Medical applications to be popularized - $100 Android medical device

Oh! Gail Davis, a British mother of two, won a $10,000 iTunes gift card because one of her daughters downloaded a free game from the Apple App Store that has been downloaded 10 billion times. 10 billion downloads! That's more than the entire population of the world would download once per person (according to Wikipedia, the total population of the earth is about 7 billion).

I have an iPhone 4 that is so important to me that I have to have it, and the most fascinating thing about it is the level of applications it offers. Just a few months ago, I was in Seoul, South Korea, attending the Continua Health Alliance conference, and I had to turn off my phone data service. As all global travelers know, data service is extremely expensive when you are abroad. Like Pavlov's dog, I pulled my phone out of my pocket every 10 minutes to check emails, text messages and instant news. Then it suddenly occurred to me that I was no longer doing that, it was just a phone... boring! Until this weekend, I rarely took it out to look at it, no matter what I was doing with it. Now that I am on the other side of the world, I don't even have to answer the phone.

This got me thinking about how important smartphone apps are to me. First, I have to admit that most smartphone apps sold in the App Store are a waste of time or money. I'm not an avid gamer, so most apps don't make sense to me. However, I find that I can't live without some apps now. For example, among my favorite apps, Amazon's book reader is at the top of the list. Then there's Slacker and Pandora music players, and Kayak can be used to find flight information. Another of my favorite apps is called "Where to Go", which I have to pay for, but it helps find related places by category, and I use this feature at least once or twice a week.

I've been using smartphones for at least eight years now. So why, all of a sudden, did the market explode? I think it's ultimately because they made some really interesting products for the masses. The iPhone and Android phones created a stable hardware platform that allowed thousands of apps to exist on the platform simultaneously. Ultimately, they solved real problems and needs for people.

So what does all of this have to do with healthcare applications, you might ask? The telemedicine market is experiencing the same teething pains that the smartphone market faced a few years ago. We are starting to see some really great telemedicine technology emerge, and yes, that is cause for celebration for the geeks. The technology to put together a telemedicine solution certainly exists today. There are multiple options in wired and wireless standards for great applications and graphics, multiple low-cost microcontrollers (MCUs) and microprocessors (MPUs), many options for tools to store data in cloud computing environments, and a plethora of databases to store data. In other words, we understand how to get data from point A to point B. What we are really missing are applications that solve real problems for the masses.

What the telemedicine market desperately needs is a healthy ecosystem that supports medical applications. We have seen hundreds of health and fitness apps emerge, and there are many serious medical applications in the Android and Apple app stores. The problem is that most of the applications I have seen are incomplete due to the lack of sensor input. There are exceptions. For example, at the recent Consumer Electronics Show, the AliveCor iPhone accessory was demonstrated that can capture your electrocardiogram (ECG) data by pressing the device against your chest. I think we will see more and more useful applications in the future. I think two things will continue to develop. The first is that the Android operating system will gradually become a stimulus for the development of medical applications, allowing them to move forward in different form factors of the platform. The second is that the Continua Health Alliance will provide the necessary connectivity interoperability to ensure that company A's sensors are compatible with company B's Android tablet, device or phone.

You might ask, why is Apple not mentioned? I think Apple will certainly have some market share, but ultimately, phones and tablets will not be the only platforms for telemedicine. For example, the large demand for telemedicine will help promote home monitoring and management of chronic diseases, thereby reducing medical costs. To achieve "continuous" monitoring, you need cheap powered devices, whether it has a simple display (a medical device or a device). In most cases, it needs to be priced under $100 to become part of the medical service. It is absolutely possible that we will see medical devices running on Android for less than $100 if equipped with Freescale i.MX application processors. In Apple's model, I don't think it is possible to see similar devices at this price level.

We will also see some amazing medical applications in the next three years. They will not only provide us with more data, but also help us maintain good health, or restore health. The heyday of geeks is coming to an end!