Partners Center for Connected Health Boston Spins Off Venture To Create “Fun” Algorithms and “Fun” Devices to Encourage Healthcare Participation

You know if all these programs were “fun” patients and doctors alike would be beating the doors down to use them, you think?  Well here’s one more fueled by some venture capital money giving is whirl, and they have lot of competition out there.  We have seen companies try to make “games” out of healthcare, but the public is too smart for that, as they know it’s really not.  One thing consumers are learning quickly is that everything may not always be as it seems on the internet today.

Perhaps someone will meet the happy medium if enough keep trying, but the whole deal here is the way that nobody makes it any fun and we have no role models, nobody in Congress, etc. and that’s the same old dead horse I beat all the time.  This site will in their own way provide incentives, information and I am guessing similar as to what you see on the other sites.  Again, no role models and the attitude of “it’s for those guys over there” will continue to baffle and frustrate call.  We have advice on how to do things coming out our ears today and even other humans are getting a bit annoying with being magpies and repeating what they think you need to hear and that’s usually wrong as they usually on hear about 2 sentences and come to a conclusion, but that’s the old world and not the one of complication we live in today.

I experience that all the time with other individuals doing that and yes it does get under your skin a bit at times as you can’t even finish a sentence and let them hear the whole story either.  Anyway, back on track here’s one more attempt at the same old thing, throw more technology and software out there that the patients don’t really understand how to access and more administrative nightmares for the doctors who barely have time to brush their own teeth today.  On my blog I try a lot of straight talk and hopefully simple solutions that maybe some will like.  Now this would be fun, using a cell phone to find FDA recalls and you what else, people like it and get enthused once they try it, but anybody listening out there at the FDA, nope.  Same old same old, throw more software out there and try to get an audience and when you add on health insurance and having to be involved in that – double whammy of no desire. 

Microsoft Tags – Microsoft MSDN Posts Ideas from the Medical Quack About Use in Healthcare!

Now my next area I ponder, how many of these Venture Capital investors will get involved as a participant here – right none, as “it’s for those guys over there” again.  They miss the boat too with dreams of more portals and programs that someone thinks is going to knock everyone’s socks off with enthusiasm. 

A while back I read an article where a journalist said writers should learn code and I think that stands true for the Venture Capital guys too, save you money on some of this that is so duplicated all over the place.  BD

Healthrageous (previously called HopSkipConnect) is a spinout of Partners Center for Connected Health, the unit of Partners HealthCare System in Boston that studies the use of technologies like text messages and the Internet to keep people healthy outside of hospitals and other traditional clinical settings. The startup’s software is designed to automatically give people personalized advice to help them reach health goals such as losing weight, lowering blood pressure, or controlling their diabetes.

North Bridge Venture Partners, of Waltham, MA, and San Mateo, CA, led the startup’s first-round financing, which also included investments from Boston-based Egan-Managed Capital and Long River Ventures in Amherst, MA. Rick Lee, a veteran managed healthcare executive, is CEO of Healthrageous (and a speaker at Xconomy’s XSITE innovation forum next week—register here). He said the new financing enables the startup, which is temporarily operating from North Bridge’s Waltham office until it finds its own digs in the Boston area, to hire more engineers and other staff. It also plans to develop a mobile application that would allow people to access its services on their smartphones.

Skeptics might scoff at using gadgets, networks, and fancy algorithms to curb people’s bad habits. To a certain extent, Healthrageous could quell some of that skepticism with the evidence it has already gained from studies led by the Harvard doctors who helped develop its technology. (The Harvard dermatologist Joseph Kvedar, a founder of the startup and the director of the Center for Connected Health, is a nationally recognized authority on telemedicine and the use of technology in caring for patients remotely.)

Healthrageous Snags $6M to Combat Unhealthy Behaviors | Xconomy

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