Agriculture Archives - InnoHEALTH magazine

17 startups, five student innovators win bio-entrepreneurship contest

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Fri, 31 Dec 2021 01:32:59 +0000

New Delhi, Dec 20 (India Science Wire): Seventeen startups and five student innovators have been declared winners in this year’s National Bio Entrepreneurship Competition (NBEC). Now in its 5 th year, the competition is an annual showcase of promising business ideas with commercial, innovation, and impact potentials in the life sciences and biotech domain.

NBEC is organized by the Government of India’s Department of Biotechnology’s
Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) and Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP) to identify and nurture game-changing deep science ideas with business potential. It receives support from national and international partners with some of the biggest names in the biotech industry in India coming on board. This year, 34 of such enterprises supported it.

The winning startups stand to receive a cumulative sum of Rs. 8.6 crore in cash prizes and investment opportunities, while the student-led teams swooped up a sum of Rs. 14.5 lakhs in cash prizes. Additionally, C-CAMP will conduct a one-year Programme for the winners, which will comprise of mentorship including one month of incubation. Among other ecosystem support, the competition will provide access to industry mentorship in tie-ups with key industry leaders to all winners.

Forty-six finalist pitches were judged for novelty, scalability, and business potential parameters. These were culled from 322 in a regional qualifying round. The winners join an illustrious cohort of 39 winners since the NBEC launch in 2017. Many of them are already in the market with globally acclaimed and investor-backed healthcare, agriculture, or environmental technologies.

Minister for Higher Education, IT & BT, Sci & Tech, Skill Development, Entrepreneurship & Livelihood, Govt. of Karnataka, Dr. C.N. Ashwathnarayan, in his Keynote address, said "It is heartening and encouraging to see that such a good amount of investment has been made in innovative ideas at NBEC. I convey my best wishes to the winners and going ahead, we will together build more innovations along with C-CAMP.”

Dr. Taslimarif Saiyed, CEO & Director, C-CAMP, Dr Manish Diwan, Head of Strategic Partnerships and Entrepreneurship Development, BIRAC, and Mrs. G.K. Krupalini, General Manager – Biotech Karnataka Innovation & Technology Society, Dept. of Electronics, IT, BT and S&T, Government of Karnataka congratulated the winners and urged them to continue to innovate to reduce the burden of diseases, increase crop yield and contribute to bioeconomy. (India Science Wire)

ISW/SP/DBT/20/12/2021

Credits: India Science Wire

The post 17 startups, five student innovators win bio-entrepreneurship contest appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.

6th Edition of India m2m+iot Forum 2019

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Mon, 25 Feb 2019 11:23:18 +0000

6th Edition of India m2m + iot Forum 2019 concluded
The two-day forum witnessed industrious deliberations on smart cities & villages

New Delhi, January 17, 2019: The 6th edition of India m2m + iot Forum 2019 (www.m2m2iotforum.com), the national forum on machine-to-machine (m2m) and internet of things (iot) focused on applications of these disruptive technologies in smart cities and villages space was concluded on 15th January after 2 days of enthralling series of Panel discussions, Keynote addresses, Technology show at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. The forum was jointly organized by the Department of Management Studies, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (DMS, IIT – Delhi), FI Media (Future Internet and Electronic Media – a prestigious project of the European Union) and India m2m + iot Forum.

The forum highlighted the need of forward-looking policies and a proactive government to play a role in the development of smart cities & villages on the bedrock of JAM Trinity which has 1bn bank accounts (Jan Dhan) + 1bn Aadhaar + 1bn mobile broadband users, already organized for the technological revolution in this space, thus, Capitalizing the connected World with the help of modern & niche technologies like 5G, GIS, IoT, m2m and others. Likewise, the governments effort to connect 2.5 lakh Gram Panchayats with BharatNet project was discussed to leverage the smart villages concept in India.

5G vision for India was also one of the major highlights of the 2-day forum, as 5G technology has the potential for ushering a major societal transformation in India by enabling a rapid expansion of the role of information technology across manufacturing, education, healthcare, agriculture, finance and social sectors. The panelists voiced that India must embrace this opportunity by deploying 5G networks early, efficiently, and pervasively as well as emerge as a significant innovator and technology supplier at the global level. Emphasis should be placed on 5G touching the lives of rural and weaker economic segments so as to make it a truly inclusive technology.

Ms. Aruna Sundararajan, Honorable Secretary, Department of Telecommunications, Ministry of Communications, Government of India via her message highlighted, “A city is a complex system, involving many different domains, infrastructure, organizations and activity which need to be integrated for that city to emerge as a smart city. Standardisation forms a critical part of the work that needs to be done. Being smart cities, a new holistic and cross functional standardization approach is needed, breaking the old ‘vertical silos’ approach, through better cooperation and synergies.”

