Limited Time Deal Gets You Pro at Half-Price

What Analysts Are Saying About CVS Health Stock - CVS Health (NYSE:CVS) - Benzinga

Get the most recent info and news about CVS Health on HackerNoon, where 10k+ technologists publish stories for 4M+ monthly readers.

CVS Health Corporation provides health services in the United States. The company's Health Care Benefits segment offers traditional, voluntary, and consumer-directed health insurance products and related services. It serves employer groups, individuals, college students, part-time and hourly workers, health plans, health care providers, governmental units, government-sponsored plans, labor groups, and expatriates. Its Pharmacy Services segment offers pharmacy benefit management solutions, including plan design and administration, formulary management, retail pharmacy network management, mail order pharmacy, specialty pharmacy and infusion, clinical, and disease and medical spend management services. It serves employers, insurance companies, unions, government employee groups, health plans, prescription drug plans, Medicaid managed care plans, plans offered on public health insurance and private health insurance exchanges, other sponsors of health benefit plans, and individuals. This segment operates retail specialty pharmacy stores; and specialty mail-order, mail-order dispensing, and compounding pharmacies, as well as branches for infusion and enteral nutrition services. The company's Retail/LTC segment sells prescription and over-the-counter drugs, consumer health and beauty products, and personal care products; and provides health care services through its MinuteClinic walk-in medical clinics. This segment also distributes prescription drugs; and provides related pharmacy consulting and other ancillary services to care facilities and other care settings. As of December 31, 2021, it operated approximately 9,900 retail locations and 1,200 MinuteClinic locations, as well as online retail pharmacy websites, LTC pharmacies, and onsite pharmacies. The company was formerly known as CVS Caremark Corporation and changed its name to CVS Health Corporation in September 2014. CVS Health Corporation was founded in 1963 and is headquartered in Woonsocket, Rhode Island.

CVS Health

The COVID-19 pandemic has spurred significant changes in the way businesses to operate. Particularly, it the growth of e-commerce, including in the pharmaceutical space. As consumer needs and preferences have evolved, e-commerce has become crucial to healthcare delivery. In this post, I will discuss some of the key tech trends in pharmaceutical e-commerce and the development of online pharmacies. has accelerated Online Pharmacy Market Pharmaceutical e-commerce offers a simple, effective, and transparent way to purchase prescription drugs in both B2B and B2C settings, which makes it an especially attractive, fast-growing market. No wonder the world’s largest e-commerce corporations have doubled down on their online pharmacy investments, followed closely by big pharmaceutical companies that are going digital. Here’s a closer look at this global trend. the global e-pharmacy market size is expected to reach US$ 351.9 billion by the end of 2033. It is anticipated to create lucrative growth opportunities over the forecast period by registering a CAGR of 14.3% from 2023 to 2033. According to Future Market Insights Take , an online pharmacy service offered by the e-commerce giant Amazon. It a relatively recent addition to the company’s core platform and aims to make filling prescriptions as easy and convenient as other transactions performed on Amazon. Prime members have access to free two-day delivery of orders and to savings of up to 80% off generic and 40% off branded medications when not paying using insurance. Amazon Pharmacy has become Another major US-based player, , has been in its digital offerings, including its CVS app that allows customers to refill prescriptions, set medication reminders, and access health resources. CVS Health investing heavily Meanwhile in China, , also known as AliHealth, has an online pharmacy platform that offers prescription medications and over-the-counter products. The company also provides telemedicine services and a health management app. Alibaba Health Information Technology launched is a similar project in India. PharmEasy's mobile customers to order medications and other healthcare products, as well as book lab tests and consult with a physician. PharmEasy app allows Harnessing the Cutting-Edge Tech As the above examples suggest, the growth of pharmaceutical e-commerce falls within a wider trend toward the digitization of the healthcare industry. Both pharmacies and healthcare providers technological innovations in areas including telemedicine, AI, blockchain, and the IoT to develop and deliver novel treatments and services. effectively harness Integration of technologies gives rise to a new type of service, an e-pharmacy, which potentially can transform beyond its initial scope of selling medications online. By collaborating with other healthcare providers, such as hospitals and clinics, e-pharmacies can offer patients seamless access to a wide range of healthcare services and serve as a central hub for a comprehensive healthcare platform. This emerging trend has the potential to transform the way we think about healthcare, by providing patients with a convenient and holistic approach to managing their health. Artificial Intelligence The biggest advantage of AI-driven healthcare is personalisation. E-commerce companies are to develop personalised treatment plans, product recommendations, email marketing, and promotions. AI is also being used to with chatbots and virtual assistants that can answer customer queries and provide customer support. using AI improve the customer experience When it comes to treatment plans, AI-assisted pharmacists can use data from a patient's medical history, genetics, and lifestyle to manage both acute and chronic conditions. This can help optimise medication therapy and reduce the risk of adverse events. The patient experience can be further enhanced with AI-enabled chatbots and virtual assistants that can respond to customer queries and provide support. Furthermore, AI can be used to help patients manage their prescribed treatment by sending out alerts that remind them to take medications or refill prescriptions, as well as warnings about potential drug interactions or side effects. Telemedicine Many online pharmacies—including Amazon, , , and CVS, among others—already provide telemedicine consultations. Telemedicine is the practice of using telecommunication and information technologies to provide remote clinical services. This technology can help online pharmacies offer virtual consultations and remote monitoring to patients, increasing access to medical care. Hims Sesame The Internet of Things IoT devices can monitor patient health and transmit data to healthcare providers, allowing for more personalised treatment plans. With regard to pharmacies, IoT devices can be used to monitor the temperature and humidity levels of pharmaceutical products during shipping and storage. Blockchain In the pharmaceutical industry, Blockchain technology can be utilised to improve supply chain transparency and prevent counterfeiting. With blockchain, e-commerce companies can track the movement of pharmaceutical products from the manufacturer to the end consumer, ensuring that the products are authentic and have not been tampered with. Each transaction or movement of the product is recorded on the blockchain, creating an immutable trail of the product's journey. If a pharmaceutical product has been compromised during transportation, the blockchain will show an irregularity in its movement, allowing the e-commerce company to investigate and take appropriate action. One example of a company using blockchain in the pharmaceutical industry is Blockpharma, a French startup that is using blockchain and ML to combat medicine counterfeiting. Alibaba Case A more prominent example is the case of Alibaba Health Information Technology, a subsidiary of Chinese online retail giant Alibaba. The company has created a one-stop healthcare platform and provides a comprehensive range of clinical services, including online consultation, medicine delivery, and appointment booking. Aside from conventional medical care, Alibaba Health has also partnered with Traditional Chinese Medicine hospitals so that patients can consult with traditional healthcare practitioners remotely and receive prescribed herbal medicine through Alibaba Health's logistics network. Additionally, Alibaba Health has developed a medication traceability system to ensure the authenticity and safety of the drugs sold on their platform. This system uses blockchain technology to track the entire supply chain of a drug, from production to distribution. Alibaba Health's online pharmacy business has been particularly important during the COVID-19 pandemic, when online consultations and medicine delivery have made it easier for patients to access the healthcare they need while minimising their exposure to the virus. This makes Alibaba Health's e-commerce pharmaceutical business a prime example of the potential for technology to revolutionise healthcare. By investing in advanced tech, Alibaba Health is transforming the way medical care is delivered in China and setting a precedent for the rest of the world. To conclude The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the growth of e-commerce, particularly in the pharmaceutical space, as consumer needs and preferences have evolved.  The growth of pharmaceutical e-commerce falls within a wider trend toward the digitization of the healthcare industry, which integrates technologies such as telemedicine, AI, blockchain, and the IoT to develop and deliver novel treatments and services. These technologies can help personalise treatment plans, improve the customer experience, increase access to medical care, monitor patient health and transmit data, improve supply chain transparency, and prevent counterfeiting. The case of Alibaba Health Information Technology demonstrates how a one-stop healthcare platform can provide a comprehensive range of clinical services, including online consultation, medicine delivery, and appointment booking.

