Gail Casper, Deputy Director of Project HealthDesign
Although I was unable to attend several talks and demonstrations at the recent Health2.0 convention in San Francisco, I believe I had the “best seat in the house” while staffing the Project HealthDesign booth in the Exhibit Hall. Not only was I accompanied by the creators of the booth Joseph Pullen and Bob McKinnon of Galewill, I also had the opportunity to share time with several of the Project HealthDesign grantees and to talk with many of the Health2.0 participants who stopped by the booth. I was a bit surprised at the virtually constant flow of interested people stopping by, both during breaks and during sessions.
Because our booth displayed a number of physical devices, many people first stopped by because they thought we were selling something. But they stayed to learn more about our five projects, to view the devices they used and see the data displays created for both patients and clinicians. Matt Lee’s panel presentation on Monday generated considerable interest in the dwellSense project and the medication sensor; while others were intrigued more for the apps’ personal utility. People who had a newborn infant at home were particularly interested in the Estrellita app.
Others who stopped by were interested in learning more about Project HealthDesign in general and in exploring potential synergies with their own work. The booth gave us a terrific opportunity to talk about Observations of Daily Living (ODLs) and to emphasize the importance of patient-centered data.
Many people inquired about a next round of funding for Project HealthDesign. Although disappointing to those who were asking, we appreciated the opportunity to let people know that Project HealthDesign will officially end in June, 2013. While Project HealthDesign is coming to an end, we are confident that “our work” will continue, as more providers, developers and patients examine our project’s findings and build on our foundation.
I would be remiss not to mention the grantees who so successfully represented their projects at the Health2.0 booth:
Matt Lee for dwellSense
Gillian Hayes and Sen Hirano for Estrellita
Lucia Rojas-Smith for BreathEasy
Kathy Kim and Christina Sabee for iN Touch
Marcos Athanasoulis and Nikolai Kirienko for Chronology.MD
Many thanks to all of them for the commitment of time, energy and intellect to this program.