(Special interview for iPhone Medical Apps)

Voalté successfully integrated an interesting innovative iPhone-based clinical communications project in Sarasota Memorial Hospital in September 2009(link).

After 3 months, when it has become already possible to speak about real results of the project, we decided to address the Vice President of Innovation of Voalté, Trey Lauderdale, and ask him several questions. We believe that the answers on these items are interesting for professionals of the branch.

Q:  So, Trey, if it’s not difficult, let’s start with a couple of words about your company.
No problem.
Voalté helps improve hospital mobile point-of-care communication by providing a complete solution for voice, alarms and text messaging on a robust expandable platform – the Apple iPhone. We were started in Fall 2008 in Sarasota, Florida.

Q: Great! Now I would like to ask several questions directly about the introduced software solution. How can you characterize the results after two months of program integration in Sarasota Memorial Hospital?
The pilot of Voalté One has been an amazing success at Sarasota Memorial Hospital. I truly feel we were able to strike a win-win relationship with the organization and we were lucky to have such a great hospital in our backyard. We were able to learn an unbelievable amount from their caregivers and it has greatly helped to improve the functionality we are able to offer as a company to our end-users. It was also a win for SMH in that they were able to help shape the future of point-of-care communication on the iPhone and were able to leverage the advanced communication functionality we could offer to them with this innovative platform.

Q: Could you, please, mention the most interesting responses from the patients and the clinic staff as the main users?
One of the most interesting comments we received came from two separate patients the day of go-live at the pilot unit. Almost immediately we were able to drastically reduce overhead paging in the hospital. There were two different patients who had been in the nursing unit a few days, and separately, they both asked their nurses if everything was OK in the unit. The nurses said yes, and asked why. Both patients said they noticed the unit was so much quieter than the day before and wanted to make sure everything was alright.
Keeping the nursing floors quiet is unbelievably important to nurse management because it helps patients sleep and rest better which leads to better patient outcomes. We were thrilled to hear our solution was able to effect noise in and around the room the day of Go-live.

Q: it would be interesting for our readers to learn about the basic parameters of solution integration(integration terms; the budget, counted for the one user; requirements to the staff; whether it is necessary to carry out training etc.)
We provide a turn key solution to the hospital to get iPhone’s in at the point-of-care. Hospitals don’t want (and really don’t have the time) to purchase piece-meal solutions that aren’t made to fit their workflow.
We provide the hardware, installation, integration to hospital’s PBX, integration to middleware, training to users, and go-live support to make sure the project is a success.

Q: If it’s not a commercial secret, are you going to integrate similar solutions in the USA and other countries? What level of interest in similar systems, including the interest of the state structures, is there now?
Our goal is to continue growing our market share in the U.S. acute care hospital setting. As we see new opportunities develop for our software, we will investigate them accordingly. Right now, we feel the greatest return on investment for our solution is at the point-of-care.

Q: As for you, which of mobile platforms, along with iPhone, have prospects for the mass use in clinics? Why?
The iPhone and RIM BlackBerry seem to be the two devices gaining the most traction in healthcare. RIM still has a strong presence due to it’s support by IT staffs and technical teams. Without a doubt, the iPhone is still the hot item right now, and the App store has helped make it even hotter. Apple claims more than 700 medical apps which is unbelievable- just think of the number of apps that will be out in a few years. The raw number of applications and the number of developers storming to the iPhone was a deciding factor in why Voalté selected to develop on the iPhone first.
One other platform worthy of mention is the Google Android. With the launch of the 2.0 firmware Google has started to get minimal attention in healthcare. The openness of Android platform allows developers to access a number of API’s they would not be able to get to on an iPhone. The result (in theory) should lead to deeper app’s available only on the Android. Only time will tell if developers fully embrace the Android in healthcare as much as they have the iPhone.

Q: It would be interesting to learn from your words what is the venture investors’ estimation of the start-up investments perspective in the mHealth sphere? What ideas for investment in the mHealth sphere will be the most popular during next 2-3 years?
mHealth, as in all new industries, will take a few years to gel before the market leaders begin to take form. We have big players entering the field (Cisco, GE, Philips, etc). I think it is great that they are getting involved so early, but I really think it is the smaller start-ups that will drive the greatest innovation and out-of-the-box ideas.
I think ideas that enable the automatic entering of person health data onto mobile devices and the web (PHR) will be the technologies that have the most success. Unfortunately, the average consumer is not going to take a proactive role in entering their health data into the cloud. I think the companies that find the easiest, most non-intrusive way to get data from the patient to the PHR are going to be the most successful and have the greatest effect on the market.

Q: When mHealth will become popular and start to bring profit on the mass market? What is necessary for this purpose?
That’s a tough question. I think there will be one vendor that finds a way to make this profitable, and the floodgate swill then open. As for time frame, I would say early 2011 to mid 2011 is when the mass market will begin seeing profit.

Trey, Thanks for wonderful interview!
I believe your answers will allow estimating at true worth the mHealth sphere and we’ll see even more interesting and useful decisions on the market soon!

Editor
Vitaliy Goncharuk

The iPhone Medical Apps is a project of The VIactivity LLC

(medical SEO, software development for iPhone and Android, production)