Tech Trends Driving E-Pharmacy

Welcome! Happy to see you in the fifth part of my Vuejs Amsterdam Conference 2022 summary series, in which I share a summary of all the talks with you. You can read my JSWorld Conference 2022 Summary series (in four parts) , where I summarized all the first day's talks. You can also find the previous Talks of the Vue Amsterdam conference 2022 in my blog. here (Recurring) Introduction After two and a half years, JSWorld and Vue Amsterdam Conference were back in Theater Amsterdam between 1 and 3 June, and I had the chance to attend this conference for the first time. I learned many things, met many wonderful people, spoke with great developers, and had a great time. On the first day the JSWorld Conference was held, and on the second and third days, the Vue Amsterdam. The conference was full of information with great speakers, each of whom taught me something valuable. They all wanted to share their knowledge and information with other developers. So I thought it would be great if I could continue to share it and help others use it. At first, I tried to share a few notes or slides, but I felt it was not good enough, at least not as good as what the speaker shared with me. So I decided to re-watch each speech, dive deeper into them, search, take notes and combine them with their slides and even their exact words in their speech and then share it with you so that what I share with you is at least at the same level as what I learned from them. A Very Important Point and I have only tried to learn them so that I can turn them into these articles. Even This means if you learn something new, it is because of their efforts. (So if you see some misinformation blame them, not me, right? xD) Everything you read during these few articles is the result of the effort and time of the speaker itself, many of the sentences written in these articles are exactly what they said or what they wrote in Slides. Last but not least, I may not dig into every technical detail or live codings in some of the speeches. But if you are interested and need more information, let me know and I’ll try to write a more detailed article separately. Also, don’t forget to check out their Twitter/Linkedin. you can find the program of the conference. Here Reusable Widgets That Work! - Head of Accessibility Training and Sr Manager of Accessibility Engineering at CVS Health Maria Lamardo Vue.js is an amazing framework that allows you to quickly build reusable components. We can leverage this to build accessible reusable widgets with the help of ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Application). Using ARIA roles and attributes, we can improve the accessibility of certain elements by providing additional semantics. In this talk, we will go over how to follow the specifications and build accessible and reusable tabs, accordions, toggle buttons, and modal dialogs that work for everyone! Modal All the things that you need to know about ARIA are well documented in and it is recommended to read, but here is an abstracted version of it. W3C Modals Design Considerations It must have a button that closes the dialog. The content outside of the dialog should be obscured with visual styling like a grey background. Make sure you prevent users from interacting with content outside of the dialog. Modals Opening Focus Interaction When a dialog opens, focus can be set on either the first focusable element, or a static element at the top of the dialog to make content easier to read and ensure that all the content remains in view, or the most frequently used element if interactions are limited to providing information or continue processing. You don’t wanna set focus to something that is going to be destructive for the user, for example, let’s imagine you have an interaction where you open a modal to delete your account. You don’t want to set the first focus on “Yes, delete my account”. Modals Closing Focus Interaction When a dialog closes, the focus is set on the element that invoked the dialog, or when it doesn’t make sense you can set the focus on a different element, like an element that provides logical workflow if invoking element no longer exists, or on the next element if there is a subsequent step in the workflow following dialog task completion, especially if immediately reopening dialog is very unlikely. Modals Keyboard Interaction Tab Moves focus to next tabbable element in modalLooping around to first element Shift + Tab Moves focus to previous tabbable element in modalLooping around to last element Escape Closes the dialog Modals Technical Considerations Dialog container should have: Role of dialog set to true. aria-modal or referring to dialog title, this is going to help assistive technologies figure out what the naming of this element will be. aria-label aria-labelledby Optionally you can set to any description. aria-describedby All elements required to operate the dialog should be descendants of the element that has a dialog role. <div 
	role="dialog" 
	aria-modal="true"
	aria-labelledby="title"
	aria-describedby="description"
>
	<h2 id="title">Title of the dialog</h2>

	<p id="description">Information provided by the dialog.</p>

	<button aria-label="close">×</button>
</div> On the mac, you can Activate Voice Over which is the default mac screen reader by clicking Command + F5, and then you can go through your page and test it. Also in chrome Dev-Tools, there is an accessibility tab that has some cool accessibility information. With that, you can open and check it out, and is the code. this example here Toggle Buttons If you want the full information you can find it on the website. W3C Buttons A is a widget that enables users to trigger an action or event, such as submitting a form, opening a dialog, canceling an action, or performing a delete operation. button In addition to the ordinary button widget, WAI-ARIA supports 2 other types of buttons: Toggle buttons Menu buttons Toggle Buttons Design Considerations A two-state button that can be either off (not pressed) or on (pressed). To tell assistive technologies that a button is a toggle button, specify a value for the attribute . aria-pressed The label on a toggle mustn't change when its state changes; if the label changes in the design, there is no need for the aria-pressed attribute. Toggle Buttons Focus Handling If activating the button does not dismiss the current context, then focus remains on the button after activation. If activating the button opens or closes a dialog, then follow the dialog pattern. If the button action indicates a context change, you can move focus to the starting point for that action If the button is activated with a shortcut key, then focus usually remains in the context from which the shortcut key was activated Toggle Buttons Keyboard Interaction Enter Activates the button Space Activates the button Toggle Buttons Technical Considerations The Toggle button must have the role of . button Make sure that the button has an accessible name. You can set to any description. aria-describedby You can add set to true if action is unavailable. aria-disabled The toggle button has an state. aria-pressed <button aria-pressed="false">
  Mute
</button> Here is a good that you can check out and is the code. example here Accordions is the complete documentation. Let’s take a look at its main points. Here Accordions Design Considerations Vertically stacked set of interactive headings that each contain a title, content snippet, or thumbnail representing a section of content Accordion Header: Label for or thumbnail representing a section of content that also serves as a control for showing, and in some implementations, hiding the section of content. Accordion Panel: Section of content associated with an accordion header. Accordions Keyboard Interaction Enter or Space Expands associated collapsed panel, optionally collapses other opened panelCollapses associated expanded panel; if the implementation allows. Tab Moves focus to the next focusable element Shift + Tab Moves focus to the previous focusable element Down Arrow (Optional) Moves focus from the accordion header to the next accordion header Optionally loops back to the first accordion header. Up Arrow (Optional) Moves focus from accordion header to the previous accordion header Optionally loops back to last accordion header Home (Optional) Moves focus from an accordion header to the first accordion header End (Optional) Moves focus from an accordion header to the last accordion header Accordions Technical Considerations Make sure that Each accordion header button has: wrapped in a heading set to the ID of the corresponding accordion panel content aria-controls set to true if corresponding panel content is visible aria-expanded set to true if the collapsing accordion is not permitted aria-disabled Each panel content has and to the corresponding header button (Optional) role region aria-labelledby Avoid using the region role in circumstances that create too many landmark region Accordions Code Example <h3>
   <button
     aria-expanded="true"
     class="Accordion-trigger"
     aria-controls="sect1"
     id="accordion1id"
	 >
		Accordion 1
   </button>
 </h3> <div
   id="sect1"
   role="region"
   aria-labelledby="accordion1id"
   class="Accordion-panel"
>
	Content Placeholder
</div> Here is a good and its . example code Tabs You can see Tabs’ full documentation on . W3C Tabs Design Considerations Tabs are a set of layered sections of content, known as tab panels, that display one panel of content at a time. A set of tab elements contained in a element Tab List: tablist An element in the tab list that serves as a label for one of the tab panels and can be activated to display that panel Tab: The element that contains the content associated with a tab Tab panel: It is recommended that tabs activate automatically when they receive focus as long as their associated tab panels are displayed without noticeable latency. Tabs Keyboard Interaction Tab Places focus on the active tab element when user moves into the tab list Left Arrow (Horizontal tabs) Up Arrow (Vertical tabs) Moves focus to the previous tab; looping to the last tabOptionally, activates the newly focused tab Right Arrow (Horizontal tabs) Down Arrow (Vertical tabs) Moves focus to the next tab; looping to the first tabOptionally, activates the newly focused tab Space or Enter Activates the tab if it was not activated automatically on focus Shift + F10 When focus is on a tab that has an associated popup menu, opens the menu Tabs Optional Keyboard Interaction Home (optional) Moves focus to the first tabOptionally, activates the newly focused tab End(optional) Moves focus to the last tabOptionally, activates the newly focused tab Delete(optional) If deletion is allowed, deletes (closes) the current tab element and its associated tab panel, sets focus on the tab following the tab that was closed, and optionally activates the newly focused tab Tabs Technical Considerations Element containing a set of tabs must have or . Role of Tablist: aria-labelledby aria-label The element that serves as a tab must have paired to the associated tabpanel, the active tab should have the state aria-selected set to true; all other tabs are set to false. Role of Tab: aria-controls And it should have the property aria-haspopup set to either menu or true if a tab element has a pop-up menu. Element containing content panel for a tab should have aria-labelledby paired to associated tab, and set aria-orientation to vertical or horizontal (default). Role of Tabpanel: Tabs Code Example <div role="tablist" aria-label="Tabs Example">
  <button
    role="tab"
    aria-selected="true"
    aria-controls="tab1-content"
    id="tab1"
  >Tab 1 </button>

  <button
    role="tab"
    aria-selected="false"
    aria-controls="tab2-content"
    id="tab2"
    tabindex="-1"
  >Tab 2</button>
</div> <div 
  tabindex="0" 
  role="tabpanel"  
  aria-labelledby="tab1"
  id="tab1-content">
  <p>Content 1</p>
</div>

<div
  tabindex="0"
  role="tabpanel"
  aria-labelledby="tab2"
  id="tab2-content">
  <p>Content 2</p>
</div> Here is a good and its . example code Resources ARIA Authoring Practices Guide Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 You can find a complete Vue code example with different components here: https://github.com/mlama007/Widgets End of the Talk fifth I hope you enjoyed this part and it can be as valuable to you as it was to me. Over the next few days, I’ll share the rest of the talks with you. Stay tuned… Also published . here

Vue Amsterdam 2022: Part V - Reusable Widgets That Work!

