which we know, along with the social environment, to make up a majority of one’s health,” Crotty explained. “Pharmaceuticals influence biology. Medical devices influence physiology. Digital can influence behavior, and be there in the home or in the pocket of someone who is working toward improved mental health.”

RESULTS

Froedtert & Medical College of Wisconsin Health Network’s results were positive. 64.7% of patients with moderate symptoms registered for digital health. Of those with severe depression, 74.8% showed improvement and 59.3% experienced significant improvement. Of those with severe anxiety, 70% showed improvement and 58.9% experienced significant improvement.

“In our initial two years of the program, with those having moderate depression, for example, 54% showed a clinical improvement,” Crotty added. “With moderately severe depression, 57% showed clinical improvement. By ordering SilverCloud through Xealth, the care team was involved throughout, gaining deeper knowledge about program progression.”

Physicians had data for the first time about which patients followed through with enrolling in the program and information about the severity of their condition. Patients took comfort in knowing that their physician was involved in this course of treatment, which made them more likely to follow through with the program, Crotty noted.

Singapore-based healthtech startup SSIVIX Lab has recently launched its MyCLNQ mobile app, which provides real-time doctor and clinic availability, offers location-based suggestions for the nearest clinic and earliest available doctor, and confirms booking appointments.

There is also a host of value care services provided, including online doctor consultation so users can stay home and receive treatment with prescribed medicine conveniently delivered to their doorsteps.

From medical caregivers to home therapists, users can request in the app their preferred qualified professionals at the touch of a button. The app also provides them with a platform to seek non-emergency private ambulances and book medical transport for their appointments.

According to the startup, over 300 healthcare practitioners have signed up for a strategic partnership with them to date. SSIVIX Lab also said that there are currently 15,000 users for the MyCLNQ app.

The startup’s immediate focus is mainly on patient care beyond hospital and clinics through the use of AI, IoT and blockchain technologies. It also plans to expand regionally in India and Southeast Asian countries such as Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand in the coming two years.

THE LARGER TREND

With the COVID-19 pandemic having a second wave of outbreaks in many parts of the world, telemedicine and integrated digital healthcare services will continue to play a crucial role in delivering care to many patients, as well as protecting healthcare staff.

Asia’s largest private healthcare group IHH rolled out telemedicine services in Singapore, Malaysia, Turkey, India and Hong Kong in June, and Singapore’s OCBC bank also recently launched its own healthcare app to provide users access to telehealth services.

In terms of booking of emergency private ambulance services, Singapore-founded house call doctor app Speedoc partnered with private ambulance operator Comfort Ambulance last July, according to a report by Healthcare IT News. This allows Speedoc users to hire Comfort’s fleet of 25 ambulances for transport to more than 100 healthcare institutions across Singapore directly through their app.

Sentinel Healthcare, a digital healthcare company known for its state-of-the-art remote patient monitoring solutions, announced a new strategic partnership with Vituity, a nationwide, physician-owned and -led multispecialty partnership. As part of this collaboration, Vituity is making an investment in Sentinel to advance its remote care programs and bring healthcare into the home following hospital discharge, helping its customer base of healthcare systems improve patient satisfaction and outcomes.

As part of the collaboration, Vituity and Sentinel will co-develop a custom platform that enables remote patient monitoring; connecting patients, clinicians and health systems via an app installed on a patient’s smartphone. The HIPAA-compliant platform collects, stores, and visualizes physiologic data collected from patients’ FDA-approved wearable devices. Once collected, Sentinel analyzes the data and delivers clinical recommendations customized to the patient’s needs.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the need for bringing the hospital directly into patients’ homes and reinforced our sense that remotely-provided care can significantly improve quality of care, patient satisfaction and patient outcomes,” said Andrew J. Smith, Vice President of Transformation and Operations at Vituity. “Remote monitoring is advancing as a best practice in medicine. Our investment in Sentinel will enable our physicians to have more actionable insights into patients’ health between office visits at scale, while also furthering our mission to be at the heart of providing better care.”

