Prevention is undoubtedly the best medicine against health care crises. Healthcare can only survive if people start living healthier lives. But how do you get people to that point? DrHealthy thinks it has a solution.
“Look, here you can see that I ate an energy drink and a chocolate bar. ” Jelle de Rijke from Rolde shows a few pictures on his phone. The graphs are of his blood sugar level. It is nice and durable, both during the day and at night. Sometimes you see it go up a bit, when De Rijke is exercising. “I really wanted to shake the line for once. Then a small unhealthy snack is enough. It will turn red and then you will see that there will be hours of non-stop peaks to process all that sugar. In this case, that led to worse sleep.”
Jelle de Rijke is the technological brain of DrHealthy, a platform created and developed by interventional radiologist Kai Yiu Ho, with the support of funding expert Harold Nanninga from Groningen. The app instantly shows people the effects of a healthier lifestyle and supports them in their pursuit of better health. It works, many people have already noticed.
Real-time blood glucose and energy level monitoring
Guessing knows. The startup program will start with a few stickers. The participant attaches it to their arm and the app shows in real time how blood glucose, ketones, energy level and more are doing. Along with information about weight, reported nutrition and exercise, the DrHealthy receives a complete picture of the health status of the participant. So that very detailed advice can be given.
“With our program we first target people between 40 and 70 who are already suffering from something,” said Ho. “They usually feel much better within a week. Ultimately, we want everyone to live a healthier life. That’s the next step. Because if you do that, you will avoid a lot of misery. Not just for yourself, but for society as a whole.”
As an interventional radiologist, Ho saw many patients in his career. They were very sick, they were locked up for a while, but they usually died a few months later. “I thought for a long time: this cannot go on. We fix without doing anything about the cause. This has to do with the entire health care system as we know it. Our doctors are mainly paid for sickness, not health. Almost no prevention occurs during training. Specialists are judged by the number of patients they see, so more healthy people means less turnover. It is against that. This is a finished road. Healthcare cannot sustain this in the long term.”
As easy as possible
For that reason, prevention is not an option. It just has to be done. However, it is very difficult for people. There is confusion everywhere. Unhealthy food is all around us. A screen is always trying to keep us from moving. And then you have the problem that you may only notice in years what food you are eating now.
“So we want to make it as easy and fun as possible,” says Ho. “That vision is where you start. When you see what things do for you, you are more willing to make different choices. After that it’s a matter of maintenance. And that is also very difficult. That’s why you get inspiration and tips every day through ourin in in out in the app, you will receive inspiration and tips every day. For example, we’ve linked it to a recipe book with lots of delicious foods that are good for you. Healthy is not the same as ‘not tasty’. On the contrary. You just have to give it.”
The app is fully AI driven. Participants in the program are encouraged at the right time, the advice they receive is changed in real time based on the data received by the application. Either from the sensors on the body, or from the participants themselves. Because every body is different. One group needs more proteins, the other needs more exercise, something like that.
Healthier people, relieving the burden of healthcare
As is still the case in our world, many of these organizations end up in health care, an already overburdened sector that is slowly but surely falling apart. each other Soon the way health care is structured will be untenable. The effort per patient is impossible, because there are very few workers to continue in this way.
Kai Yiu Ho sees it happening from the inside and knows that things have to change. “DrHealthy was created to make people healthier and thereby ease the burden on healthcare. That’s an important start at least. That’s why we’ve designed the app in such a way that it instantly relieves the pressure on primary care. We are sure that the number of visits to the GP will decrease significantly as more people start using DrHealthy.”
It works like this: if something bothers you, you tell the AI module what your problem is. The technology determines whether a visit to the doctor is necessary or whether the defect can be corrected with lifestyle changes. Ho: “We work according to the NHG triage guidelines, based on a lot of data. We can almost always make a good estimate, and if that is not possible, we refer directly to the participant’s GP. But without a doubt the number of care requests will decrease significantly. ”
Unhealthy lifestyle
All this is related to the nature of the diseases that patients suffer from. Most conditions are a direct result of an unhealthy lifestyle. Starting a healthy lifestyle early is the best option, but making changes later in life also helps a lot. A different diet and more exercise will make the biggest difference in that regard.
DrHealthy looks specifically at metabolic health, in other words: how well your metabolism is running. “That’s the key,” says Ho. “Metabolic imbalance predicts which diseases will occur later in life. And you can also accurately measure metabolic health, so we can do something about it immediately. Our app has answers to many questions. The technology knows what is good for you in every situation. You usually don’t need to call a doctor for that anymore.”
Everyone has a different metabolism, everyone needs personal advice to keep that metabolism in shape. And that’s where the app can make the difference, Jelle de Rijke knows. “We collect so much data that our technology knows exactly what food is appropriate for each profile, we know how much exercise is required, and so on. It’s not about losing weight fast or getting fit. It’s about health.”
2024-04-25 10:00:00
#DrHealthy #care
