October 22, 2010:

Live Blog:

Jennifer uses herself as a hypothetical patient for this presentation.  She present us with two possible life paths of a patient.  One life path depicts the life of the person who adhered to their insulin schedule; the other of the person who didn’t take insulin appropriately.   The outcomes could not be more physically different.  The person who used insulin correctly is able to travel, enjoy life and take risks.  The other person experiences blindness and physical hardship.

Technology has allowed for insulin pumps to supply insulin – the only action needed is to push a button every time the person with diabetes eats.  Constant glucose monitoring is currently available.  The future might hold nanopumps (computer chip implanted in pancreas) and steering wheel glucose monitoring with GPS integration for assistance when necessary.

As a doctor, Jennifer knows it is important to meet the patient where they are.  She sees that teens in her office are constantly texting.   She has leveraged this as a way to remind teens to take their insulin.   After successful testing with a few patients, Dr Dyer developed an automated, personalized iPhone App.

It is important to make these messages personalized, but having 500 patients make a personal message to each patient prohibitive.  This app addresses that issue.

How it started:
Essentially Jennifer had an idea, and made it happen.  She used Twitter to find programmer and got to work!

How it works:
The health-care provider populates a database with some information about the teen, including some personal information personal interests and activities. Reminder messages are then sent automatically with the insulin reminder as well as a personal message based on the data.
The doctor/sender needs iPhone, the patient/receiver only needs ability to receive text.

Challenges:
Privacy concerns
Providers may not want to send the messages without compensation.

What’s Next?
It’s the right thing to do whenever you meet a patient where they are.  Good health care is meeting people where they are and helping people out.  Meeting her teen patients via text is certainly getting them “where they are” right now.