Vituity’s national, multi-specialty presence among hospitals, health systems and other practices was a driving force behind the strategic partnership, enabling the two privately-held companies to develop a solution that can flex and scale depending on a wide variety of customer, physician and patient needs. For example, if an emergency department sees an athlete for a sports-related injury, the local hospital will be able to leverage a real-time information feed to stay connected on his or her recovery.

“Sentinel’s platform was designed by physicians to connect patients, doctors, and health systems on a single platform that enables higher quality patient care, improved physician efficiency, and reduced healthcare costs,” said Nirav H. Shah, M.D., CEO and co-founder of Sentinel Healthcare. “We are very excited about this new partnership with Vituity and look forward to working together to bring healthcare into the home.”

About Sentinel Healthcare

Sentinel Healthcare leverages the power of wearable (IoT) technologies to improve patient outcomes. Sentinel has created a platform that supports healthcare systems in providing better, more efficient care by monitoring physiologic data, making actionable treatment recommendations, and improving medication adherence. Sentinel is committed to protecting the privacy of its users. The Sentinel platform is HIPAA compliant.

Conceptualized and designed by physicians, Sentinel’s digital health platform enables health systems to continuously monitor patient data and deliver seamless, integrated care.

About Vituity

For nearly 50 years, Vituity has been a catalyst for positive change in healthcare. As a physician-led and -owned multispecialty partnership, our 4,200 doctors and clinicians care for 6.5 million patients each year across 400 practice locations and nine acute care specialties.

Vituity’s acute focus and compassionate care are the driving forces that place us at the heart of better care. Our clinicians and practice management leaders develop front-line solutions for healthcare challenges that improve quality and have a direct, positive impact on millions of lives nationwide.

Our services span the entire acute care continuum, integrating emergency medicine, hospital medicine, critical care, anesthesiology, acute psychiatry, neurology, acute care surgery, telehealth, post-acute care, and outpatient medicine. Partnering with hospitals, health systems, clinics, payers, employers, and state and local government, our footprint continues to rapidly expand.

DarioHealth Corp., a pioneer in the global digital therapeutics market, announced that the company has entered into a new strategic partnership with Williams Medical to make the DarioHealth Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) digital therapeutics platform available to Healthcare Professionals (HCPs) across the United Kingdom and Ireland. Dario’s turn-key RPM solution integrates the company’s existing open platform, application technology, and the DarioEngage coaching platform, to allow Healthcare Professionals to monitor their patients remotely.

Dario’s digital solution is intended to provide relief for primary and secondary care providers challenged by the COVID-19 pandemic and facing potential serious winter pressures in the healthcare system. We believe that equipping practitioners to proactively treat, monitor and manage patients with long-term conditions within the community will ultimately result in reduction of the ongoing pressure on general practitioners, emergency departments, and in-patient services.

Williams Medical is the leading provider of medical goods and services to primary care in the UK, and this agreement supports both companies’ commitment to drive growth and deliver innovative solutions to frontline healthcare. With a broad base of over 8,000 general practices and healthcare providers in the community and domiciliary care sectors, Williams’ comprehensive sales network serves as an ideal platform to promote and strengthen the Dario’s suite of digital therapeutic solutions in the British and Irish healthcare markets.

Williams’ goal is to further enhance their comprehensive product range by adding Dario’s RPM capabilities. The initial offering will provide digital patient services to primary care practices in the management of patients with a broad range of chronic conditions, such as diabetes.

“We are very excited about this partnership between DarioHealth and Williams Medical as this aligns with our international growth initiative by offering our world-class RPM platform to physicians outside of the United States,” said Dror Bacher, Chief Operating Officer of DarioHealth. “Williams’ in-depth understanding of the UK and Irish healthcare markets and strong presence in the primary care arena creates an ideal opportunity for us to deliver a best-in-class RPM solution to general practices and patients, which we believe leads to reduced HCP workload while enhancing patient care and clinical outcomes.

We are proud to partner with DarioHealth in this new endeavor as this will give our customers access to an exclusive and innovative RPM platform at a time when digital therapeutics solutions are poised for rapid adoption in the UK and Ireland,” said Hugh Hamer, Managing Director of Williams Medical. “At Williams, innovation is one of our core values and we are always seeking new opportunities to make it quicker and easier for our customers to spend more quality time with their patients. We strongly believe that Dario’s RPM offering fills a major unmet need by helping practices achieve meaningful improvements in medical outcomes while potentially increasing efficiency and reducing healthcare costs.”

