How do hospital pharmacies keep track of millions of pills and bottles while ICUs and ERs are flooded with COVID patients? How can insurance companies make sure patients get connected with the right healthcare providers? How can doctors remotely monitor patient symptoms?
We want to take a moment to recognize three outstanding DC health-tech startups and the impact they’ve had in the fight against the Coronavirus pandemic. They’re helping to tackle all these issues and more.
CareJourney
CareJourney was founded in 2014 to blend value-based care with advanced analytics, so that healthcare providers can devote time and resources to improving healthcare, rather than processing data.
Aneesh Chopra, formerly United States Chief Technology Officer during the Obama administration, asked for more public data, updated health reporting, and increased researcher access to COVID patient registries. Chopra now works for CareJourney, and when he put out a call to action to health-tech companies, CareJourney sprang into action.
CareJourney was already at the forefront of public health data, but they took it to another level. They created heat maps and collaborated with Schema.org to update existing data feeds on syndromic surveillance. They’re also working with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Health Data for Action program. Together, they’re helping to increase non-commercial researcher access to COVID patient registries.
B.Well
Do you feel in control of your healthcare? Is it personalized to you? Getting healthcare in America can often feel complicated, impersonal, and out of control. B.Well aims to change that, by changing how patients interact with the healthcare system. From their mobile app, you can see your fitness tracker stats, schedule your next appointment, and access all healthcare records in one place.
During COVID, doctors need to be able to triage, monitor patients, connect patients to testing facilities, and provide timely, factual communication, often remotely. To that end, B.Well has created a lite platform that healthcare providers can roll out fast. Healthcare providers can go here to learn more. If you’d like to check out the app, go here.
Kit Check
Have you ever wondered how hospital pharmacies keep track of the millions of pills and bottles they handle each day? If they make mistakes or mishandle anything, they could be violating the law or putting patients at risk. That’s where Kit Check comes in. Their scanning station uses RFID tags on pharmacists’ trays to quickly identify potential issues, such as a missing bottle.
In hospitals overwhelmed with Coronavirus patients, time is of the essence. Kit Check is virtually built for this kind of environment. When hydroxychloroquine was identified in the media as a possible treatment option, Kit Check customers were able to use Kit Check to monitor its use in ICUs. Other customers are creating and using Kit Masters to monitor COVID trays.
Each of these teams is iterative and passionate about solving problems. Using the talent and technology that was already established within their teams, they have adapted quickly and are solving the daily challenges that COVID brings.