“While the cities of India are fast progressing towards digitalization, it is encouraging to note that digital solutions are being readily accepted amongst the rural population of India as well. To support this technology adoption, the Department of Telecommunications (DOT), Ministry of Communications, Government of India, has initiated projects to provide broadband connectivity for connecting various digital services and solutions across our Urban and Rural Landscapes”, added Ms. Sundarajan.

Elated about the forum Mr. Kunal Kumar, Joint Secretary (Mission Director – Smart Cities), Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs stated, “The forum can make noteworthy contributions to the Smart City Program at large. By sharing and collaborating on topics such as technology, multi-country experiences and innovative approaches, I am sure that we can bring together the best minds, and the surest hands to co-create cities of the future.”

The attraction of the forum was, NOT TO BE MISSED ‘Technology Show – by FIWARE Foundation member companies namely – NEC Technology India, APInf, MobilePedia and Smart Cities Lab Ltd where they demonstrated the OPEN SOURCE PLATFORM designed and developed by the FIWARE FOUNDATION– a market- ready open source software, combining components that enable the connection to IoT with Context Information Management and Big Data services in the Cloud.

The forum also hosted a dedicated session on 'India-EU Dialogue on ICT for Smart Cities' which was organized by the prestigious project, namely, ‘India-EU ICT Collaboration Standardization’ of the Delegation of European Union to India, highlighting the absolute need for ‘Leveraging Standards for Smart Cities’, which brought together key stakeholders and smart city officials.

Participants from across the globe got the opportunity to meet Stellapps Technologies – an end-to-end dairy technology solutions company – the first of its kind in India, Sensorise – an IOT Services and Solutions company, Phoenix Robotix – a network-IoT and Big data company, Sensable – an IoT company offering end-to- end smart solutions using artificial intelligence and machine learning, C-DOT – an autonomous Telecom R&D Centre of Department of Telecommunications (DOT), Government of India – showcasing Common Service Platform for m2m communications on oneM2M Specifications.

“We appreciate the participation from our key partners, showing trust in the forum and the vision it stands for. The key speakers, thought leaders and industry leaders have made this forum a thought provoking one with dialogs on disruption these modern technologies can bring to make cities & villages smarter, and at the same time, mentoring the startups in this segment. We are proud to have EU partners to share their insight on business possibilities from across the globe. Thus, making the 6 th edition of this forum a success” concluded Ms. Shilpi Batra, Director, India m2m + iot Forum 2019

About India m2m+ iot Forum

India m2m + iot Forum is a cohesive and shared platform, which validates united and collective vision of the global m2m and iot ecosystem. It is the most awaited annual congregation of m2m + iot stakeholders representing the entire ecosystem comprising of academics, analysts and researchers, enterprises and industry, governments – policymakers and regulators, industry associations and organizations, media organizations, standards organizations, the student’s community and above all the end users from businesses, citizen services and government.

For more information, contact:
Pratik Baurai
E-mail: pratik@saintsart.in
Mobile: 9871006258

Sonali Shyam
E-mail: sonali.shyam@saintsart.in
Mobile: 9891820253

The post 6th Edition of India m2m+iot Forum 2019 appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.

AI Engraving Footprints on Healthcare Transcontinental Canvas

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Fri, 21 Dec 2018 07:22:38 +0000

SIR ALEXANDER FLEMING, the discoverer of Penicillin, shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1945. But when he arrived in Stockholm to receive the award he had a bad cold. Throughout the ceremony, he used his handkerchief repeatedly. Later when he was leaving, his eyes were still watery, and he was still sniffing. One of the officials shook his head sympathetically and said, “No good for colds”. EE Edgar January 1965.

[vc_single_image image=”5108″ img_size=”500×300″ alignment=”center” onclick=”link_image”]

But, it was a stunning discovery that changed the course of history. The active ingredient, which Fleming named Penicillin, turned out to be an infection-fighting agent of enormous potency. When it was finally recognized for what it was, the most efficacious life-saving drug in the world, Penicillin altered forever the treatment of bacterial infections.

Now, it is turn of AI (Artificial Intelligence) that is making fast forays in a broad-spectrum of disciplines, and medical diagnostics and treatment field is paving way for intrusion of AI.

Across the world, race is underway to exploit AI for good of patients. Many say it is not much away from tipping point: those who will take timely advantage of it or those who are set to miss the opportunity at the initial moments.

