#199 - Slow and steady wins the race 🗳️
#199 - Slow and steady wins the race 🗳️
The one-minute healthtech roundup
Hi friends,
This week: Women’s health investment is on the up, tech and mental health collide (again), and what do people want politicians to do about healthcare?
Tired eyes? 👀 Listen to the Healthtech Pigeon podcast ➡️ Huw and Jess from SomX breakdown the best stories from this week’s newsletter, with help from Coulter Partners’ Ian Coyne. Available now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
News Bites 🥪
🔎 Color Health taps OpenAI to generate screening plans for cancer patients – They sure keep themselves busy over at OpenAI! They've teamed up with Color Health to utilise—yep, you guessed it—artificial intelligence to improve patients' access to cancer care. Word on the street is they've developed a copilot app that leverages GPT-4 to identify missing diagnostics and create personalised care plans for patients.
🗳️ What do health tech leaders want from the general election campaign? – For reasons that Pigeon can’t begin to fathom (isn’t everything working perfectly?) people have some strong feelings about what the next government should prioritise when it comes to NHS digital transformation. These leaders want to see movement on everything from investments in infrastructure to using tech to tackle waiting lists.
🔮 Future Health Index 2024 global report: Healthcare leaders turn to AI to address critical gaps in patient care – Look, no one’s arguing that automation and AI could help address workforce challenges but… wait, what do you mean they are arguing that…? Ok, so there’s actually fairly significant variation in how enthusiastic people are about healthcare AI – and those differences can depend on your role, where in the world you’re based, and how much money you have.
🧠 Can Technology Help Us More Accurately Diagnose Mental Illnesses? – Just for this week, we’re stepping away from the question of ‘can AI be a therapist’, and considering the altogether more clear cut issue of diagnosis. After all, if tech can take a (data-driven) stab at physical conditions like Alzheimers, why shouldn’t it have a go at mental health too? Err… Pigeon can think of a few reasons…
🤰 How virtual reality transforms women’s labor experiences – For those mothers going through childbirth and able to resist the instinct to tell that nurse approaching you with a meta quest to **** right off*, VR has been found to be a promising intervention that successfully reduces acute pain and anxiety — making it an all-around effective non-pharmacological technique for pain management in labour. Move over, heat packs and water immersion.
🐌 Freespira bets on slow and steady, amid spectacular digital health collapses – The digital therapeutics market famously went a bit pear-shaped in 2023, and at the time, the question on everyone’s minds was: was it bad business models, or was something rotten in the state of DTxmark**? Freespira’s betting on the former, as it tries to do things right.
🔓 Funding For Women’s Health: Unlocking The Power Of Women Investors – Investment in women’s health is on the up, but challenges remain. Inadequate funding from VCs and limited partners persists, and we’re not going to lie, we’re disappointed. For growth to continue, diversity at the investment table could help to foster a more inclusive and impactful investment landscape.
💰 Better Health Raises $14M To Reach More Patients with Chronic Conditions – Pigeon wouldn’t turn our beak up at an extra $14m. What we’d do with it is a discussion for another day, but Better Health is using their recent cash injection to expand their offerings of peer coaching, education, and home delivery of medical supplies to patients with chronic wounds, diabetes, and many other conditions. Probably a better use of funds than what we had planned….
📈 Fierce Healthcare Fundraising Tracker—Canary Speech lands $13 M; Rock Health backs Marigold Health's series A – End of life care, virtual addiction services and tech-enabled speech therapy are among the millions invested in US healthtech over the past few weeks – Fierce Healthcare’s running tracker has the lowdown.
What to listen to 🔊
Events 📅
Pathfinder Women’s Health Summit
🕣 Jun 26
📍 Birmingham
HPN South
🕣 Jun 27 -28
📍 Heathrow
SomX Comms 102: Fundraising Essentials
🕣 Jul 11
📍 Online
BIA Summer Party 2024
🕣 Jul 11
📍 London
AI in the NHS: Shaping the future of healthcare - The Health Foundation
🕣 Jul 18
📍 Online
Visit the SomX events page or subscribe to SomX’s events roundup to see all of the best upcoming healthtech, biotech and healthcare events
Opportunities 🕵️♀️
Be a part of a study: What kind of person builds a digital health startup? – Some people think anyone who would build a company working in the digital health space must be crazy. Others take a more scientific approach: Coulter Partners’ Ian Coyne has published his study of 50 founders to find out their strengths, weaknesses, and what makes them ….*ahem* unique. Now he’s looking for more subjects…
🐢 Business Development Executive, TORTUS – Passionate about making a long-lasting positive impact in healthcare? Know how to build and nurture relationships with clients? Have a knack for sales? You answered yes, Pigeon may just have a role you’ll be interested in…
🧑💻 User Support Specialist, Accurx – This is a role for the best communicators out there! You’ll be the first point of contact for Accurx users, providing responsive, effective, and friendly support. Not only that, everyone will look to you to keep your eyes peeled on ways to further improve user support. Big shoes to fill! Are you up for the challenge?
📈 Operations Support Manager, HeliosX Group – This opportunity is for someone who can run a tight ship! HeliosX Group is on the hunt for someone who can dive into their current processes, provide insights for improvement opportunities, and understand upcoming projects to ensure seamless integration into operations. Sounds like you? You know what to do!
🎨 Senior Product Designer, DrDoctor – Pigeon admires someone with an eye for detail! Creating usable, informative, and aesthetically pleasing interface designs isn't easy, but someone has to do it! If you're someone who can effortlessly craft the best possible experiences and outcomes for users, this Senior Product Designer role might just be the one for you!
*Flap. Flap right off. Why, what did you think we meant?
**Pigeon is, as far as we know, the only publication to make healthtech-related puns about Shakespeare, Cypress Hill and 1970s science fiction in a six week period. Say what you like about Pigeon (and people do!), but you can’t deny we’ve got range.
Got news, jobs or events you think is worth coo-ing over? Let us know! Email us: news@healthtechpigeon.com
SomX is a communications and creative agency for healthcare. We are clinicians, scientists, creatives and communicators dedicated to serving our healthtech, biotech, pharma and public sector clients with services across strategy, content, PR, design, events and media production. Get in touch to learn more.