Vue Amsterdam 2022: Parte V - ¡Widgets reutilizables que funcionan!

Vue Amsterdam 2022 : Partie V - Widgets réutilisables qui fonctionnent !

Vue एम्स्टर्डम 2022: भाग V - पुन: प्रयोज्य विजेट जो काम करते हैं!

Vue アムステルダム 2022: パート V - 機能する再利用可能なウィジェット!

Vue Amsterdam 2022: Parte V - Widgets reutilizáveis que funcionam!

Vue Amsterdam 2022: Phần V - Các vật dụng có thể tái sử dụng hoạt động!

Vue Amsterdam 2022：第五部分 - 可重复使用的小部件！

These are the 100+ Companies Hiring Data Scientists Now

List of 50 Billion Dollar Companies (and their Key Leaders) Who are Using Blockchain Technology Introducing Blockchain 50 With assistance from industry consultants and other experts, ’ team of reporters and editors identified more than 100 big companies actively exploring blockchain through industry consortiums and other proprietary projects. This new list features 50 — with minimum revenues or valuations of $1 billion, and U.S. operations — that are currently leading the way in adapting decentralized ledgers to their operating needs. Forbes Allianz SE - Germany Hyperledger Fabric, Corda Robert Crozier, head of Allianz’s Global Blockchain Centre of Competence Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Amazon - Seattle Hyperledger Fabric, Ethereum (later in 2019) Rahul Pathak, general manager of Amazon Managed Blockchain at AWS Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Anheuser-Busch InBev - Leuven, Belgium Ethereum, Corda Tassilo Festetics, VP of global solutions Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Ant Financial, Hangzhou- China : Ant Blockchain : Geoff Jiang, VP of Ant Financial Blockchain Platforms Key leader BBVA-Bilbao, Spain : Hyperledger Fabric, Corda, public Ethereum : Carlos Kuchkovsky, CTO, new digital business Blockchain platforms Key leader Bitfury- Amsterdam : Exonum, Bitcoin : Valery Vavilov, CEO and cofounder Blockchain platforms Key leadership BNP Paribas- Paris : Corda, Hyperledger Fabric, Ethereum : Jacques Levet, head of transaction banking for Europe, Middle East and Africa Blockchain platforms Key leader BP PLC- London : Ethereum, Cardano, Quorum : Julian Gray, technology director, Digital Innovation Organization Blockchain platforms Key leader Broadridge- New York City : Hyperledger Fabric, DAML, Quorum : Michael Tae, head of strategy Blockchain platforms Key leader Bumble Bee Foods- San Diego : Multichain : Tony Costa, CIO Blockchain platform Key leader Cargill- Wayzata, Minnesota : Hyperledger Sawtooth, Hyperledger Grid : Keith Narr, VP, Cargill Digital Labs Blockchain platforms Key leader Ciox Health- Alpharetta, Ga : Ethereum : Florian Quarre, chief digital officer Blockchain platform Key leader Citigroup- New York City Ethereum Puneet Singhvi, managing director Blockchain platform: Key leader: Coinbase- San Francisco Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, Lumen Brian Armstrong, CEO; his Coinbase holdings make him a billionaire Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Comcast- Philadelphia Bitcoin, Ethereum, Hyperledger Fabric, Quorum Gil Beyda, managing director, Comcast Ventures Blockchain platforms: Key leader: CVS Health- Woonsocket, RI IBM Blockchain, Hyperledger Indy, Hyperledger Sawtooth Claus Torp Jensen, CTO of both CVS and Aetna Blockchain platforms: Key leader: The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation- Jersey City Axcore Rob Palatnick, chief technology architect Blockchain platform: Key leader: Facebook- Menlo Park, CA Unknown David Marcus, blockchain lead Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Fidelity- Boston Bitcoin, Ethereum Tom Jessop, president, Fidelity Digital Assets Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Foxconn- Taipei, Taiwan Ethereum Jack Lee, founding managing partner of venture arm HCM Capital Blockchain platform: Key leader: Golden State Foods- Irvine, CA IBM Blockchain Bob Wolpert, chief strategy and innovation officer Blockchain platform: Key Executives: Google- Mountain View, CA Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum Classic, Litecoin, Zcash, Dogecoin, Dash Allen Day, science advocate Blockchain platforms: Key leader: HPE- San Jose, CA Corda, Ethereum, Quorum, Sia, Hyperledger Fabric Raphael Davison, worldwide director of blockchain Blockchain platforms: Key leader: HTC- Taoyuan, Taiwan Bitcoin, Ethereum Phil Chen, decentralized chief officer Blockchain platforms: Key leader: IBM- Amsterdam Corda, Quorum, Hyperledger Fabric, Hyperledger Indy Mariana Gomez de la Villa, program director of distributed ledger technology Blockchain platforms: Key leader: ING- Amsterdam Corda, Quorum, Hyperledger Fabric, Hyperledger Indy Mariana Gomez de la Villa, program director of distributed ledger technology Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Intel- Santa Clara, CA Corda, Ethereum, Hyperledger Fabric, Hyperledger Sawtooth Michael Reed, director, blockchain program Blockchain platforms: Key leader: JPMorgan Chase- New York City Quorum Christine Moy, blockchain lead Blockchain platform: Key leader: Maersk- Copenhagen IBM Blockchain, Corda Michael J. White, head of TradeLens Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Mastercard- Purchase, NY Its own platform, built from scratch. Ken Moore, EVP and head of Mastercard Labs Blockchain platform: Key leader: MetLife- New York City InsureChain built on Ethereum Zia Zaman, CIO of MetLife Asia Blockchain platform: Key leader: Microsoft- Redmond, WA Ethereum, Parity, Quorum, Corda, Hyperledger Fabric Mark Russinovich, CTO of Microsoft Azure Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Nasdaq- New York City Symbiont, Corda, Hyperledger Fabric Johan Toll, head of digital assets, market technology Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Nestle- Vevey, Switzerland IBM Blockchain Benjamin Dubois, manager of digital transformation Blockchain platform: Key leader: Northern Trust- Chicago Hyperledger Fabric, Ethereum Justin Chapman, head of market advocacy and research Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Oracle- Redwood Shores, CA Oracle Blockchain Platform Frank Xiong, group vice president, Blockchain Development Platform Blockchain platform: Key leader: Overstock- Midvale, UT Bitcoin, Ethereum, RVN, Florin Patrick Byrne, founder and CEO of Overstock Blockchain platforms: Key leader: PNC- Pittsburgh Hyperledger Fabric, DAML, Corda, Ripple J. Christopher Ward, EVP and head of Treasury product management Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Ripple- San Francisco XRP Ledger Brad Garlinghouse, CEO Blockchain platform: Key leader: Samsung- Seoul Nexledger, Ethereum Jeanie Hong, SVP and head of Blockchain Center Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Santander- Madrid RippleNet, Hyperledger Fabric María de la Concepción de Monteverde, director of the Blockchain Center of Excellence Blockchain platforms: Key leader: SAP SE- Walldorf, Germany Hyperledger Fabric, MultiChain, Quorum Raimund Gross, chief innovation strategist, Blockchain Blockchain platform: Key leader: Seagate Technology- Cupertino, CA Hyperledger Fabric Manuel Offenberg, managing technologist and data security research lead Blockchain platform: Key leader: Siemens- Munich Ethereum, Hyperledger Fabric, Corda Bernd Rosauer, head of research, Technology Field IT Platforms Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Signature Bank- New York City A private, Ethereum-based blockchain Frank Santora, senior vice president and director of digital asset solutions Blockchain platform: Key leader: State Farm- Bloomington, IL Hyperledger Fabric, Corda, Quorum Mike Fields, innovation executive at State Farm RED Labs Blockchain platforms: Key leader: UBS- Zurich Hyperledger Fabric, Ethereum, Quorum, Corda Sam Chadwick, head of blockchain Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Visa- San Francisco Hyperledger Fabric . Kevin Phalen, global head of business solutions Blockchain platform: Key leader: VMware- Palo Alto, CA Project Concord, a new blockchain, which supports multiple frameworks such as Ethereum Mike DiPetrillo, senior director, Blockchain Blockchain platforms: Key leader: Walmart- Bentonville, AR Hyperledger Fabric Karl Bedwell, senior director, Global Business Services & Technology Blockchain platform: Key leader:

