5 Technological Advances in Healthcare
Technology in healthcare eases workflows, betters patient outcomes, lowers costs and improves record keeping and communication. As technology advances, broader opportunities for its application do as well. Technology also empowers patients to be in tune with their own health through trackers, wearables and sensors.
Although still in the infancy of development, here’s a list of 5 new “smart“ advances that caught our eye:
Temporary tattoos: the Electrozyme is a temporary tattoo that measures lactate and can monitor muscular exertion, fatigue, hydration levels and electrolyte balance.1
Shirts: using smart shirts designs from professional athletes, researchers have developed the Hexoskin, a shirt that will measure lung function in COPD, asthma, cystic fibrosis or after transplantation. The hope is that these shirts will allow physicians to remotely assess when symptoms are progressing.2
Contact lenses: Google and Alcon are hoping to launch smart contact lenses will continuously monitoring the wearers blood sugar levels in real time. The lenses will send data to a smartphone, which could in turn relay alerts to their physician.3
Bras: the iTBra, provides an on-the-go digital breast self-exam. Women are suggested to wear the bra one day a month so it can assess subtle temperature changes that may indicate a tumor.4
Underwear: for those worried about the impact of electromagnetic rays from smartphones on reproductive organs, Riparo has developed boxer briefs with silver woven into the fabric. The manufacturer claims they will block 99.99 percent of radiation from smartphones and other devices.5
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