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Basit Chaudhry, MD, PhD
Medical Scientist, IBM Research
The U.S. healthcare system is capable of producing breathtaking innovations that drive progress forward. New frontiers open up on an almost regular basis. This is the “miracle of medicine.” At the same time, however, advancements made at the leading edge of science are slow to diffuse through the system and enormous inefficiencies exist in how scarce resources are used. Our ability to generate new scientific knowledge and develop advanced medical technologies has never been greater. Our ability to apply those innovations rationally in practice has not kept pace, unfortunately. Continue Reading »
Multiple sclerosis is a cruel disease. It typically strikes young adults. The body’s own immune system attacks the brain and spinal cord, resulting in physical disabilities, cognitive problems and a host of other chronic symptoms. The cause isn’t known. There is no cure. Fortunately, the amount of biomedical and clinical data related to MS has exploded over the past decade, and, at the same time, new research methods make it possible to assess environmental factors and hundreds of thousands of genetic variations taken from single samples.
Researchers at The State University of New York at Buffalo are using a new approach to computing in an attempt to identify the causes and promising therapies. We’re conducting a TweetChat on Thursday, May 10, from 12 to 1 p.m. ET at Twitter hashtag #IBMDataChat. Please join the conversation about using technology to help defeat MS.
Participants:
· Shawn Dolley, IBM VP of Big Data Healthcare & Life Sciences (Moderator), @shawndolley
· Dr. Murali Ramanathan, SUNY Buffalo Professor Pharmaceutical Sciences and Neurology, Director of Graduate Studies & Co-Director, Data Intensive Discovery Initiative, @M_Ramanathan
· David Smith, Revolution Analytics R Evangelist & VP of Marketing, @revodavid
· Tim Coetzee, National MS Society Chief Research Officer, @tim_coetzee
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Steve Hamm in
Editor’s note: Please join a Tweet chat featuring Dr. Murali Ramanathan and other healthcare and data analytics experts May 10 from noon to 1 p.m. Eastern Time at #IBMdatachat.
Multiple sclerosis is a cruel disease. It typically strikes young adults. The body’s own immune system attacks the brain and spinal cord, resulting in physical disabilities, cognitive problems and a host of other chronic symptoms. The cause isn’t known. There is no cure.
Fortunately, the amount of biomedical and clinical data related to MS has exploded over the past decade, and, at the same time, new research methods make it possible to assess environmental factors and hundreds of thousands of genetic variations taken from single samples.
Researchers at The State University of New York at Buffalo are using a new approach to computing in an attempt to identify the causes and promising therapies. “The eventual goal is to help develop a cure or prevention for MS,” says Dr. Murali Ramanathan, a professor of pharmaceutical sciences and neurology at SUNY Buffalo. “The ability to do this kind of computational analysis is a great complement to basic science and clinical research.”
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Chris Luongo in
Drug counterfeiting is a significant public health threat in Africa and other developing countries. This is a big problem for drug companies — and an even bigger problem for patients, whose lives may depend on these medications.
But technology can be a powerful asset in the fight against counterfeiting. And the good news is Sproxil and IBM are showing the way.
Click on the image below to open the slideshow version.
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By Ashifi Gogo
CEO, Sproxil
In the U.S., large scale drug counterfeiting is rare, but in some parts of the world, particularly in developing nations, it’s rampant. This makes fighting treatable diseases like malaria – which kills a million people every year — extremely difficult. According to the World Health Organization, about 200,000 of the world’s malaria deaths alone can be linked to ineffective treatment resulting from counterfeit anti-malarials.
Pharmaceutical manufacturers and distributors globally are now experimenting with ways to combat counterfeiting by creating a smarter pharmaceutical supply. My company, Sproxil, provides a cloud-based service called Mobile Product Authentication™ (MPA) that allows consumers to use their mobile phones to determine if their medicine is genuine, at point of purchase, in a matter of seconds. Each package using the MPA service bears a label with a unique PIN as well as a text number. At the point of purchase, the consumer scratches the label to reveal the PIN code, then sends it to our authentication service via a free text message. Within seconds, a reply is sent back indicating whether the drug is genuine or counterfeit.
I’m proud that in January we reached a milestone within regions of Africa where consumers have used MPA technology one million times to verify their medication.
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by Martin Kelly, Partner, IBM Venture Capital Group
We’re pleased to announce the line-up for IBM SmartCamp 2012. This is our program for helping entrepreneurs who are developing products and services that make the world work better. Entrepreneurs who participate gain access to mentors who understand their industry and can help them develop their businesses. Also, networking and publicity can lead to venture funding.
