When an airplane passenger is in physical distress, the flight attendant calls through the speakers asking if medical professionals are on board. It’s a simple action that can make a huge difference. What if we could mimic this same outreach, 10,000 feet below, everyday on the ground?
That’s exactly what the smart phone app PulsePoint (for download here) makes possible, according to Emergency Management. Using the gadgets we all carry every day, municipalities that use the free mobile service are able to send out alerts to CPR-certified citizens who are nearby someone in need. In many cases, there are just a few minutes between life and death, so every second counts. By quickening response times, this app can help save lives — before an ambulance is even in sight.
PulsePoint doesn’t replace dispatched responders, but as fast as ambulances and emergency medical technicians try to arrive, they’re often not quick enough. Once 9-1-1 is dialed and the available crew is actually with the patient, it can be too late – making those that can arrive quicker a vital resource.
San Jose became the first area city to use PulsePoint in 2012 — the app’s founder and CEO, Richard Price, is from the area, having worked as an ex-fire chief of the San Ramon Valley Fire Protection District. Since then, it’s caught on thanks to support from a local hospital and the results it provides. A local hospital is also planning a public registry of automated defibrillators through a new, related app, PulsePoint AED.
With decreasing local budgets for emergency response, increasing populations and traffic congestion, the demand for innovations like PulsePoint is greater than ever. By alerting off-duty first responders, medical professionals, and other CPR certified individuals of a nearby need, PulsePoint turns them into valuable lifesavers, all with the tap of a phone, making the app early — and effective — when time means everything.
Tag: healthcare
The One Thing Health Care Reform Needs Most
Much of the controversy and emotionally-charged conversations surrounding health reform come from the same place: medical care is simultaneously costly, crucial and complex. People don’t always get the care they need, and when they do, they often don’t know how much it costs. In this visual analysis, Castlight Health offers a concise look at the issue of health care transparency, and how it affects American families, businesses and taxpayers.
Source: Castlight Health/Visually
You Won’t Believe the Data Behind This Health Care Innovation
Collecting more data isn’t the solution to every problem. But in health care, better data often lead to better results. One of the biggest obstacles in diagnosing, treating, and preventing diseases is that medical professionals and researchers need more accurate, detailed, diverse, connected data to better understand threats to people’s health. Digital technology can help. The Nokia Sensing XChallenge recognizes major innovation in health technology, and showcases some of the big numbers behind health at the same time. For example, tuberculosis still kills about 1.4 million people worldwide every year, but new devices can detect epidemics early and prevent the disease’s spread.
The Checklist That Can Reform Healthcare
Behind the scenes, hospitals are transforming the way that doctors and nurses care for patients under the Affordable Care Act. The experiments that hospitals are trying out and small changes they’re making are less prominent parts the ACA, but Summa Akron City Hospital is showing off as an example of innovative implementation. Starting Jan. 1, the hospital will embrace a new business model. Medicare will pay the hospital one lump sum, upfront, for surgical procedures and any complications that surgery patients experience within 30 days of discharge. Currently, payments come based on procedures, not patients, so if a patient had complications and returned for another procedure, revenue grew. Under the new system, based on quality instead of quantity, the hospital could lose money if the patient needs to return, but would profit more from a successful procedure. As cardiologist Dr. Ken Berkovitz, explains it, “Everybody in the health care system gets rewarded for doing more, rather than rewarded for doing the right thing.” Meanwhile, some of the other seemingly simple changes are already making a difference; for example, did you ever think that a using checklist could be so innovative?