Inventing two extra dimensions of change The previous section looked at the many ways patient, iterative work by engineers exponentially improves the price, power and size of technology. While vast, the previous categories of improvement are, each on their own, obvious, quantifiable, predictable in scale, if not precise time-frame. Each can be easily graphed on standard […]
Author Archives: Hank Copeland
4) Five categories of health technology change
More of more: devices, precision, data, users, and software To be clear, I’m not claiming that any of the genetic data or analysis above is close to 100% accurate. Or that I know what all the numbers mean. Or that the results are in any way currently actionable — unless you’re considering asking me out on a date. […]
23andme’s new type 2 diabetes report changes the face of healthcare
23andme rolled out a new type 2 diabetes report this month that’s revolutionary. Previously, 23andme results told the average person obvious things like that she/he does, indeed, have blue eyes and dimples. They also made it easier to find unknown relatives. The new analysis goes a lot further — it quantifies your risk of type […]
3) A jumbo jet in every garage, a CAT scanner in every rec room
Patient, heal thyself As I’ve monkeyed with genetic tests, friends have reminded me that patients generally know a lot less than their doctors. (Yes, an eyebrow sometimes has been arched in my direction.) Overwhelmed by complexity and without years of rigorous training, patients are prone to grabbing at simple-sounding fixes. Avoid vaccines! Stop eating gluten! Gimme […]
2) A peek at my genes relating to empathy, OCD, and cheese burger risk
Recently I spit into a little plastic tube and sent it off to 23andMe. I sprang for the $200 DNA test because it was a fast, affordable way to detect genes relating to hereditary thrombophelia — a tendency to clot. I was interested because, in early October 2018, I had experienced a pulmonary embolism — in layman’ terms, clot(s) […]
1) Tales my Fitbit didn’t tell
Safe at the ER… then my heart rate plummets I obviously survived the morning run on October 6, though I walked most of the second half of my four mile “run.” After lunch, I talked with my kids about what I described as my “odd health development.” They suggested I go immediately to the emergency […]
0) Two times Fitbit didn’t save my life
Like most of my Saturdays, October 6, 2018 began with an extra-large coffee laced with plenty of cream.
Starving for light
Who you gonna believe, this gadget or your lying eyes? You live in an cocoon made of steel, glass, rubber and wood. Seduced by the simplicity of electric lights and herded by a tight schedule, you see only slivers of sunlight as you hustle to school or work each day. You think your life is […]
Run in the morning sun, sleep better
Ben Franklin almost got it right. “Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise” summed up sleep’s importance. But Ben’s folk wisdom got good sleep’s cause and effect backward. New research shows that how well you sleep often depends on what you did that morning. Morning sun The research, conducted at […]