List of Leading Billion Dollar Companies using Blockchain

This article is coreported with KFF Health News KFF Health News Read on our collaborator's site Read on our collaborator's site This article was coreported with KFF Health News, a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF. Sign up for KFF Health News’s newsletters. This article was coreported with KFF Health News, a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF. Sign up for KFF Health News’s newsletters. KFF Health News’s newsletters Looking for an at-home HIV test on CVS’s website is not as private an experience as one might think. An investigation by The Markup and KFF Health News found trackers on CVS.com telling some of the biggest social media and advertising platforms the products customers viewed. And CVS is not the only pharmacy sharing this kind of sensitive data. We found trackers collecting browsing- and purchase-related data on websites of 12 of the U.S.’s biggest drugstores, including grocery store chains with pharmacies, and sharing the sensitive information with companies like Meta (formerly Facebook), Google, through its advertising and analytics products, and Microsoft, through its search engine, Bing. The tracking tools, popularly called “pixels,” collect information while a website runs. That information is often sent to social media firms and used to target ads, either to you personally or to groups of people that resemble you in demographics or habits. In previous investigations, The Markup found pixels transmitting information from the U.S. Department of Education, prominent hospitals, telehealth startups, and major tax preparation companies. the U.S. Department of Education prominent hospitals telehealth startups major tax preparation companies Pharmacy retailer websites’ pixels send a shopper’s IP address—a sort of mailing address for a person’s computer or household internet—to social media giants and other firms. They also send cookies, a way of storing information in a user’s browser that in this case helps track a user from page to page as the user browses a retailer’s site. Cookies can sometimes also associate individuals on a site with their account on a social media platform. In addition to the IP address and cookies, the pixels often send information about what you’ve clicked or bought, including sensitive items such as HIV tests. “HIV testing is the gateway to HIV prevention and treatment services,” said Oni Blackstock, the founder of Health Justice and a former assistant commissioner for New York City’s Bureau of HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control, in an interview. “People living with HIV should have control over whether someone knows their status,” she said. Many retailers shared other detailed interaction data with advertising platforms as well. Ten of the retailers we examined alerted at least one tech platform when shoppers clicked “add to cart” as they shopped for retail goods, a capacious category that included sensitive products like prenatal vitamins, pregnancy tests, and Plan B emergency contraception. Supermarket giant Kroger, for instance, informed Meta, Bing, Twitter, Snapchat, and Pinterest when a shopper added Plan B to the cart, and informed Google and Nextdoor, a social media platform on which people from the same neighborhood gather in forums, that a shopper had visited the page for the item. Walmart informed Google’s advertising service when a shopper browsed the page of an HIV test, and Pinterest when that shopper added it to the cart. A previous investigation from The Markup found that Kroger used loyalty cards to track, analyze, and sell an array of data about customers to advertisers. previous investigation Using Chrome DevTools, a tool built into Google’s Chrome browser, The Markup and KFF Health News visited the websites of 12 of the U.S.’s biggest drugstores and examined their network traffic. This monitoring tool allowed us to see what information about shopping habits and, in some cases, prescriptions were sent to third parties. Over the course of the investigation, retailers frequently changed their trackers—sometimes activating them, sometimes removing them. Some retailers appeared to be taking steps to limit tracking on sensitive items. For example, Walgreens’ website prevented some trackers from activating on the pages of some products, which included Plan B and HIV tests. This code didn’t prevent all tracking, though: Walgreens’ site continued sending Pinterest information about those sensitive items a user added to the cart. Walgreens shared a new policy after learning of The Markup and KFF Health News’s findings. Spokesperson Fraser Engerman said that while the chain already had a “robust privacy program,” it would no longer share browsing data related to reproductive health and HIV testing. Engerman also told us that “Pinterest confirmed that the data will be deleted and that it has not been used for advertising purposes.” Crystal Espinosa, a spokesperson for Pinterest, said the company “can confirm that we will be deleting the data Walgreens requested.” The Pharmacy vs. the Pharmacy Aisle In the U.S., drugstores and grocery stores with associated pharmacies are only partially covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA. The prescriptions picked up from the pharmacy counter do have this protection. But in a separate section, sometimes confusingly called the pharmacy aisle, stores also often sell over-the-counter medications, tests, and other health-related products. Consumers might think such purchases have similar protections to their prescriptions, but HIPAA only covers the pharmacy counter’s clinical operations, such as dispensing prescriptions and answering patients’ questions about medication. This distinction can be confusing enough inside the brick-and-mortar location of a retailer. But the line can become even harder to make out on a website, which lacks the clarifying delineations of physical space. What’s more, descriptions about what will happen with retail data are generally in retailers’ privacy policies, which can usually be found in a link at the bottom of their webpages. The Markup and KFF Health News found them murky at best, and none of them were specific about the parts of the site that were covered by HIPAA and the parts that weren’t. In the “Privacy Notice for California Residents” part of its privacy policy, Kroger says it processes “personal information collected and analyzed concerning a consumer’s health.” But, the policy continues, the company does not “sell or share” that information. Other information is sold: According to the policy, in the last 12 months, the company sold or shared “protected classification characteristics” to outside entities like data brokers. privacy policy Kroger spokesperson Erin Rolfes said the company strives to be transparent and that “[i]n many cases, we have provided more information to our customers in our privacy notices than our peers.” Brokering of general retail data is widespread. Our investigation found, though, that some websites shared sensitive clinical data with third parties even when that information would be protected at a HIPAA-covered pharmacy counter. Users attempting to schedule a vaccine appointment at Rite Aid, for example, must answer a survey first to gauge eligibility. This investigation found that Rite Aid has sent Facebook responses to questions such as: Do you have a neurological disorder such as seizures or other disorders that affect the brain or have had a disorder that resulted from a vaccine?
Do you have cancer, leukemia, AIDS, or any other immune system problem?
Are you pregnant or could you become pregnant in the next three months? Do you have a neurological disorder such as seizures or other disorders that affect the brain or have had a disorder that resulted from a vaccine? Do you have cancer, leukemia, AIDS, or any other immune system problem? Are you pregnant or could you become pregnant in the next three months? The Markup and KFF Health News documented Rite Aid sharing this data with Facebook in December 2022. In February of this year, a proposed class action lawsuit based on similar findings was filed against the drugstore chain in California, alleging code on Rite Aid’s website sent Facebook the time of an appointment and an identifier for the appointment location, demographic information, and answers to questions about vaccination history and health conditions. Rite Aid has moved to dismiss the suit. proposed class action After the lawsuit was filed, The Markup and KFF Health News tested Rite Aid’s website again, and it was no longer sending answers to vaccination questions to Facebook. Rite Aid isn’t the only company that sent answers to eligibility questionnaires to social media firms. Supermarkets Albertsons, Acme, and Safeway, which are owned by the same parent company, also sent answers to questions in their vaccination intake form—albeit in a format that requires cross-referencing the questionnaire’s source code to reveal the meaning of the data. Using the Firefox web browser’s Network Monitor tool, and with the help of a patient with an active prescription at Rite Aid, KFF Health News