Digital Health Coffee Time Briefing ☕ 

Your morning summary of digital health news, information and events to know about if you want to be “in the know”.

👇 News  

📰 European start-up Health Sage AI has launched its Open Source Generative AI Platform fully dedicated to healthcare: a trusted and transparent foundation for the development of AI applications for healthcare. The first release of HealthSage AI’s Large Language Model, Note-to-FHIR, transforms clinical notes and other types of unstructured text into a structured FHIR output. It is now available in beta for the medical and open source community to review and extend prior to the impending launch of the first commercial version.  

👇 Urinal mats in public places in England will begin to carry blood in pee cancer warnings for men, as part of a major new NHS earlier diagnosis drive. The NHS and P-Wave, a leading urinal products brand, are working together to put the message “Blood in your pee? Contact your GP practice” on urinal mats in thousands of men’s toilets across the country. 

🧑‍⚕️ Conversational AI could be the key to unlocking better chronic disease management, with new data in JAMA Network Open showing that a voice assistant tool improved glycemic control and insulin dosing for type 2 diabetes patients. These findings come as the healthcare industry weighs the pros and cons of consumer AI use and how the technology can streamline the patient experience. 

🏛 Google has a plan for incorporating AI into its healthcare offerings and now its lobbyists are working to influence future regulations, according to Politico. Lawmakers are questioning whether Google’s plans for rolling out advanced AI before regulations are released could put patient data at risk and reinforce biases. Google already has AI partnerships with health systems including Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic to deploy tools examining medical records, research papers and more to help clinicians diagnose and treat patients. 

💳 Imprivata, the digital identity company for life- and mission-critical industries, celebrated customer collaboration and innovation at its annual HealthCon user group held at the Royal College of Physicians of London. Each year, Imprivata hosts a series of regional HealthCon user groups worldwide to highlight customers, share best practices, and facilitate conversations around industry trends. 

❓ Did you know that? 

Offices across the UK are at risk of becoming a hotbed of flu this festive season, as new research reveals that Brits are willing to travel into work despite feeling ill. The study revealed that more than a third (35%) of Brits would travel into the office even if they had a winter cold or flu, with London being the highest of any region in the country at 43%.

It comes as new data reveals that more Brits are back to working five days in the office than working from home, for the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic. More than half (55%) of Brits expect to catch an illness this Christmas, which equates to more than 22 million people. Despite many saying they’ll still go to the office, other behaviours from the pandemic seem to be more engrained. 43% say they will wear a mask when in public places if they get ill and almost three quarters (74%) will wash their hands more regularly. 

📖 What we’re reading 

Health systems accountable for patients need to know patients’ vital status. Yet the electronic health record (EHR) often does not reflect death. A JAMA study investigated what proportion of active patients a health system is unaware are deceased and encounters after death. 

🚨 This week’s events 

8 December 12:30-13:30 – Digital Health Webinar: Accelerating Healthcare Insights – Rapidly unlocking value from your data