Within the Texas Medical Center, one baby is delivered every 20 minutes – approximately 26,280 births per calendar year. With statistics like that, improving women’s healthcare is an ever-present focus for TMC Innovation.
Facilitating clinical partnerships to improve clinical delivery and outcomes for women is an objective for TMCi Accelerator for HealthTech. We work towards this commitment by supporting digital health and medical device companies like Babyscripts, Origin Health, and Kegg.
The Texas Medical Center has quite possibly the highest level of quality specialty care in the nation and Women’s health is no exception, but even at the top of a field, scalability and access can be a challenge. That’s where we see innovation playing a role.
– Devin Dunn, Head of TMC Accelerator for HealthTech
Even in the world’s largest medical city access to quality healthcare isn’t a reality for many in our state and the Greater Houston Area. In Harris County, life-threatening, pregnancy-related complications doubled between 2008 and 2015. A 2018 report discovered that Harris County outpaced not only the state but the nation, in life-threatening complications due to pregnancy.
In our neighborhood, we’ve seen the disparity. The largest medical city in the world is next to Third Ward. The community is home to many women who are low-income, lack insurance, and may face disparities due to their race. According to data from the Houston State of Health, over 30 percent of adults in the Third Ward do not have any form of health insurance, posing challenges in effectively receiving healthcare. Deficiencies like these have become a catalyst for raising the consciousness and motivation for TMC Innovation to continue to find and support modern methods to improve healthcare among expectant mothers.
Understanding the needs of the community is the first step. The second is finding suitable solutions.
Already in the hands of moms in Houston, Babyscripts is a virtual care platform for obstetrics that enhances the maternity care experience through mobile-based digital education and remote patient monitoring. Via an internet-connected blood pressure cuff, patients enrolled in Babyscripts can remotely manage their blood pressure under the supervision of their provider, helping them to monitor and maintain blood pressure levels to identify and prevent hypertensive disorders, among other risks. Users can monitor their levels from the comfort of their homes, with the security of knowing that data is communicated immediately and directly to their provider, enabling intervention in the event of an abnormal or critical reading.
Consistent monitoring is especially important during pregnancy because hypertensive disorders can cause numerous issues, ranging from low birth weight to potential death. Women who suffer hypertensive disorders of pregnancy are more likely to deliver preterm, which can have long-term effects on the health of the child, and the mother can develop coronary and cardiovascular-related health issues later in life. Without access to readily available and affordable healthcare, expectant mothers are at a higher risk of experiencing these sometimes fatal consequences. Remote patient monitoring for low-income moms through Babyscripts directly addresses these barriers to access, enabling data collection, provider connection, and intervention outside the four walls of the office.
While this solution is a great step in the right direction, there are hurdles that many women may face even if they do receive devices.
Reliable transportation systems or support to quickly reached care is a hurdle to access. Additionally, expectant mothers may not have access to telehealth due to a lack of availability of internet connectivity. To combat this obstacle, the TMCi Accelerator for HealthTech has facilitated discussions with founders about the most strategic and effective way to boost patient engagement and remote monitoring. One reoccurring topic of conversation is engaging patients via app versus SMS text approach. The app route could create hurdles in lack of adequate WI-FI, logging in, or downloading the app. With SMS text-based communication mobile devices and connectivity are still hurdles.
We have learned that patient engagement with SMS text in most cases, including with senior populations is the preferred method for ongoing patient communication. However, expectant mothers are highly motivated in their health journey and the Babyscripts app is an effective tool for engagement.
Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy are some of the primary contributors to maternal mortality and morbidity rates, and the ability to access solutions to monitor and prevent those risks is one of the primary pillars of our mission to support better pregnancies for all. We’ve found that empowering women through education and remote monitoring tools not only drives better outcomes in the short term but carries long-term benefits for the community, setting up those women and their families for a better, healthier life,” said Juan Pablo Segura, President, and Co-founder of Babyscripts.
TMC invested in Babyscripts because they serve moms in Houston and because they have illustrated how data can be made actionable. Babyscripts measure the right vitals, shares that data with the patient’s provider, and create the opportunity for action or intervention to be taken. Many healthcare startups don’t close this loop effectively by gathering the appropriate data in a way that is incorporated into the clinical decision-making process.
In healthcare, there will always be obstacles, but these only serve as fuel for innovation and drive to create better patient outcomes. We understand that ongoing progress requires the efforts of stakeholders, scientists, engineers, clinicians, and investors, in other words, a community that is dedicated to the advancement of women’s health and wellness.
For technology to be developed with the community in mind, it must start small and involve the very people that it’s meant to serve. It’s only at the intersection of community and innovation that a company can implement solutions in mass that truly strike at the heart of the problem.
If there was any place in the world, any medical city that can make a positive impact, it’s Houston.
Apply here for TMCi Accelerator for HealthTech.