About DarioHealth Corp.

DarioHealth Corp. (Nasdaq: DRIO) is a leading, global digital therapeutics company revolutionizing the way people with chronic conditions manage their health. By delivering evidence-based interventions that are driven by data, high-quality software and coaching, we empower individuals to make healthy adjustments to their daily lifestyle choices to improve their overall health. Our cross-functional team operates at the intersection of life sciences, behavioral science and software technology to deliver highly engaging therapeutic interventions. Dario is one of the highest-rated diabetes solutions in the market, and its user-centric MyDario™ mobile app is loved by tens of thousands of consumers around the globe. DarioHealth is rapidly moving into new chronic conditions and geographic markets, using a performance-based approach to improve the health of users managing chronic disease. To learn more about DarioHealth and its digital health solutions, visit http://dariohealth.com

About Williams Medical Supplies

With a heritage dating back more than thirty years, Williams Medical Supplies Ltd is the largest supplier of medical disposables, equipment, pharmaceuticals and medical services to UK primary care. Williams’ parent company is DCC Vital, which is part of DCC plc; listed on FTSE 100 and one of the UK and Ireland’s largest companies.

Many of us can relate to the experience of downloading a game on your phone to pass the time for half an hour…only to realise you’ve been staring at your screen for over an hour and you’re utterly hooked!

This is especially true of brain training games – but the good news is that while they’re unmistakably addictive, brain training also has many benefits.

From improved memory to increasing productivity, below we’ve listed some of the top benefits to brain training games and why you should definitely keep up your practice!

1. Helps With Memory

This is the biggest benefit of brain training games (and, some would argue, the only real benefit besides having fun!).

Brain training games are designed to test your memory with a range of different games and challenges. There is evidence that some of these games can be effective at sharpening certain skills that can deteriorate with age, such as decision making, reaction time, and short-term memory.

2. Reduces Risk For Dementia Or Alzheimers

In 2015, research found that brain training games can be directly associated with an improvement in reasoning, verbal learning, as well as completing daily tasks in a study of over 7,000 participants with Alzheimers.

The study found that changes were most apparent in people who played the brain training games at least five times a week – although it should be noted that these studies are rather small-scale and cannot be considered conclusive evidence of brain training games’ ability to improve cognitive function across the board.

3. Improved Attention Span

Another benefit of brain training games is that they focus on improving your attention span – a skill that can certainly transfer across to your personal and professional life.

If you’ve been struggling to concentrate recently, downloading a game that really focuses on boosting your concentration and improving your attention span could be a great idea.

4. Increased Reaction Time

Brain training games also focus on helping you to improve your reaction times with timed challenges and quick-fire rounds aimed to test your speed, attention, and ability to react quickly and accurately.

Of course, this might not always carry across to physical situations where a quick reaction is essential, but it can be helpful when it comes to making decisions more efficiently and with more confidence.

5. Mental Agility

Brain training games are also designed to test your mental agility. This relates to your problem solving skills, your ability to think critically, and solve problems efficiently.

Improving your mental agility is something we can all benefit from, and a great by-product of regularly completing the challenges on your brain training app!

What To Look For In A Good Brain Training Game

So, now you know the key benefits of brain training games your next challenge is finding one that will challenge you properly.

A few features good brain training games will have include:

• Measuring your performance: You want to know that all this training you’re doing is actually paying off! Make sure whatever app you download has the ability to measure your performance over time.
• A variety of games and challenges: It would be difficult for a game to be able to test your reaction time, attention span, memory, and everything else all at once, so whatever games you use, make sure there are a variety of challenges on offer to get the full spectrum of benefits.
• Premium subscription plans: You might not want to invest any money into your brain training games, but an app with a premium option at least shows you that if you want to level up, you have the option to do so in the future.

