Macadamian’s My Diabetes Coach™ Chosen as a Finalist in Novo Nordisk’s 2017 HITLAB World Cup of Voice-Activated Technology in Diabetes
Gatineau, Quebec (PRWEB) November 16, 2017 -- Healthcare software design and development firm, Macadamian, today announced that My Diabetes Coach™ was chosen as one of five finalists out of 146 applications from 15 countries in the eleventh annual 2017 HITLAB World Cup of Voice-Activated Technology in Diabetes presented by Novo Nordisk, an international challenge where innovators present original solutions to pressing global healthcare challenges.
Macadamian will present My Diabetes Coach to a panel of industry leaders from Google and HITLAB at the HITLAB Innovators Summit on November 29, 2017 in New York City. The international competition offers participants a high-profile stage to showcase their work, up to $75,000 in prize money for winning solutions (Grand Prize is $50,000) as well as networking opportunities with thought leaders.
About My Diabetes Coach
My Diabetes Coach is a unique way to improve the health of youth with type 2 diabetes by creating an intelligent, voice-enabled system – using Amazon’s Alexa – that provides accurate, personalized feedback and suggestions based on actual behaviors.
Macadamian is collaborating on My Diabetes Coach with the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario — Ottawa Children’s Treatment Centre’s (CHEO – OCTC) pediatric endocrinologist, Dr. Stasia Hadjiyannakis.
Leveraging Macadamian’s Hive software platform, the team is developing a voice-enabled and connected health solution that includes a custom developed mobile application, Amazon Alexa skill (voice enabled application), integration with popular wearables, and a Bluetooth glucometer interface, all of which ties into a patient portal and a database with patient support content. The solution is being designed to complement and enhance the initiatives of the clinician and members of the patient’s circle of care. Voice interaction and gamification are also being integrated to encourage and reward patients, while providing advice and guidance to those that are struggling.
In youth with type 2 diabetes, blood sugars are affected by nutrition, activity, sleep, stress and prescribed medication, often including insulin injections and day-to-day measurement of blood sugar levels. Achieving blood-sugar targets for youth with type 2 diabetes is critical to preventing diabetes-related health complications, such as kidney failure, blindness, early heart disease and amputation.
My Diabetes Coach is a unique approach to overcome the barriers of more traditional modes of communication — phone calls and email are now less desirable to youth — by connecting with youth directly using the intelligence of their smartphones or other home systems and introducing peer to peer mentorship opportunities.
This solution is aimed at improving and strengthening the teamwork between clinician, parent and child in diabetes management, and reducing diabetes-related family conflict, which results in better control of blood sugar levels.
In the United States today, 29.1 million people are living with diagnosed or undiagnosed diabetes, and about 208,000 people younger than 20 years are living with diagnosed diabetes, according to a study published in April’s New England Journal of Medicine, entitled, “Incidence Trends of Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes among Youths, 2002-2012.”
“One of the key challenges in managing diabetes is empowering youth to engage in health behaviors in a supportive way,” says Dr. Stasia Hadjiyannakis, Medical Director of CHEO – OCTC’s Centre for Healthy Active Living. “Establishing and encouraging good diabetes self-management at an early stage will provide significant benefits to patients over the years by mitigating the risk for diabetes-related health complications.”
“We are thrilled and honored to be chosen as finalist in this international competition and to showcase our strength in developing and integrating voice-enabled solutions in front of such highly regarded technology leaders,” said Timon LeDain, Macadamian’s Director of Internet of Things. “Leveraging our Hive platform to create My Diabetes Coach truly demonstrates how beneficial the use of voice assistants can be in healthcare. This solution has enormous potential to make an impact on youth suffering from a chronic illness like diabetes.”
Watch this video to get a better sense of how My Diabetes Coach will work.
About Macadamian
Macadamian is a full-service user centered software design and development firm focused on the healthcare industry. From product ideation to market ready – and everything in between, we provide a complete range of usability, design and engineering services. From healthcare organizations to mid-size enterprises; our solutions are founded in research-informed design first while leveraging the cloud, big data, and Internet of Things to deliver context-aware and adaptive experiences. Macadamian is headquartered in Gatineau, Canada and also has offices in Armenia, and Romania. http://www.macadamian.com
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Tracy Hartman, Brandigo, http://www.brandigo.com, 1-978-462-0002 x103, [email protected]
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