FORBES MAGAZINE (April 12, 2018)
New Approaches, Based on Prevention, Societal Change and Technology Are Supporting the Management of Specific Female Chronic Diseases
On average, 38% of women across the world suffer from a chronic disease, accounting for one-third of female mortality. The incidence of chronic diseases increases drastically in women above the age of 64 and a large proportion of elderly women have limited options for care, often with no assistance or support from caregivers. There are several chronic diseases which are more prevalent in women and that need to be managed differently for women and men, such as osteoporosis, arthritis and hypertension. From apps for creating awareness, health coaching and medication management to technology-enabled solutions for accurate screening and diagnosis of chronic diseases, Femtech finds several applications in this area. An example of a company disrupting this space is MobileODT that has an FDA-approved colposcope and enhanced visual assessment solution combining high-quality medical-grade image and video capture using smart devices for cervical cancer screening. The impact of such Femtech applications in making screening accessible and scalable up to a large population is very high, especially for challenges such as cervical cancer screening in low-resource settings, which account for 80% of cervical cancer incidence and 95% of cervical cancer mortality.