In India, AI ball has started rolling in the wake of the huge potential of the healthcare network and an ever-burgeoning population of 130 crore people. A discussion paper on National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence prepared by NITI Aayog team which included, Arnab Kumar, Punit Shukla, Aalekh Sharan, and Tanay Mahindru, came up for discussions recently and moves are afoot to proceed further.

The paper delved at length on various dimensions of AI. It said NITI Aayog is working with Microsoft and Forus Health to roll out the technology for early detection of diabetic retinopathy as a pilot project. 3Nethra, developed by Forus Health, is a portable device that can screen for common eye problems. Integrating AI capabilities to this device using Microsoft’s retinal imaging APIs enables operators of 3Nethra device to get AI-powered insights even when they are working at eye checkup camps in remote areas with nil or intermittent connectivity to the cloud.

The resultant technology solution also solves for quality issues with image capture and systems checks in place to evaluate the usability of the image captured.

AI-based healthcare solutions can also help in making healthcare services more proactive – moving from “sick” care to true “health” care, with emphasis on preventive techniques.

AI solutions can augment the scarce personnel and lab facilities; help overcome the barriers to access and solve the accessibility problem; through early detection, diagnostic, decision-making and treatment, cater to a large part of India.

Cancer screening and treatment, the paper says, is an area where AI provides tremendous scope for targeted large-scale interventions. India sees an incidence of more than 1 million new cases of cancer every year, and early detection and management can be crucial in an optimum cancer treatment regimen across the country.

NITI Aayog is in the advanced stage for launching a programme to develop a national repository of annotated and curated, despite the obvious economic potential, the healthcare sector in India remains multi-layered and complex and is ripe for disruption from emerging technologies at multiple levels.

It is probably the most intuitive and obvious use case primed for intervention by AI-driven solutions, as evidenced by the increasing activity from large corporates and start-ups alike in developing AI focused healthcare solutions.

Researchers said the Adoption of AI for healthcare applications is expected to see an exponential increase in the next few years. The increased advances in technology and interest and activity from innovators provides an opportunity for India to solve some of its long-existing challenges in providing appropriate healthcare to a large section of its population. AI combined with robotics and Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) could potentially be the new nervous system for healthcare, presenting solutions to address healthcare problems and helping the government in meeting the above objective pathology images. Another related project under discussions is an Imaging Biobank for Cancer.

In US, Viz.ai, Inc., an applied artificial intelligence healthcare company a few months back announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted a De Novo request for the first-ever Computer-Aided Triage and Notification Platform to identify Large Vessel Occlusion (LVO) strokes in CTA imaging. This regulatory clearance compliments Viz.ai’s recent European CE Mark for the product in January 2018.

“The Viz.ai LVO Stroke Platform is the first example of applied artificial intelligence software that seeks to augment the diagnostic and treatment pathway of critically unwell stroke patients,” said Dr. Chris Mansi, Neurosurgeon and Chief Executive Officer. “We are thrilled to bring artificial intelligence to healthcare in a way that works alongside physicians and helps get the right patient, to the right doctor at the right time.”

Stroke is a serious and time-sensitive medical condition that requires emergency care and can cause lasting brain damage, long-term disability, and death. A stroke occurs if the flow of oxygen-rich blood to a portion of the brain is blocked. When this happens 2 million brain cells die every minute. “This software device could benefit patients by notifying a specialist earlier thereby decreasing the time to treatment. Faster treatment may lessen the extent or progression of a stroke,” said Robert Ochs, Ph.D., Acting Deputy Director for Radiological Health, Office of In Vitro Diagnostics and Radiological Health in the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

The Viz.ai LVO Stroke Platform was developed using deep learning, a revolutionary technique where algorithms learn how to identify patterns in data from millions of prior examples. The Viz.ai system connects to a hospital CT scanner and alerts the stroke specialist that a suspected LVO stroke has been identified, sending the radiological images directly to their smartphone.

In a 300-patient performance study, the Viz.ai LVO Stroke Platform obtained an AUC of 0.91, identifying LVOs and alerting the relevant specialist with 90% sensitivity and specificity and a median scan to notification time of under 6 minutes. In over 95% of cases, the automatic notifications demonstrated faster notification of the specialist, saving between 6 and 206 minutes, with an average time saving of 52 minutes.

“Timely LVO stroke identification and transfer to a specialist hospital that can perform mechanical thrombectomy is the top priority for LVO stroke patients,” said Dr. Raul Nogueira, Professor of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Radiology at Emory University and the Immediate-Past President, Society of Vascular & Interventional Neurology. “This software is designed to help identify appropriate patients earlier and more often, and enable faster transfer and treatment, which, ultimately may result in improved patient outcomes.