Highly-Rated Brain Training Games

The following brain training games are all highly rated for providing a full range of the benefits listed above:

• Luminosity: an app with both a free and premium subscription available, with a number of daily challenges and tests.
• Elevate: this app has over 35 games and tracks your progress across five different types of development so you can really deep dive into your performance over time.
• Peak: contains over 30 games designed to test your attention, mental agility, memory, and language.
• Scrabble: Scrabble and other word games are fantastic for boosting your vocabulary and language skills – and you can also use word tools to help you make the most out of your games and really boost your score.

Overall, there are many benefits to playing brain training games – while not all of these benefits are necessarily backed by research and evidence, there’s no doubt that they leave you feeling more productive and sharpen your mind after a quick bout of daily challenges.

Besides, even if you just have a spare 10 minutes or so in the day, playing some brain training games for fun is a much better use of your time than other games, and you might gain some useful mental agility skills that transfer to other parts of your life as an added bonus!

Holon Solutions, one of health care’s most advanced knowledge delivery companies, and Cerner Corporation, a global health care technology company, announced they are joining forces to accelerate the seamless delivery of critical patient information to providers. Working together, Holon and Cerner will deploy patented technology that automatically delivers contextually relevant patient information from Cerner’s HealtheIntent® population health platform, which is electronic health record (EHR)-agnostic, directly to clinicians in their workflow to inform care decisions.

Simply having access to patient data is not enough for today’s providers, especially those caring for at-risk patients through value-based care arrangements. With mounting clinical and administrative demands, providers do not have time to search through multiple systems for critical patient information. To optimize clinical decision-making, treatment planning and care delivery, Holon and Cerner are bringing providers curated, patient-specific knowledge directly into their workflows during a care episode to improve outcomes and reimbursements.

“Holon’s advanced capabilities will help us automatically bring providers relevant information, insights and critical health data to help them guide patient care in a timely manner,” said Ray Herschman, Vice President & General Manager, Health Network and Risk Solutions, Cerner. “In support of Cerner’s vision of a seamless and connected world where everyone thrives, we’re making it easier and more convenient for providers to use their data effectively and provide a higher quality of care.”

Holon’s CollaborNet® patented technologies sense provider workflow activity and automatically surface relevant patient information from Cerner, such as gaps in care, to providers in an unobtrusive “ribbon” that displays alongside the patient chart in the provider’s EHR. The advanced capabilities of the Holon technology are designed to supportquicker and more efficient delivery of valuable care insights without interruption for the provider.

“Delivering critical knowledge at the point of need is the foundation of Holon’s mission in the market,” said Jon Zimmerman, CEO, Holon Solutions. “We are thrilled to be collaborating with Cerner to ensure the valuable information generated reaches providers when and where they need it – with no effort on the provider’s part – as a huge step toward better quality care, provider experience, business performance, and improving outcomes. We look forward to continuing this exciting journey with the Cerner team, their HealtheIntent clients, and provider users, as we work together to advance better healthcare for everyone.”

About Holon Solutions

Holon Solutions is a healthcare information technology company that puts the right information in front of the right people at the right time through our reimagined knowledge delivery platform. Holon empowers risk-bearing organizations to optimize patient outcomes and financial performance by surfacing actionable, patient-specific insights at the point of need. Holon’s vendor inclusive CollaborNet® platform surfaces contextual insights within the provider workflow, seamlessly shares clinical data from health plans and vendors, and automates documentation exchange and referrals across health communities independent of the technologies in play. Our team of innovators is focused on removing the administrative burden from clinicians through our patented, sensor-based solutions. We are grateful to have been recognized by Healthcare Informatics as the “2018 Innovator of the Year for Value-Based Care” and recognized by the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG) Southeastern Software Association (SSA) as the best Independent Software Vendor in 2019 at the 10th Annual Impact Awards.

About Cerner

Cerner’s health technologies connect people and information systems in thousands of facilities worldwide dedicated to creating smarter and better care for individuals and communities. Recognized globally for innovation, Cerner assists clinicians in making care decisions and assists organizations in managing the health of their populations. The company also offers an integrated clinical and financial system to help manage day-to-day revenue functions, as well as a wide range of services to support clinical, financial and operational needs, focused on people.