Research : “Consumerizing” Healthcare Industry |
Present : Acoustic Medical Diagnosis |
Future : Acoustic Spatial 3D Analysis |
Solution : Preventive Healthcare Technology |
Research : Acoustic Medical Diagnosis |
Research : Acoustic Medical Diagnosis |
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Welcome to our virtual office of Healthcare Research in San Jose, California, USA.
By the time it takes for you to finish reading this introduction, more than ten Americans would die of heart related failures — some of which could have been clearly prevented.
5.5 million Americans and 22 million people around the world encounter heart failures each year. Surprisingly, half are healthy young athletic people while the other half are rapidly aging baby boomers.
To make things worse, there are only 10 thousand heart specialists in USA to properly diagnose and attend these patients. Worse yet, these limited specialists not only have to screen new patients, but also care for 80.7 million existing heart patients in the USA.
This is a formidable task and possible contributor for the highest mortality rate in USA (larger than the combined sum of all mortalities caused by cancer, chronic lower respiratory disease, accidents, and diabetes mellitus) as reported from American Heart Association 2008 statistics.
Moreover, the rising cost of medical expenses are also preventing people from seeking preventive medical treatments. Consequently the overall cost of usual hospitalization has been growing exponentially over the years that the Americans spent $2.5 trillion dollars in 2009 for medical expenses, and possibly $4.5 trillion by 2019.
One of the studies conducted by Common Wealth Foundation showed that in 2007 more than one third of US households spent more than 10% of their annual income to pay for medical insurance and out-of-pocket medical expenses. Worst of all, similar reports showed that more than half (53%) of low income families spent close to half (44%) of their annual income on healthcare.
Thus, it is good thing that US government is trying to curb the escalating cost of healthcare expenses and individual’s insurance premiums. However, we should realize that it is not only for the benefits of its citizens, but also for the best interest of the US government, because US government is now paying over 45% of the $2.5 trillion dollar annual healthcare industry expenses through its Medicare and Medicaid programs.
Regretfully, this system can not be sustained. US government can not afford to spend trillion dollars a year from an account which does not generate enough income to cover these expenses. But, the worst is yet to come when the majority of baby boomers will be retiring soon and will be drawing additional expenses from Medicare and Medicaid.
When the resulting net expenses starts to draw significant portions of the fund’s principals, the system will collapse. The best will of the people and arm twisting of the government to reduce medical expenses will not work. It would be only natural to expect long delays in the medical services and eventual rationing of critical care.
Contrary to popular concerns that government will be forcing terminally ill people the option of euthanasia, I am afraid that many people will be begging for euthanasia as a merciful alternative for their loved ones than the extended suffering from ailments that they have no hope of getting medical treatments.
Consequently, we will have to make drastic changes to our current system of medical treatments to curtail our healthcare expenditures. The current system of “after-the-fact” medical treatments will always be too expensive, thus, we will need to concentrate our efforts to create “before-the-fact” preventive healthcare system.
The technologies that we had used to develop therapeutic drugs and diagnostic equipments should be used to develop preventive medicines and wellcare equipments. Cost of early detection and preventive treatments will be order of magnitude smaller than the postmortem cost required to heal the sick.
Thus, we propose to “consumerize” healthcare industry by developing preventive healthcare technologies utilizing proven technologies of consumer electronics industry.
There are many creative minds and technological innovations that have been used successfully for annually doubling the performance of consumer electronic devices while halving the cost of these products, such as computers, TVs, cellphones, internets, and etc.
Consequently, it seems urgent for us to use whatever technologies that we know the best to develop better means to massively screen large population of rapidly aging baby boomers and healthy young athletic people for early signs of medical anomalies.
Surely, there might be other technologies that could be better, but the acoustic technology is something that we know well and has the passive monitoring qualities that no other technology seem to provide.
Others have argued that lower cost of medical imaging devices like MRI and CT scanner would be better for detecting medical anomalies. Even a portable ultrasound scanner would be better for isolating medical problems.
However, I contest that acoustic stethoscope and phonocardiograph had been used by experienced physician for ages in accurately detecting and diagnosing medical ailment of heart, lung, and intestines—all this without producing any side effects of using them as often as necessary.
I admit that these auscultation techniques have given ways to the diagnostic imaging technologies, because people are more visual than aural.
However, I believe these are the difference in user interfaces and presentation skills, not the underlying technology of medical diagnostic capabilities. With the help of modern day’s computerized human interface, all device could now present its diagnostic information in visual images as well as aural soundings.
Thus we propose to develop non-invasive and non-intrusive acoustic cardiograph technology by utilizing the surround sound signal processing technologies to massively screen high-risk population for early signs of anomalies for preventive treatment by utilizing computerized artificial intelligence and massively parallel Internet socio-medical network servers.
Please join us, if you want to see the cost and the performance of medical devices taking the route of consumer electronic devices. Thank You.
Jason Kim |
Problem 1 : Leading cause of death |
Problem 2 : Enormous cost of hospitalization |
Problem 3 : We will not be able to afford care |
Solution : Consumerize Healthcare Industry |
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