Noted Cardiologist ERC Topol, who is Professor of Genomics and holds the Scripps endowed chair in innovative medicine, has now written a book that calls for the “creative destruction” of the current medical paradigm, which he believes has failed to keep up with the digitized world of interactivity, social media, computers, apps, and advanced engineering and electronics.

In his book, he lambasts current day medicine as being archaic and wasteful, making his case with a compelling blend of statistics, anecdotes. Prof. Topol believes that consumers teaming up with innovators in the med-digital world are the key to forcing change, which is certainly true. But how exactly will this work?

The NITI Aayog discussion paper says AI is a constellation of technologies that enables machines to act with higher levels of intelligence and emulate the human capabilities of sense, comprehend and act. Thus, computer vision and audio processing can actively perceive the world around them by acquiring and processing images, sound and speech.

The natural language processing and inference engines can enable AI systems to analyze and understand the information collected. An AI system can also act through technologies such as expert systems and inference engines or undertake actions in the physical world. These human capabilities are augmented by the ability to learn from experience and keep adapting over time. AI systems are finding ever-wider application to supplement these capabilities across enterprises as they grow in sophistication. The paper says healthcare is one of the most dynamic, yet challenging, sectors in India, and is expected to grow to USD 280 billion by 2020, at a CAGR of upwards of 16%, from the current ~USD 100 billion.

Adoption of AI for healthcare applications is expected to see an exponential increase in the next few years. Technology disruptions like AI are once-in-generation phenomenon, and hence large-scale adoption strategies, especially national strategies, need to strike a balance between narrow definitions of financial impact and the greater good. NITI Aayog has decided to focus on five sectors that are envisioned to benefit the most from AI in solving societal needs: a) Healthcare: increased access and affordability of quality healthcare; b) Agriculture: enhanced farmers’ income, increased farm productivity and reduction of wastage; c) Education: improved access and quality of education; d) Smart Cities and Infrastructure: efficient connectivity for the burgeoning urban population; and e) Smart Mobility and Transportation: smarter and safer modes of transportation and better traffic and congestion problems.

Yet, it faces major challenges of quality, accessibility, and affordability for a large section of the population:

A: Shortage of qualified healthcare professionals and services like qualified doctors, nurses, technicians and infrastructure: as evidenced in 0.76 doctors and 2.09 nurses per 1,000 population (as compared to WHO recommendations of 1 doctor and 2.5 nurses per 1,000 population respectively) and 1.3 hospital beds per 1,000 population as compared to WHO recommended 3.5 hospital beds per 1,000 population.

B: Non-uniform accessibility to healthcare across the country with physical access continuing to be the major barrier to both preventive and curative health services, and glaring disparity between rural and urban India. With most of the private facilities concentrated in and around tier 1 and tier 2 cities, patients have to travel substantial distances for basic and advanced healthcare services.

The problem is further accentuated by lack of consistent quality in healthcare across India, most of the services provided are individually driven rather than institution driven, and less than 2% of hospitals in India are accredited.

The post AI Engraving Footprints on Healthcare Transcontinental Canvas appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.

Distributed incubation may help promote grassroots innovations

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Wed, 10 Oct 2018 07:33:39 +0000

Several grassroots innovations which we often hear about failing to make it to the market. This is due to a number of factors including lack of access to formal incubation facilities, venture capital, and prototyping and mentoring. In order to overcome these hurdles, experts have suggested setting up of special purpose incubators that can provide necessary technical and mentoring support to innovators in the non-formal sector.
“The idea is to develop some kind of distributed incubation and to nurture ventures in their respective regions, in the spirit of in-situ incubation,” said Dr. Ashutosh Sharma, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology (DST) while presenting recommendations emerging from roundtables held as part of the Festival of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the Rashtrapati Bhawan few months back.

It was also suggested that since most innovative products fail to compete with large companies and against established products and brands, the government must develop norms for a preference in public procurement for such products.
Besides distributed incubation facilities, the roundtable also came up with the idea of ‘value addition centres’ which should be open for all innovators so that prototypes of innovations could be further developed and converted into marketable products. At present, academic and research institutions are involved in developing prototypes only and innovators have to look elsewhere for fabrication. Commercial fabricators accept orders for large quantities. “Innovators need special fabrication centers where limited units of a finished product can be developed for a pilot study, market research and test commercialization,” Dr. Sharma added.