We plan more than 17 SmartCamp events worldwide this year. The schedule starts in Miami on May 15th, with a new format focused on healthcare. Over the last two years we have seen growing interest in certain topics and believe the timing is right to have dedicated events. These one- and two-day events will bring together entrepreneurs, mentors and investors in particular industries allowing a more focused discussion. We will follow Miami up with New York on May 24th with a focus on Smart Cities. The New York event was planned to coincide with TechCrunch Disrupt NYC, to allow mentors and companies to make the most of the community.
For more information and to apply, you can get started here.
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Harry Reynolds
IBM Director Health Industry Transformation
What if your physician knew you as well as a personal shopper? Or how about if your health insurance provider could suggest the most advantageous plan the way your cell phone carrier recommends the latest family plan?
While the tongue depressor hasn’t changed in years, new influences such as social media, the mobile revolution and higher expectations from consumers are forcing healthcare organizations to rethink the way they deal with patients.
We are entering the age of the empowered health consumer. Consider that 50 million consumers will enter the individual and exchange insurance market by 2017. Additionally, a 40 percent decline in group health care coverage is expected by 2017. Meanwhile, annual private healthcare spending will increase by $430 billion by 2015.
Consumers now have unprecedented access to information about medicine and health care. As a result they’re becoming more demanding and better informed about the care they receive. Combine this new reality with the transition going on in healthcare and the industry will certainly face looking at patients and their health differently. Many organizations are even rethinking their business models.
This week during the World Health Care Congress in Washington, D.C., we’re discussing this new reality and the need for healthcare to be more consumer focused. Together we’ll explore what it will take to enable healthcare providers and insurance companies to connect and collaborate with patients better.
Taking a page from the retail industry playbook, can these types of organizations apply the retail mentality to better understand and influence consumer behavior through vast amounts of data? In all of this, analytics is key. Understanding the individual and providing a more personalized view of the patient will help organizations compete in a new era of healthcare transformation. This kind of insight can be used to keep patients healthier.
We are barreling through unprecedented change in the healthcare industry. Everything is changing with new competitors, new opportunities and new challenges. One thing is clear, better information just might enable better care.
View a Slideshare of Harry Reynolds’ presentation at World Health Care Congress.
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Dr. William R. LaFontaine
Vice President, Technical Strategy
IBM Research
Coming from IBM Research, I think of innovation in two dimensions. First, there is the continuous innovation that goes into IBM’s products and services. This innovation provides important advances to current technology as well as helps IBM introduce breakthrough products. The benefits of this approach are clear in IBM’s next-generation computing platform PureSystems.
But we also look for more exploratory challenges that help us advance science by leaps and bounds. We call them grand challenges. Meeting them requires a very different set of practices and capabilities – and presents some interesting problems.
And that was the topic today as the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation in Washington, DC hosted a forum with the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, IBM and Qualcomm to discuss how we can meet the next Grand Challenges.
Continue Reading »
19:03
By Dr. Larry Norton
Medical Director, Evelyn H. Lauder Breast Center
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
To me, the recently-announced collaboration between my institution, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, and IBM is of profound importance for reasons both obvious and more subtle. The obvious reasons concern what we may call knowledge. The subtle ones would be apparent only to those of us who care for patients on a daily basis and concern what we may call wisdom. Let me explain what I mean by the distinction.
First: What is the project? Our two organizations plan on applying IBM’s Watson technology, which impressed all of us by beating two grand-champions on the Jeopardy! TV quiz show, to MSKCC’s vast store of cancer case histories, utilizing the skills of expert computer scientists and highly experienced cancer doctors. The goal is to develop a tool to help physicians all over the world better care for their patients with cancer.
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By David Kerr
Director, Corporate Strategy, IBM
Cancer is the second most common cause of death in the United States, and, according to the American Cancer Society, more than 1.6 million new cases are expected to be diagnosed this year. Discoveries in molecular biology and genetics in recent years have produced new insights into cancer biology, but these advances have also ratcheted up the complexity of diagnosing and treating each case.
The disease is one of the most important fields of medicine, yet it’s devilishly complex and there’s too much information for any single practitioner to keep up with.
A collaboration announced today between Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City and IBM could revolutionize how physicians in the United States and worldwide get access to world-class information about cancer.