and The Markup also found Rite Aid sending the names of patients’ specific prescriptions to Facebook. Rite Aid kept sharing prescription names even after the company stopped sharing answers to vaccination questions in response to the proposed class action (which did not mention the sharing of prescription information). Rite Aid did not respond to requests for comment, and as of June 23, the pixel was still present and sending the names of prescriptions to Facebook. Network Monitor Other companies shared data about medications from other parts of their sites. Customers of Sam’s Club and Costco, for example, can search names of prescriptions on each retailer’s website to find the local pharmacy with the cheapest prices. But the two websites also sent the name of the medication the user searched for, along with the user’s IP address, to social media companies. Many of the retailers The Markup and KFF Health News looked at did not respond to questions or declined to comment, including Costco and Sam’s Club. Albertsons said the company “continually” evaluates its privacy practices. CVS said it was compliant with “applicable laws.” Kroger’s Rolfes wrote that the company’s “trackers disclose product information, which is not sensitive health information unless one or more inferences are made. Kroger does not make any inferences linking the product information collected or disclosed by trackers to an individual’s health condition.” A Huge Regulatory Challenge Pharmacies are just one facet of a huge health care sector. But the industry as a whole has been roiled by disclosures of tracking pixels picking up sensitive clinical data. After an investigation by The Markup in June 2022 found widespread use of trackers on hospital websites, regulatory and legal attention has homed in on the practice. found widespread use of trackers In December, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights published guidance advising health providers and insurers how pixel trackers’ use can be consistent with HIPAA. “Regulated entities are not permitted to use tracking technologies in a manner that would result in impermissible disclosures” of protected health information to tracking technology or other third-party vendors, according to the official bulletin. published guidance If implemented, the guidance would provide a path for the agency to regulate hospitals and other providers and fine those who don’t follow it. In an interview with an industry publication in late April, the director of the Office for Civil Rights said it would be bringing its first enforcement action for pixel use “hopefully soon.” bringing its first enforcement action Lobbying groups are seeking to confine any regulatory fallout: The American Hospital Association, for example, sent a letter on May 22 to the Office for Civil Rights asking that the agency “suspend or amend” its guidance. The office, it claimed, was seeking to protect too much data. asking that the agency This year the Federal Trade Commission has pursued action against companies like GoodRx, which offers prescription price comparisons, and BetterHelp, which offers online therapy, for alleged misuse of data from questionnaires and searches. The companies settled with the agency. companies like GoodRx BetterHelp Health care providers have disclosed to the federal government the potential leakage of nearly 10 million patients’ data to various advertising partners, according to a review by The Markup and KFF Health News of breach notification letters and the Office of Civil Rights’ online database of breaches. That figure could be a low estimate: A new study in the journal Health Affairs found that, as of 2021, almost 99 percent of hospital websites contained tracking technologies. 99 percent of hospital websites One prominent law firm, BakerHostetler, is defending hospitals in 26 legal actions related to the use of tracking technologies, lawyer Paul Karlsgodt, a partner at the firm, said during a webinar this year. “We’ve seen an absolute eruption of cases,” he said. during a webinar Abortion and pregnancy-related data is particularly sensitive and driving regulatory scrutiny. In the same webinar, Lynn Sessions, also with BakerHostetler, said the California attorney general’s office had made specific investigative requests to one of the firm’s clients about whether the client was sharing reproductive health data. It’s unclear whether big tech companies have much interest in helping secure health data. Sessions said BakerHostetler had been trying to get Google and Meta to sign so-called business associate agreements. These agreements would bring the companies under the HIPAA regulatory umbrella, at least when handling data on behalf of hospital clients. “Both of them, at least at this juncture, have not been accommodating in doing that,” Sessions said. Google Analytics’ help page for HIPAA instructs customers to “refrain from using Google Analytics in any way that may create obligations under HIPAA for Google.” help page for HIPAA Meta says it has tools that attempt to prevent the transfer of sensitive information like health data. In a November 2022 letter to Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) obtained by KFF Health News and The Markup, Meta wrote that “the filtering mechanism is designed to prevent that data from being ingested into our ads.” What’s more, the letter noted, the tech giant reaches out to companies transferring potentially sensitive data and asks them to “evaluate their implementation.” November 2022 letter “I remain concerned the company is too passive in allowing individual developers to determine what is considered sensitive health data that should remain private,” Warner told The Markup and KFF Health News. Meta’s claims in its letter to Warner have been repeatedly questioned. In 2020, the company itself acknowledged to New York State regulators that the filtering system was “not yet operating with complete accuracy.” acknowledged to New York State regulators To test the filtering system, Sven Carlsson and Sascha Granberg, reporters for SR Ekot in Sweden, set up a dummy pharmacy website in Swedish, which sent fake, but plausible, health data to Facebook to see whether the company’s filtering systems worked as stated. “We weren’t warned” by Facebook, Carlsson said in an interview with KFF Health News and The Markup. set up a dummy pharmacy website Carlsson’s and Granberg’s work also found European pharmacies engaged in activities similar to what The Markup and KFF Health News have found. The reporters caught a Swedish state-owned pharmacy sending data to Facebook. And a recent investigation with The Guardian found the U.K.-based pharmacy chain LloydsPharmacy was sending sensitive data—including information about symptoms—to TikTok and Facebook. sending data to Facebook recent investigation In response to questions from KFF Health News and The Markup, Meta spokesperson Emil Vazquez said, “Advertisers should not send sensitive information about people through our Business Tools. Doing so is against our policies and we educate advertisers on properly setting up Business Tools to prevent this from occurring. Our system is designed to filter out potentially sensitive data it is able to detect.” Meta did not respond to questions about whether it considered any of the information KFF Health News and The Markup found retailers sending to be “sensitive information,” whether any was actually filtered by the system, or whether Meta could provide metrics demonstrating the current accuracy of the system. In response to our inquiries, Twitter sent a poop emoji, while TikTok and Pinterest said they had policies instructing advertisers not to pass on sensitive information. LinkedIn and Nextdoor did not respond. Google spokesperson Jackie Berté said the company’s policies “prohibit businesses from using sensitive health information to target and serve ads” and that it worked to prevent such information from being used in advertising, using a “combination of algorithmic and human review” to remedy violations of its policy. KFF Health News and The Markup presented Google with screenshots of its pixel sending the search company our browsing information when we landed on the retailers’ pages where we could purchase an HIV test and prenatal vitamins, and of data showing when we added an HIV test to the cart. In response, Berté said the company had “not uncovered any evidence that the businesses in the screenshots are violating our policies.” Editor’s Note: KFF Health News uses Meta’s pixel on its website to collect information that may be used by third-party websites to measure web traffic and performance data and to target ads on social platforms. You can read KFF’s privacy policy in its entirety. The Markup does not use Meta’s pixel or similar trackers. You can read our full privacy promise here. Editor’s Note: KFF’s privacy policy here Credits: Darius Tahir for KFF Health News, Simon Fondrie-Teitler Credits: Darius Tahir for KFF Health News, Simon Fondrie-Teitler Darius Tahir Simon Fondrie-Teitler Also published here Also published here here Photo by Amanda Dalbjörn on Unsplash Photo by Amanda Dalbjörn on Unsplash Amanda Dalbjörn Unsplash