Also Read: Innovation is the New Buzz Word

Innovators at FINE 2018
There is a need for testing and calibration of technologies developed by a large number of innovators. However, many innovators and startups do not have adequate funds for Distributed incubation may help promote grassroots innovations By Dinesh C Sharma this. A fund through which the testing and calibration of technologies could be facilitated is required.
In order to correctly ascertain the needs of the people, an appropriate need-gap analysis is essential to guide the R&D efforts in the right direction. If the industry could be involved during the initial phase of product development, the chances of the products’ acceptance by the people increase manifold. Hence, industry and R&D linkages at institutions be facilitated.
The roundtable on sustainable agriculture recommended adoption of one innovator by every agriculture institute and university. The Indian Council for Agriculture Research (ICAR) already runs a program called Innovator Farmers – IARI Fellows. It was recommended that this scheme should be extended to central and state agriculture universities for innovations in agriculture and allied activities.
“We have seen that coming together of innovators from informal sector and institutions in the formal sector can help disseminate innovations on a wider scale,” observed Dr. Anil K Gupta, Executive Vice Chairperson of National Innovation Foundation which organized the innovation festival in collaboration with the Office of the President and DST.
“The exhibition of innovations held at Rashtrapati Bhavan has demonstrated to industry, government and civil society how innovators are collaborating for a creative and compassionate India,” President Ram Nath Kovind said while speaking at the concluding session.
However, he said, merely showcasing innovations was not the sole purpose of this Festival.
(By India Science Wire)

The post Distributed incubation may help promote grassroots innovations appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.

Cyber-Biosecurity: Are we ready?

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Thu, 02 Aug 2018 08:42:50 +0000

Bertrand Russell once said, ‘War doesn’t determine who is right−only who is left”, thus ‘we need to update, upgrade and be prepared for our own survival’. These words sound more relevant in the contemporary phase in the wake of fast changing global scenario and emerging inevitability for updating virtually by spilled of seconds.

Amalgamation of biotechnological and information technology advancement in the 21st century has altered our world at the fundamental level which is evident in the area of health, manufacturing, and food security. Humankind has also witnessed malicious bugs like Y2K and Wanna cry in biological and cyber field respectively. We have reached new landmarks on our understanding of how biological systems work and also discovered ways to meaningfully manipulate these systems as per our advantage/ requirement. Biotech tools, such as gene drives, can deliberately engineer inheritable genetic traits into wild populations, offering a powerful new way to escape from certain vector-borne diseases.

Gene editing tools such as CRISPR-CAS9 (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats associated protein-9 nuclease) are being used globally for quick and precise gene editing. Researchers like to use computers to analyze DNA, operate lab machines and store genetic information. In the health sector, the digitization of biology & metabolic engineering accelerated the development of new vaccines, drugs, and painkillers. Agriculture is becoming smarter/digitized, with farmers relying on data-driven decision acquired through sensors planted in the ground, satellites guiding tractor movements and other new practices. But these emerging capabilities come with a whole new category of vulnerabilities and risks.

Also Read: IIT Kanpur Braces Up to Prevent Cyber Attacks

Over the last five years “technological barriers to acquire and use biological weapon has been significantly eroded.” The security impact of biotech advances goes beyond bioweapon. For example, developments in metabolic pathway engineering also offer opportunities to produce illegal drugs such as heroin. Scientists have already identified how to make the active compounds in other narcotics, such as for cannabis and precursors of LSD. What if a terrorist group or a despotic regime tries to spread modified organisms aimed at striking troops, frightening civilians, or putting food production in disarray? The failed attempt of Japanese cult to obtain Ebola strains from South Africa is one such indicator.

Recently Jean and coworkers (2018) highlighted the risks of using gene sequencing technologies to corrupt the databases by altering sequences or annotations. In this article, computer scientists designed a DNA sample that when sequenced, resulted in a data file which enabled the hacker to control the sequencing computer remotely and gave access to the hacker to make changes in DNA sequences. These alterations could delay a research program causing capital, labor loss or can be used in act of terrorism for uncontrolled production of toxins or infectious agents. To mitigate these risks, the culture of the life sciences community needs to shift from trusting blindly to a highly aware and trained community. This also requires intricate relationships between the computational and experimental dimensions of product development workflows.

The diverse nature of pathogens and toxins with their potential to be used as a biowarfare agent (BW) could be attributed to multiple factors. These include infectivity (the number of organisms required to cause disease), virulence (the severity of the disease caused), transmissibility (ease of spreading from person to person), and incubation period (the time from exposure of a biological agent to the onset of illness). All these attributes are manageable by modern biotechnology and information related to such experimentation trials is key to any covert attack using these for BW.

