Healthcare is such a massive space, one that takes up a sixth of the entire U.S. economy, that just one small piece of that pie can be extremely lucrative. Take diabetes, for example, where there has been a slew of different companies tackling that problem, and raising money in the process, including Glooko, Omada Health, Siren and Virta Health.
Health technology and clinical wearables are hot topics in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. They are creating waves of excitement and talking points for debate, while also topping many of the healthcare trends of this year.
Novo Nordisk has moved into sickle cell disease through a licensing deal (PDF) with EpiDestiny. The $400 million deal gives Novo worldwide rights to an epigenetic treatment of the disease that is closing in on the start of a phase 2 trial.
Investment in digital health rose to its highest level for the first quarter of the year at $1.6 billion compared with $909 million for the same time last year, according to a new report by Rock Health. That figure reflected investment across 77 digital health deals, dominated by the category of disease diagnosis in terms of total investment and monitoring of disease category in terms of deal volume.
One of the first studies to explore the effects of calorie restriction on humans showed that cutting caloric intake by 15% for 2 years slowed aging and metabolism and protected against age-related disease. The study, which will appear March 22 in the journal Cell Metabolism, found that calorie restriction decreased systemic oxidative stress, which has been tied to age-related neurological conditions such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, as well as cancer, diabetes, and others.
Medtronic has finally received FDA clearance for Guardian Connect, its smartphone-connected standalone CGM for patients who use multiple daily injections (MDI) for their insulin. Medtronic's closed-loop system for pump users was cleared in 2016.
Medical device maker DexCom announced Tuesday that the company has received a de novo clearance from the FDA to sell its latest continuous glucose monitoring system — the G6 — that requires no fingerstick calibration.
A wearable device, developed by researchers at the GI Innovation Group out of the University of California San Diego, can track electrical activity in the stomach over a 24-hour period. The device works similarly to how an ECG would work for the heart, but instead it monitors the electrical activities of gastrointestinal tract.
Having an accurate record of food and alcohol intake is important for managing a number of diseases including diabetes, various cardiovascular conditions, and alcoholism. Currently, not much practical technology is available to do this aside from smartphone apps, and apps tend to be tedious and require constant vigilance of making sure to input all the data.
Artificial intelligence company twoXAR—a specialist in separating signals from noise in data-rich drug discovery projects—has raised $10 million in a first-round financing led by SoftBank Ventures.
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