Need to Buy Plan B or an HIV Test? Facebook Already Knows About It

Dr. Daniel Freeman at Oxford VR came up with , a worthy-of-its-name cognitive therapy platform. It uses a mix of technologies — with VR at its core — to treat agoraphobic avoidance in patients with psychosis. GameChange The platform puts a patient in lifelike simulations, be it visiting a cafe, a shop, or a doctor’s office, while a therapist walks the patient through the program to let them rethink their defense behaviors. Test results prove that compared to patients who receive usual care alone, those enrolled in immersive therapy have significantly improved their condition. Having assistance like this is invaluable in scaling and increasing the quality of mental care and healthcare in general. So, if you have your mind on taking a leap into the healthcare metaverse or consider turning to a , keep on reading! metaverse development company Below, we describe what immersive technologies — and a mix of them, which the metaverse essentially is — can do for the industry and highlight the challenges that could halt wider adoption of the metaverse in healthcare. Medical metaverse: let’s clear up the definition first The concept of the metaverse has been around for decades. Though it’s Facebook’s turning into Meta that took the topic to the headlines. And now healthcare leaders are taking notice as well. So, let’s see what the metaverse means in the context of digital health. Today’s healthcare tech is mostly dominated by that give users an opportunity to interact with digital content, for instance, manage ERP records or exchange medical images. medical software solutions What pairing up the metaverse and healthcare is about to do is to change the very nature of people/content relationships, rather than simply interact with it. making users experience content The end goal of the healthcare metaverse vendors is to eventually merge the digital and the physical worlds into a collective virtual open space for all kinds of activities to take place — from surgery planning to next-gen to virtual therapy sessions. telemedicine consultations If you wonder how that will be realized, it’s not that complicated. To step into the metaverse, a user will only need a virtual reality (VR) headset, augmented reality (AR) glasses, an inexpensive add-on that turns a smartphone into an extended reality (XR) gadget, or any other XR device. The applications of the metaverse in healthcare The metaverse and healthcare are not a common pairing just yet, but the industry experts agree on its promising value-generating potential. At ITRex, we don’t believe in the digital-only future of healthcare. Still, we do see some aspects of it flourishing in virtual settings. Here’s a rundown of the essential ones. Improving healthcare training and education Leading medical schools have already amplified healthcare training by tapping into AI, VR, and AR development. Bringing the metaverse into healthcare training could help medical schools take a step further and switch to stimulation training. Students, for example, could join virtual settings to watch complex surgeries demonstrated in 3D or even practice conducting one themselves on a digital twin of a human body. Healthcare professionals, too, may use the metaverse to exchange experience (for instance, demonstrate a new diagnosis or treatment method) in digital conference rooms, no matter where they are in the world. On the healthcare education frontier, several startups embracing immersive technologies are quite noticeable. One of them is , a digital medical library featuring immersive training content. Surgical training platforms, like and , are getting in the spotlight, too. These platforms help clinicians practice and automate responses to emergency situations through VR-enabled interactive experiences. Giblib Osso VR Health Scholars Another aspect of how the metaverse improves healthcare training is by allowing healthcare employees, as well as family caregivers, to better understand the experiences of their patients or loved ones. , for example, exploits immersive technologies to help users understand, among other things, what hearing and vision loss may feel like, discover how social isolation associated with certain conditions might impact a patient, or learn to spot and differentiate the symptoms of dementia and Parkinson’s disease. Embodied Labs Enhanced medical diagnosis and therapy Beyond education, metaverse technologies can assist healthcare professionals as they plan and complete diagnosis and treatment. Back in 2020, for example, neurosurgeons at Johns Hopkins Hospital the institution’s first operation using an augmented reality headset by Augmedics, a surgical assistance pioneer. The surgeon used a see-through eye display that projected the images of a patient’s anatomy to fuse six vertebrae in a patient’s spine in order to cure persistent back pain. So, the solution basically gave the surgeon the needed X-ray vision. performed Medical metaverse environments can be used for surgical planning as well. , for example, allows surgeons to better do preoperative planning by converting patients’ CT scans into 3D reconstructions accessible through headsets. So, surgeons may view, manipulate, and isolate relevant anatomical areas before performing the surgery. InVisionOS Medical metaverse tools could also be used as an amplification to prescribed treatments. This way, assistive therapy solutions, like EaseVR, are getting attention. is a prescription-based solution that uses CBT and other behavioral therapy methods to assist patients with chronic back pain. EaseVR The solution consists of a VR headset and a controller and relies, among other techniques, on deep relaxation, attention-shifting, and interoceptive awareness to address the physiological symptoms of pain. Test results report that at the end of the assisted treatment, 66% of EaseVRx participants reported experiencing less pain, compared to 41% of control participants who received usual care alone. When it comes to , metaverse environments can help extend access to therapy. Along with GameChange we referred to earlier in the article, there are several prominent startups rising on the metaverse and mental health scene. , for example, helps children with autism spectrum disorder practice behavioral skills by placing them in different social contexts. And helps treat neuro-visual impairments, like amblyopia, in children by generating specially modified digital scenes. bettering the population’s mental health Floreo Luminopia Effective patient engagement Due to its immersive, gamified nature, the healthcare metaverse can become a useful means of . High-quality immersive content and gamification features could help clinicians explain complex concepts, walk patients through procedures they’re about to undergo or make sure patients take the prescribed medications. boosting patient engagement Digital twins take a step further in keeping the population informed and engaged. Digital twin solutions, like the one from , for example, combine a patient's vitals, CT scans, medical history records, and genetic test results to create a digital simulation of a patient’s anatomy and physiology, as well as tap into insights about their health. Q Bio So, patients could see all of their health data visualized beautifully on a virtual dashboard and share it with clinicians, nutritionists, and researchers for individual care plans. Next-gen telemedicine Since the beginning of the pandemic, the provisioning of healthcare as a remote service has peaked. The tendency is expected to carry on in the metaverse. But with the engaging, immersive experiences the healthcare metaverse could offer, it would open a new range of opportunities for both patients and healthcare providers. Compared to videoconferencing that is in use today, the healthcare metaverse could convey a far greater feeling of being present, which could help patients feel more at ease with the medical staff. Clinicians, in turn, could get a more thorough picture of a patient's health condition. Although the telemedicine market is still predominantly video-based, a number of metaverse startups have already entered the scene. One of them is ThirdEye. The company offers to access live video and audio communication with remote physicians — all in real time. By using the AR solution, first responders can interface directly with a see-what-I-see platform and live stream emergency situations to offsite clinicians. AR glasses for first responders High-touch brand interactions The metaverse could add a human touch and personalization to healthcare and pharma brand campaigns. Stepping in the metaverse, healthcare and pharma brands can host events for those who can’t attend in person or reach out to new audiences through immersive advertising. Despite the sector’s long-held reputation of digital timidity, healthcare and pharma are ready to move forward, experts estimate. GCI Health EVP and US Head of Digital and Innovation states: Kristin Mengel Ryan “Healthcare organizations are ready to commit, even if they lack clarity around budgeting for metaverse initiatives. Pharma has done a good job recruiting digital talent, and in the last two years they’ve radically accelerated adoption of digital.” While the market is considering opportunities, some pioneers have already ventured into the metaverse. For example, , a top healthcare advertising agency, has recently presented a metaverse primer for internal and external audiences that drew a record number of visitors. Area 23 Other big industry players are keeping up as well. Back in 2021, Pfizer hosted an event, where Grand Theft Auto players could get vaccinated in roleplay as part of the company’s campaign. CVS, too, is attempting to trademark pharmacy, health clinics, and retail goods in the metaverse, and is offering virtual wellness and nutrition coaching. Metaverse in healthcare: the challenges that lie ahead Like all new technologies, the metaverse comes with its hurdles. Gaining wider use, the metaverse could cause healthcare inequities associated with device ownership, digital literacy, and internet accessibility. Moreover, virtual entities like digital twins raise questions regarding healthcare data ownership and privacy. At ITRex, we see the following challenges halting a wider adoption of the metaverse in healthcare: : The industry has to think over the aspects of data ownership and privacy and develop for protecting sensitive patient information Data privacy and security new mechanisms and regulations : To realize the full potential of the metaverse, healthcare organizations would need to invest in high-tech hardware, like headsets, gloves, and other needed wearables. So, initially, the technology is likely to be limited to those who can afford it. Also, the cost of the metaverse solutions infrastructure is expected to be quite high as it requires high-end connectivity, especially when it comes to such use cases as surgical assistance High upfront costs : The essential component of the current healthcare paradigm, interoperability is yet to be addressed when it comes to the healthcare metaverse. Unless the entire industry adjusts the current data and communication standards, the adoption of the metaverse is likely to be slowed down Interoperability : It’s only natural that patients may feel skeptical about receiving treatment online, so they would have to be educated on the specifics, opportunities, and limitations of the healthcare metaverse settings A lack of trust Metaverse and healthcare: another gimmick or a viable alternative to traditional patient care technologies Healthcare metaverse technologies are still nascent and unlikely to take over the market for another few years. Yet industry experts believe healthcare organizations may start to “dip their toes in the water”. According to Emma Chiu, Global Director at Wunderman Thomson Intelligence, healthcare organizations considering metaverse tech must remember just how important technology is to most people. The company’s recent report revealed that 93% of respondents believe technology is the future, 81% stated that a brand’s digital presence is as important as a physical one, and 76% noted that their everyday lives depend on technology. “Into the Metaverse” Technology also makes people feel better, the report found, with 88% of Gen Z survey participants and 85% of millennials saying they use tech to unwind. Ms. Chiu also points out that there’s a clear link between technology and wellness with 55% of respondents indicating that technology makes them physically healthier and 56% stating that tech improves their mental health. Metaverse healthcare applications are also expected to improve in the coming years, bringing about a positive change — be it scaling access to therapeutic environments, breaking down barriers for seniors and people with disabilities, or making it easier for people to participate in research. Still, although people are indeed interested in digital services, the cumbersome digital experience would rather turn them off, . Concerns over the metaverse’s privacy, security, and trust remain, too, amplified by the difficulties of integrating new tools into day-to-day clinical workflows. according to Gartner So, if you don’t want to miss out on the new opportunities the metaverse and healthcare duo could drive but you’re still unsure about the impact of the novel technology, it’s only natural to take small steps. Bring in a touch of the metaverse experience into the areas that are not directly connected to the clinical workflows. Alec Pollak, SVP for group omnichannel strategy at Area 23 advises: “The opportunity to advertise in a game, for example, represents a nice first step and one that doesn’t require a big commitment.” If you have unanswered questions regarding the metaverse and healthcare combo or are ready to take the first step into the metaverse, — we’ll help! contact our experts Also published . here

The Metaverse and Healthcare: Opportunities, Challenges, and Tips for Tech Pioneers