Similarly, in the cyber world, there is a diversity of malicious codes. These include viruses (programs that replicate in target machinery); worms (self-sustaining programs) and carriers such as a trojan horse to perform a legitimate function with malicious activity. Additionally, Botnets, or networks of computers infected with malicious code, can be coordinated to perform distributed denial of service attacks. For biological weapons, delivery vehicles range from advanced aerial spray technology to contamination of food products or water, while malicious code in cyberspace can be delivered by usage portals, email, web browsers, chat clients, web-enabled applications, and updates. The cyber threat has expanded dramatically in recent years with a series of damage. Terrorists are using cyber capabilities over traditional methods to target 104 countries including India.

Also Read: Time To Take Some Intelligent Decisions

Governments and security experts have singled out the life sciences sector as being significantly vulnerable to cybercrime. In cybersecurity terms, innovation is fast 50 Volume 3 | Issue 3 | July-September 2018 becoming a double-edged sword for life sciences clients. Recently FireEye disclosed the threat posed by two Advance Persistent Threat (APT) groups which gained access to the environment of a leading pharmaceutical company for up to three years prior to detection. They stole IP and business data from the victim, information on bio cultures, products, cost reports, and other details pertaining to the company’s operations abroad. There is nothing more important to a pharmaceutical organization than the formula for one of its new drugs.

For cyber biosecurity, employee training should be given priority. It can greatly increase an organization’s general awareness of these new risks. Similar to biosafety training, cybersecurity training modules and policies should be introduced. Secondly, organizations should perform a thorough analysis of its exposure to cyber biosecurity risks not covered by existing biosafety and biosecurity policies.

Training exercises based on this type of analysis will encourage participants to review their workflows and identify their vulnerabilities. It is high time now to evolve a policy framework to detect and prevent security threats that may compromise life sciences assets. It includes guidelines on synthetic DNA targeted companies that provide DNA synthesis services to monitor research focus and relates features.

Bioinformatics software is still not hardened against attack. Encouragement of widespread adoption of standard software best security practices like input sanitization, the use of memory safe languages or bounds checking at buffers, and regular security audits is necessary. Patching still remains challenging as the analysis software are often located in individually managed repositories and not regularly updated. One solution is to use a centralized repository to manage updates and deliver patches, similar to the APT package manager.

These could also be signed to ensure their authenticity. In the case of file sharing, the sequencing files themselves could be signed by verified research groups before uploading them to centralized databases. This is just the glimpse of the long list of strategies that need immediate deployment, continuous review, and improvement with time.

The post Cyber-Biosecurity: Are we ready? appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.

Re-Shaping of Healthcare Through Innovations

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Fri, 01 Dec 2017 11:04:09 +0000

[vc_empty_space]

The World economy is changing drastically from agriculture to manufacturing to services. Among all services, healthcare services are one of the significant contributors to the economic growth. Further, it has become easy to implement due to advances in information and communication technologies (ICT ), Internet of Things (IoT), efficient network of organisations. IoT is a network of organisations based on their complementarity strengths / resources available. IoT is connecting homes, cars cities as never before to make life simple and more comfortable [1].

Innovations has become critical capability of many business organisations including healthcare organisations. New technologies such as Internet of Things (IoT), nano technology, semiconductor products, stem cells, genetic engineering are driving the healthcare across the world. Among all, medical sciences have advanced significantly in terms of adopting latest technologies throughout the process of care delivery. Innovations in healthcare industry primarily aimed at improving quality of life, life expectancy, treatment options and cost efficiency.

Healthcare Innovation can be defined as the introduction of a new concept, idea, service, process, or product aimed at improving treatment, diagnosis, education, outreach, prevention and research and with the long term goals of improving quality of life, safety, outcomes, efficiency and costs [2].

Also Read:
Gallstones: The Truth Underneath
Top 10 Private Healthcare Insurance Provider in India

There are several innovations happened in healthcare delivery. Some of these are given below (figure 1):

• Product innovation
• Process Innovation
• Service design Innovation
• Service delivery Innovation
• Business model Innovation
Innovations in healthcare improves adaptation and affordability.

Product Innovation is concerned with introduction of new types of goods and services for the external markets. This includes significant improvements in technical specifications, components and materials, software, user friendliness or other functional characteristics. Examples include wearable devices, portable ECG of GE, Intra Ocular lens of Aravind Eye Hospital, Jaipur foot etc. These innovations help in generating incremental revenues [2]. Some of the main products include patient monitoring devices, home care and health and fitness. Wearable devices market is growing at the rate of 4.8% on year-on-year growth [3].

