Recycled Blood
20 mins $130-150
SAVED VS DONOR
TRANSFUSION
COST OF ONE
PINT OF BLOOD
$0
COST OF PATIENT’S
OWN BLOOD
Studies have suggested that recycling a patient’s
blood rather than using donor transfusions leads to
better results post-surgery. A groundbreaking, lowcost medical device called the Hemafuse can also
harvest blood from a patient’s internal hemorrhage,
reducing the need for donor blood. By decreasing
reliance on donor blood, certain operations and
surgeries can be made more effective, recovery
more rapid, and sustained health more likely.
Health Tracking
Wearables
10k
RECOMMENDED
STEPS/DAY
$9B
RANGE OF HEALTY
BODY MASS INDEX
85-145
RANGE OF TARGET
HEART RATE AT
AGE 50
Bioprinting Organs
29k+
TRANSPLANT
IN 2014
22
DEATHS PER DAY
WAITING
$100m
GOOGLE INVESTMENTIN
BIOPRINTING
Needing an organ transplant has long meant spending critical time on a waiting list. With bioprinting,
organs may soon be available without the wait or the
loss of those who die waiting. Printers are already
producing cartilage, muscle, skin, and bone; more
complicated organs, such as hearts and livers, are
in the pipeline. A surgeon based in New York City,
whose team successfully implanted the first bioprinted trachea into a baby pig, expects FDA approval for human trial within the next two years.
Custom-built
Bones
6-12
WEEKS FOR BONES
TO HEAL CURRENTLY
$22b
ANNUAL COST OF
OSTEOPOROSIS
IN US
206
BONES IN HUMAN
Tracking activity and health is key to longevity, and
smart technology can help us pin down exactly what
we need to be doing to be our healthiest. From devices that can alert you when you’re not being active
enough to contact lenses that measure blood sugar
levels, technology is in place that can make and keep
us more active and less prone to obesity and a host
of other health conditions.
A startup called Epibone works with scans of patients’ bone defects and natural material to reconstruct and custom-build bone grafts for people with
congenital defects or bone-related medical conditions. It currently works with facial and cranial
bones but will be applicable to the entire skeleton
as the process is refined. The technology can make
surgeries simpler, faster, and less likely to be rejected.
Predictive
Technology
Spray-on
Skin
2008
GOOGLE FLU
TRENDS
LAUNCHES
148
FLU-RELATED
CHILD DEATHS IN
US IN 2015
1.2
TRILLION GOOGLE
SEARCHES PER
YEAR
Google’s flu heat map is designed to recognize geographical patterns in web searches, such as whether
an unexpectedly high number of people in one city
are searching for terms related to the flu. Tech companies are starting to apply predictive technology to
everything from unde standing patterns in the human genome related to longevity to seeking cures
for common food allergies and tracking the spread
of disease.
11m
BURN VICTIMS
WORLDWIDE 2004
4
DAYS TO HEAL IN
TRIAL VS WEEKS
NOW
90 mim
LENGTH OF ENTIRE
TREATMENT
PROCESS
Artificial skin derived from a combination of natural and synthetic material changed the way severe
burns and chronic skin conditions are treated. Now,
spray-on skin developed from a patch of a patient’s
own skin promises to speed up the treatment and
recovery process significantly. It takes just 90 minutes to collect the healthy skin, combine it with an
enzyme and water mixture, and spray it onto the
wound.
OCTOBER 2016 EDITION - 43