*Note: This article first appeared in the Los Angeles Tribune by 's Head of Marketing Aaron Bours Hyro Before we can dive into the current state of hospitals and clinics across the U.S., we must first understand how the pandemic has wholly upended the healthcare market. $8.5 trillion When confronted with the following statistics, it’s impossible to overstate the impact COVID-19 has had on the main channels of revenue for healthcare organizations: elective procedures, ongoing medical care, and patient volume. Hospital visitation volumes dropped by between March 1st and March 29th, compared with pre-COVID-19 volumes. ( ) 32%-60% TransUnion The number of outpatient visits to practices has dropped by since April. ( ) 60% The Riverdale Press Emergency room visits in the U.S. fell by more than in April. ( ) 40% CDC The average number of weekly ER visits was between March 29th and April 25th, a decline from the visits seen during the same period last year. ( ) 1.2 million 42% 2.1 million Becker’s Hospital Review NYU Langone Hospital’s patient admissions between March 1st and May 9th dropped this year compared to 2019. They were down this year compared to 2018. ( ) 31.9% 43% Healthcare Dive These figures paint a sobering picture and reflect the indirect, often overlooked repercussions this pandemic is having on healthcare organizations and the patients they serve. In a conducted by TransUnion Healthcare in April, about one in four patients surveyed ( ) said they had an elective surgery, appointment, or procedure delayed or canceled due to COVID-19. survey 27% Of the patients who had an elective procedure deferred, nearly indicated they will only reschedule once they no longer believe there is a high risk of COVID-19 infection or once guidelines advise it is safe. 50% Mandatory or self-imposed, these deferments of treatment have been a source of discomfort for some and, sadly, of lethal outcomes to others. Take heart disease, for example. A suggests that the postponement or cancelation of heart disease procedures has led to irregular spikes in mortality. In the five hardest-hit states (Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Michigan, and Massachusetts), there were more deaths from heart problems than would have been typical in March, April, and May — an increase of roughly over historical averages. comprehensive analysis by the Washington Post 8,300 27% Source: Washington Post Alongside the evident toll on human life, the economic hit on the healthcare sector is almost hard to grasp. In April, the American Hospital Association estimated that hospitals were . In a , Dr. Bob Watcher, Chairman of the Department of Medicine at UC San Francisco, admitted that he expects that UCSF’s hospitals will lose million this year alone. According to Nathan Kaufman, a strategic advisor to hospitals, emergency room visits have plummeted. Kaufman notes that hospitals had their for operating margins in April, adding that “indirectly, these emergency room visits impact about of the non-COVID-19 revenue of a hospital.” bleeding more than $50 billion per month candid interview with CNBC $600-$700 “worst month ever” 40% The Road to Recovery As the initial shock begins to wane, and the pandemic transforms from a cataclysmic event into a constant reality, patients are trickling back into hospitals. , screening tests for breast, colon, and cervical cancer, which plunged by early in the pandemic, were running just below normal as of mid-June. A found that visits to physicians’ offices, which declined from mid-March to mid-April, are now running below pre-pandemic levels. Chris Mast, Vice President of Clinical Informatics at Epic, estimates that hospital volume based on revenue is back to . According to Epic 80–94% 20–30% report by the Commonwealth Fund 60% 20–30% 80–90% This is all, of course, fantastic news for patients and practitioners alike, but the hard-learned lessons of the last few months are still fresh-in-mind, and any return to service must be executed with surgical attention to safety and best practices to avoid a costly relapse. To that end, some of the country’s most prestigious healthcare associations recently released their road maps for a return to routine care. A by the American College of Surgeons, American Society of Anesthesiologists, Association of periOperative Registered Nurses, and the American Hospital Association, in April, charted the steps to resume elective surgery, while AAMC released its own set of in late August. joint statement critical recommendations In both documents, one of the most crucial steps outlined for any restart plan is an intensive, laser-focused screening process of employees, patients, and visitors, with AAMC even going as far as urging all organizations to ‘screen almost everyone, a lot.’ Using UCLA Health as a case study, they’ve asked Chief Medical and Quality Officer Dr. Robert Cherry to share his medical center’s scrupulous screening procedure: “UCLA Health’s screening process includes posting staff at each entrance to ask everyone entering the hospital about possible symptoms and take their temperature before allowing them in. Hospital staff can start their own screening process before they come to work by tapping into a smartphone app to answer questions about their health conditions. Those who might have coronavirus symptoms are steered to a call center for further assessment and determination of next steps.” Although the process described by Dr. Cherry may seem complex, expensive, or unfeasible, several leading tech companies have recently rolled out solutions and strategies that are slated to deliver and simplify screening and clearing on a mass scale. A COVID-Free Passport In mid-October, during the prominent virtual healthcare convention , major players in digital healthcare doubled down on their fight against COVID-19. In one session that followed the other, Mayo Clinic and IBM Watson Health unveiled their solutions for safely returning people to public environments, especially employees to the workplace, both built on thorough screening and clearing processes. HLTH 2020 In his keynote address, Dr. John Halamka, President of , broke down the response to the pandemic into five consecutive stages: isolation, testing and contact tracing, pre-vaccine return to life, post-vaccine return to life, and lastly, the new normal. To that end, Mayo Clinic announced its new alliance with (SHS) to develop software and workflows designed to support these stages by, for one example, providing the connecting tissue between an employee or student’s negative test result and a designated secured app that employers and universities can trust and track. Mayo Clinic Platform Safe Health Systems introduced its latest product, the IBM Digital Health Pass, a built-for-smartphones “digital health wallet” containing a person’s health status. A QR code or result from a morning COVID-19 test, would be scanned at the entrance of any venue to ensure real-time screening. As per General Manager of Watson Health, Paul Roma, the digital health pass will be intuitive and easy to use, following four simple steps: IBM Watson Health 1. downloading and enrolling to the IBM digital app, 2. when health data becomes available, users can scan a QR code to add the information to the digital wallet, 3. users can share their health status, 4. verification through Blockchain technologies to confirm authenticity and validity of the user’s account and info. The emphasis here is on security – there is fear surrounding these types of solutions that sensitive health information will inspire privacy concerns, or worse, breach. IBM maintains that security is paramount to their passport, and that people can share their health data while keeping the root source anonymous via an encrypted digital wallet built on blockchain. Roma pitched a heartening scenario in which baseball fans could get back to their favorite stadiums with the widespread adoption of screening, but noted that travel and transportation will require heightened levels of strictness when it comes to passing certain wellness tests. Back in June, another juggernaut in healthcare innovation, CVS Health, debuted its own workplace reopening product for U.S. businesses and universities with an emphasis on testing. Digital tools are included that allow for easy scheduling of tests, distribution of the results, and analytics capabilities. While CVS does not provide contact tracing, it does offer that option via third-party vendors. The features different testing options for students and employees based on their varying types of worksites and risk of exposure. Their testing sites (with over 1400 drive-thru locations) can support 15-minute turn around, leading to faster entry times for a wide array of venues. CVS will be consumers of their own product, as they plan to roll this out to their own roughly 300,000 employees. Return Ready™ program Joining these big names is small conversational AI startup . Drawing from their experience creating complimentary COVID-19 virtual assistants for some of the foremost healthcare organizations in the country, such as Mercy Health and Montefiore Medical Center, the company revealed its AI-powered screening solution in late August. Taking a more enterprise-specific approach, Hyro’s solution proactively reaches out via SMS using preconfigured triggers from healthcare providers, and fields inbound screening requests through a web-based chat and voice assistant. While the process is handled end-to-end by conversational AI, health providers can use a dashboard to manage and monitor organizational activity for better visibility. If a department is starting to experience a spike in COVID-related issues, administrators can send alerts out quickly and stymie the flow of traffic to that hospital wing, for example. One added feature that’s a bit unique to Hyro is their Conversational Intelligence Platform, which will also reveal what patients, staff and visitors of hospitals are asking beyond the scope of screening and COVID-19. Hyro Healthcare organizations use a 24/7 real-time dashboard to monitor COVID-19 screening. A One-Two Punch High tech screening solutions alone cannot be viewed as magic workarounds to this relentless and sophisticated virus. Instead, they serve as invaluable ammunition in the battle to bring back a sense of normalcy to our everyday lives. Social distancing, masks, and good hygiene practices are just as necessary as they were when the pandemic first broke out, but, finally, we may just have the tools in place to prevent mass-scale lockdowns. Until the majority of the population is vaccinated, the “hammer and the dance” continues, but these screening innovations will be vital in ensuring that the dance outweighs the hammer. Visit my blog to learn more about the innovations at the front lines of the battle against COVID-19.