Process Innovation is mainly implementation of a new or significantly improved production or delivery method. This includes significant changes in techniques, equipment and/or software. These innovations help in improving internal capabilities and quality improvement [2]. Some of the examples include use of computerisation of medical records, improvement in the use of medical equipment like in Aravind Eye Hospital where surgical equipment is being used for two tables.

Service Design Innovation mainly focus on design of man-machine system compatibility including customisation of devices and its functioning. For example, customising the pulse rate of pacemaker implanted to a patient. Examples include telemedicine, mobile healthcare units, small clinics in the vicinity of patients, collaboration with other stakeholders etc. Figure 3 shows

Service Delivery Innovation include the use of new methods in delivering the service and helps in cost reduction as well as turnaround time of care delivery. This include innovation in medication, surgical interventions, procedure etc.

For example, use of iphone for taking picture of eye and checking for preliminary diagnosis in place of a computer or other equipment. MRI, CT Scan, Cataract surgery etc. Figure 4 shows arrangement of eye check-up equipment on a two wheeler which can reach to the location where four wheeler mobile unit cannot reach.

Apart from these four innovations, one of the most important one is business model innovation. This is mainly focuses on number of alternatives and pricing of products and services. Examples include offering two or three options for surgical services along with other support services like room with air conditioner or without air conditioner etc. Providing enough number of winning alternatives refers to business model innovation.

Diffusion of innovations in healthcare requires acceptance of innovations by the different stakeholders mainly the care receivers (patients), care givers (doctors and others). This requires alignment of knowledge, technology and institutionalisation of practices. Innovations in healthcare helps government to provide conducive environment for innovation and collaboration opportunity between public and private organisations. Facilitate in implementing healthcare initiatives in large scale by optimising resources and their deployment.

References:

1. S rivastava S C and Shainesh G (2015), Bridging the service divide through digitally enabled service innovations: Evidence from Indian Healthcare service providers, MIS Quarterly, Vol 39(1), pp: 245-267.

2. O machonu V K and Einspruch N G (2010), Innovations in Healthcare delivery systems: A conceptual framework, The Innovation Journal: the public sector innovation journal, vol. 15(1), pp: 1-20.

3. http://www.todaysmedicaldevelopments.com/article/wearable-medical-devices-2016-market-72816/
https://www.innovation.cc/scholarly-style/omachonu_ healthcare _3innovate2.pdf

About the author

S Venkat is an Associate Professor in Operations Management at IIM Lucknow, India. His interests include healthcare operations management, affordable healthcare design for bottom of the pyramid consumers, Managing operations in religious organisations etc.

The post Re-Shaping of Healthcare Through Innovations appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.

HEALTH PROMOTION WITHIN WHO FAMILY CITIES IN THE BALTIC SEA REGION

InnoHEALTH Magazine — Thu, 11 May 2017 09:32:04 +0000

[vc_single_image image=”1318″ qode_css_animation=””]

Health Promotion within WHO Healthy Cities in the Baltic Sea Region

Johanna Reiman is M.Sc. (Agriculture), M.Sc. (Economics), and has 28 years working experience in health and wellbeing. She has organized tons of international conferences and seminars, promoted multi-stakeholder programmes and projects and promoted ideas to innovations.

[vc_empty_space]

There are challenges in taking health as a core of the planning process in the cities. Lack of clear responsibilities in part of the municipalities, weak leadership for health, and missing procedures are only a few examples. This results in insufficient budget allocations. Economic challenges continuously overweigh health in decision–making, even if choosing correct actions could bring considerable savings. It is essential that the municipality or region knows the health situation in the respected area and has the resources and skills to analyse impacts of major policies from the health perspective. Political will and legal backing are also important in bringing cross- sectoral health promotion into practice.

[vc_empty_space]

Health promotion work needs innovations on the local level. Healthy Cities is a programme which encourages cities and municipalities for cross-sectoral work. Health and wellbeing should be put high on the agenda of the cities. Structures are needed to ensure the sustainability of the work. This means that all city functions must take health promotion into account. Education, transport, urban planning, culture and youth services should take residents’ health to their plans. It is advisable to build a cross-sectoral health and wellbeing board which follows the plans and activities. Healthy Cities is about involving all sectors.

Healthy Cities work in phases and the themes vary. Phase VI (2014-2018) themes are linked to European Health 2020 strategy. Thus, the topics are 1) improving health for all and reducing health inequities; and 2) improving leadership and participatory governance for health.

All in all, the health promotion work is connected to urban health. Urbanization is a trend all over the world. People move to cities as there are most of the jobs. Cities also have a wide variety of culture and possibilities for various types of housing. City life may – despite its benefits – bring aspects which are harmful to life. Loneliness, sedative lifestyle, pollution and lack of social belonging are serious problems which affect people’s lives. Cities should find innovative solutions to the challenges their people face over the life course.

