GSR Ventures, a venture firm focused on early stage digital health companies, forecasts a much brighter investment picture for 2023 following a hard reset in 2022, said GSR Partner Sunny Kumar in an interview with BioWorld at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco.

Sysnav Healthcare SA and Roche Holding AG entered a new collaboration to develop digital endpoints for use in clinical trials of therapies for a range of neuromuscular disorders. The alliance combines Sysnav’s expertise in wearable technologies and movement evaluation with Roche’s clinical experience. It builds on an existing collaboration that led to the qualification of the world’s first digital endpoint, for evaluating therapies in development for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). They now aim to put that experience to work in widening its application to other disorders in which movement is a key parameter.

The COVID-19 pandemic provided opportunities for companies that provide telehealth solutions, and Taiwan-based Faceheart Inc has developed video-based measurement software that allows patients to be screened remotely using artificial intelligence (AI).

Nervtex Co. Ltd.’s diagnostic assessment software Modas for movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease has been given NMPA approval in China. Using smart mobile devices, Modas can process video data collected from people with potential or existing movement disorders when they are in any specific motion state.

In what is claimed as the largest study of how digital technologies were applied to support population level research during the pandemic, scientists at the U.K. Medical Research Council’s epidemiology unit at Cambridge University have reported high, sustained levels of engagement in a fully remote COVID-19 study that ran at a time when visits to a study center were not possible.

At a time when Chat GPT is making waves in the world of artificial intelligence (AI), new legislation is making the rounds in Washington that would allow an AI algorithm to write prescriptions for pharmaceuticals. Rep. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) introduced H.R. 206 to the House Energy and Commerce (E&C) Committee Jan. 9, although at present the bill enjoys the backing of no other members of the House, suggesting that this legislation has a steep climb in front of it.

A panel at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference touched on how multiple remote patient monitoring devices and management can be streamlined via machine learning to identify patients who need follow up, in many cases in their homes, increasing value without increasing the burden on already short-staffed health care organizations. The panelists saw technology as a way around a shortage of providers that could both increase access to care and deliver more targeted acute care while also addressing factors in health disparity to prevent development of disease.

The European Union’s (EU) Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act) drew a fair amount of criticism when it was first released, but Team-NB, the association of notified bodies (NBs) for the EU, has weighed in with some less than flattering observations. The group’s position paper on the legislation said that the act would not only up-classify some artificial intelligence algorithms to a higher risk class but would also resurrect the backlog of applications because of burdensome new requirements for NBs, thus exacerbating an existing crisis of med tech availability in the EU.