New Weapon in the Fight Against COVID-19: Digital Health Passports

The problems in the mental health space are clear from the statistics we see and the unfortunate passings of famous figures and our personal loved ones. As an investor at Pascal Capital and a team lead at Hack Mental Health, I often ask what the necessary drivers for the much-needed changes are. Thankfully, talking with entrepreneurs throughout this year allowed me to become more optimistic about the future and that a paradigm shift is coming. Here are some new shifts that I have been seeing and the novel solutions mental health startups are bringing to lead that change. #1) Mental health needs a standardized protocol provided for physical treatment. Mental health patients struggle with getting the personalized service they need as the psychiatrist only has a short monthly (or in most cases, every 2–3 months) hourly sessions to know and understand your condition. While this may work in the physiological model, where we have advanced diagnostics tools, standardized datasets, and ER for severe conditions, there are none of those support systems in the mental health system. is looking to change this by becoming the ER for severe conditions by capturing digital biomarkers that can monitor for changes in mood and cognition.  If the person is found to have symptoms of being at risk from their interaction with their phone, the app will alert the user and connect them to a mental health professional who can serve the immediate need and be there for the user at all times. Mindstrong This system is critical as there are currently not many apps that can help those with serious mental health illnesses and a lack of a standard for people to know when they need to really seek out for help. They will normally be referred to the hotline, which makes the user miss out on all the benefits a digital service can provide. Mindstrong changes that by reaching out to the user when it detects any negative symptoms so that they can intervene and ensure that the patient can readily get the treatment they need when they need it. #2) Mental health needs the scarcity of mental health professionals to match the economic value that comes from its asymmetric demand. Software engineers normally cost a fortune due to the scarcity of programmers who can add value to a company. Likewise, a lot of other services and goods (i.e. bitcoin/gold) follow the rule that when the demand outstrips the supply, the cost of such goods will be high. However, this model that applies to engineers currently does not apply to mental health professionals. Instead, mental health supporters are normally quite underpaid. For example, the average annual salary of mental health therapists in California is $63k, which is a bit more than half of what an entry-level engineer will get in Silicon Valley. Meanwhile, the psychiatrists cost users $500 for initial visits, making it highly unaffordable to many users. This gap is significant, as there are over . This means that psychiatrists only make up 4% of the mental health professional space, which explains why there’s a 3 month wait time for follow-ups and a high cost for meeting psychiatrists. 577,000 mental health professionals, while there are only 25,250 psychiatrists In order to solve this gap, is connecting therapists and psychiatrists to work together through its app. By having the care coordinator work on the daily care with the clients while the psychiatrist or the nurse practitioner only comes in to provide the necessary medication, the user is able to get the treatment they need while significantly reducing the cost of treatment. Cerebral This also means that the therapists who work with Cerebral can now access more consumers, as they can work with those who need medication and add value to more people, which in turn will lead to a higher economical value for the therapist. The health professionals who have the capacity to prescribe drugs can then focus on quick drug prescriptions so that they can treat more patients. Their traction so far clearly shows that the users have been waiting for a service like this, with tens of thousands of users currently subscribed and seeing the benefits of Cerebral today. More than 75% of Cerebral clients have achieved meaningful reductions in their symptoms in less than 2 months of care and with a brand new raise recently, their expansion to increase the value of therapists will only continue. #3) Mental health startups need governmental  support Governments spend millions for mental health support and research, but the startups normally work independently with private investors. While this model may work for other industries, mental health is different because it is a global pandemic that is slowed by the legacy laws that were made without mental health taken into account. Governmental support is crucial for this reason. If telemedicine regulations were not passed this year, telehealth companies may not have been able to expand their services and provide necessary treatments to those who need it during this difficult time with COVID. However, it’s once again a physical illness pandemic, not the care for mental health that is driving the government officials to work with the health professionals to change the laws. A company that has managed to successfully work with the government to quickly expand its outreach is , the leading anonymous telemental health platform in Thailand that provides counseling services via video calls with mental health professionals. The platform attracted over 72,000 users with over 100 psychiatrists from Thailand now on the platform, which already represents ~10% of the psychiatrists in Thailand. Ooca After starting in 2017, they were recognized by the government by receiving the Government procurement award, NIA in 2018, and in 2019, signed an MOU with the Ministry of Public Health and the Department of Mental health through the Wall of Sharing Project to provide free counseling service for university students around Thailand. Their works with the government continue today, where they are now offering free service to Thais living in Japan, Malaysia, Germany,  Hong Kong, Macau, and the United States through a partnership with Consular Affairs Department. It is thus no surprise that after successful partnerships with the government, the . Medical Council of Thailand has drafted a regulation to show official support for teleconsulting #4) We need hospitals to work with a new system of EMRs The machine learning algorithms can only be as meaningful as the data that we have to train the system. While there are better algorithms that are being developed to work with less data, for critical problems where the room for error can’t be large like diagnosing one’s brain health, the stakes for correct diagnosis gets much higher. This is why is working to help onboard more doctors to use the cloud. As the leading platform that collects consistent comorbidity and comprehensive multifactorial data on every patient that goes through their hospitals in psychiatry, having a consistent data collection process are critical for their success. Trayt As a thought leader in this space, they are taking the active steps of leading a coordinated effort to convince hospitals to make their EMRs compatible with their platform so that clinicians can get the outcome data to make better care decisions. By having Trayt be the standard of how EMRs should be integrated, it could accelerate the number of hospitals that could all connect together to offer the best treatment the patients deserve. #5) We need more healthcare professionals, as the current system will never supply enough supply to meet the overwhelming demand Leveraging apps in the mental health space have traditionally been an upward battle, as apps made in hospitals have shown a significantly low retention rate. Training professionals is a struggle as well, since training to be a licensed psychologist is a lengthy process that doesn’t have an immense financial incentive like that of a software engineer. is looking to reduce the demand for mental health professionals by providing digital cognitive behavioral therapy that leverages content that people can emotionally connect with. They overcame the hurdle that self-care wellness apps provide by bringing top storytellers, filmmakers, producers, and animators of other industries. In doing so, they have managed to reduce anxiety and help users with their sleep. Big Health They even announced a partnership with CVS Health last year to bring in more clients, which currently includes Target, Comcast, and Home Depot. With over 100 companies signed up and casting a net to over 5.5 million people, this fast-growing startup is showing positive signs that they can reduce the heavy demand for mental health professionals. is also looking to reduce the demand by increasing the supply of those who can provide mental health help. By ensuring secure end-to-end encryption on both sides, they protect the privacy of the volunteers who want to use their experience to be a listening ear to those who need help. It’s truly a safe space for those who need it at any time. Cara Unmasked By providing this Cara friends program on top of their therapist program, they are expanding the pool of options that people can utilize to get the help they need. It also helps reduce the financial burden for those who may not necessarily have the means to see a professional, but need someone to talk to. It could also help reduce the stigma, as the Cara friend could be someone near you or even you one day. #6) We need mental health talk to come early so that people grow up knowing about how their mental health is and get regular check-ups Regular health check-ups are mandatory when children grow up, as parents want to take early measures to prevent any serious illnesses from affecting their child as any problems early on could lead to a serious problem in the future. However, there are no efforts to diagnose their child’s mental state, as many assume that their child will be fine. Considering that we are all born with different brains that stem from not only how we are nurtured, but also from how we are born due to our different DNA structure, it is nonsensical that we expect the brains of humans to somehow be one standardized organ across all babies. The startup that recognized this asymmetry and is working towards bringing a change is , a Korean edtech startup that creates powerful content that even treats cognitive delay caused by mental health disorders. Their CEO was a former cognitive therapist who worked with North Korean children who had escaped and had developmental delays as a result of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). DoBrain Working with the academic experts in education, she created a new digital content using animated characters that build upon the curriculum that she created for North Korean children and a diagnostics tool to predict the child’s cognitive state. By bringing the data to their parents and the progress they are making through the interaction the child has with the app, they have impacted 300k children so far and are looking to change the narrative around children’s mental health. These startups are showing signs of encouragement that we may be able to overcome this mental health pandemic, but there’s still a long way to go. As this Nature article states, “ .” only a small fraction of the available mHealth apps had been tested and the body of evidence was of very low quality However, we are seeing an increasing number of quality papers coming out of these projects and the rigor of random controlled trials strengthening and making it to some of the top mental health journals. There are also a growing number of initiatives by these teams to provide help to those suffering from COVID, with Big Health, Ooca, and Intellect all offering a form of free service. We are yet to see what the new normal will be, but the advancements of these projects show that digital therapeutics are being disrupted globally and that the narrative around mental health is slowly changing. With technology opening up new solutions, I am excited to see what the new “normal” in mental health space will be and look forward to working together with founders to push this industry forward.

CVS HEALTH

cvshealth.com

10K+ employees

Since 1963

COMPANY RANKING

CVS HEALTH

EVERGREEN INDEX #325

Representing this company? Click here to claim and customize this page!

CVS Health WIKI

Apply to get your Tech Company News Page live on HackerNoon.com today!

CVS HEALTH

cvshealth.com

10K+ employees

Since 1963

COMPANY RANKING

CVS HEALTH

EVERGREEN INDEX #325

RELATED COMPANIESRANK

STORIES ABOUT CVS HEALTH

Representing this company? Click here to claim and customize this page!

CVS Health WIKI

Apply to get your Tech Company News Page live on HackerNoon.com today!