European Health Challenges

Europe is facing big changes which affect the health of the population. Societies are ageing rapidly. Unemployment is a problem of young people and affects also persons in middle age and older. Migration changes the services needed. Urbanization means that planning becomes more challenging for cities. Ensuring the wellbeing of the population requires an open mind and readiness for cooperation. Municipalities have to start to combat the challenged together with companies and non-governmental organisations. World Health Organization is willing to help cities plan their work for the health of the residents. In Healthy Cities programme open local innovations are shared among the network members.

Western lifestyle is a threat to the society. The health data show that non-communicable diseases (NCDs) cause the biggest disease burden in all European countries. Illnesses such as diabetes, cancer, and cardiovascular diseases account for an ever larger share of fatal illnesses. This challenge is being faced by other parts of the world also.

In the Baltic Sea Region countries, non-communicable diseases cause about 80 % of deaths. These diseases are preventable and can be avoided by the modification of unhealthy lifestyles, e.g. healthy habits. Diets containing more vegetables, adequate physical activity and the avoidance of smoking should all be adopted. The national governments recognize this necessity in their health programmes and strategies. How they are implemented depends on the capacity of the municipalities, their politicians, public health administrators and methods of working. Healthy Cities programme states that unifying the efforts of different sectors and making health promotion not only effective otherwise but also cost-effective.

WHO Healthy Cities– How Did It Start?

For decades, United Nations organisations have traditionally worked with ministries and nations. Healthy Cities began as a World Health Organization project in 1987. It has over the years become a movement with very committed cities. The network has an annual business and technical conference and also runs several sub-networks. The WHO Healthy Cities programme has promoted cross-sectoral well-being effort as well as comprehensive and systematic policies and planning for health. The Healthy Cities movement is present in more than 30 European countries and over 1400 cities and regions.

Baltic Region Healthy Cities Association has served as a World Health Organization Collaboration Centre for Healthy Cities and Urban Health in the Baltic Region since 2002. The Association assists cities in implementing Healthy Cities’ goals and to build capacity for health and well-being. Furthermore, the Association is involved in health promotion projects, many of which concentrate on promoting cross-sectoral planning for health. The members of Baltic Region Healthy Cities Association include the City of Turku, University of Turku, Åbo Akademi University and the Social Insurance Institute of Finland. Baltic Region Healthy Cities Association – based in Turku, Finland – aims at increasing the awareness of local governments in adopting health as a central part of the decision-making process in municipalities.

Health inequities mean that differences in societies grow. In Europe, many people are doing well and live healthy and long lives. However, there are people whose health conditions are bad and they may be outside the society with no education. Despite several years of efforts to combat the inequities, the divide is only growing.

Coordinated Action Is Needed

Social and welfare costs remain to account for a very large share of both national and local budgets in all countries surrounding the Baltic Sea. Promotion of health and well-being requires coordinated action from all sectors of the society at national, regional and local level. It has been confirmed that investment in health promotion is cost-effective and that the best results are obtained if all sectors work together, taking into account the effects of policies on well-being. This means that, for example, education, economic and cultural sectors can strongly promote health. Also, traffic and environmental departments should enhance human well-being.

Baltic Region Healthy Cities Association has accomplished numerous local health promotion projects. Recent themes in the projects include promoting volunteering of elderly people and thus making them participate in the society and find meaningful daily activities (www.letusbeactive.eu). Promoting children’s healthy habits is a theme of a project where the other partners are University of Turku, University of Tallinn Rakvere College and City of Jurmala in Latvia. One theme where the Association has been active is health literacy. It has been found that many Europeans lack understanding of health information. Health and welfare experts should pay special attention to understandable health information and ensure that guidance given is understood.

The World Health Organization definition of health says that “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” The challenge remains around the Baltic Sea and the rest of Europe to ensure health for all.

[vc_empty_space]

Want to write for InnoHEALTH? send us your article at magazine@innovatiocuris.com

[vc_separator type=”normal”]

Connect with InnovatioCuris on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/InnovatioCuris
Twitter: https://twitter.com/innovatiocuris
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7043791
Stay update about IC by visiting: www.innovatiocuris.com

Connect with InnoHEALTH 2017 on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/innohealth2017
Twitter: https://twitter.com/innhealth2017
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7043791
Stay update about the conference by visiting: www.innohealth.in

The post HEALTH PROMOTION WITHIN WHO FAMILY CITIES IN THE BALTIC SEA REGION appeared first on InnoHEALTH magazine.