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MantraCare Expands Holistic Wellness Offerings with Virtual Yoga and Fitness Sessions

MantraCare Expands Holistic Wellness Offerings with Virtual Yoga and Fitness Sessions

MantraCare, a company focused on transforming healthcare through AI-powered therapy and holistic wellness solutions, is expanding its services to include virtual yoga and fitness sessions. This initiative aims to support members with safe, effective, and personalized practices, aligning with the company's broader approach to wellness. The new role of Yoga & Fitness Expert will involve delivering live or recorded classes, designing session plans, offering modifications for diverse abilities, and guiding members in breathwork, mindfulness, and basic fitness routines. These experts will also collaborate with care teams, document member progress, and adapt programs based on individual needs and goals. This part-time, remote position requires consistent availability across different time zones and comfort with digital tools and telehealth platforms. MantraCare's platform already covers mental health, diabetes, musculoskeletal care, nutrition, and telehealth, utilizing AI for triage and therapy, and escalating t...

Atrium Health and Morehouse School of Medicine Partner to Invest Over $700 Million in New Atlanta Hospital and Care Network

Atrium Health and Morehouse School of Medicine Partner to Invest Over $700 Million in New Atlanta Hospital and Care Network

Atrium Health, in partnership with Morehouse School of Medicine, is committing over $700 million in capital and clinical investment to establish a new teaching hospital and comprehensive care network in Atlanta. This initiative aims to address significant healthcare access gaps in South and West Atlanta, particularly following the closure of Atlanta Medical Center and Atlanta Medical Center South in 2022. The project has received approval to proceed with plans for a new hospital at 675 Metropolitan Parkway SW, which will include a Level III trauma center, primary care practices, urgent care, specialty services, and virtual care options. The City of Atlanta is also expected to contribute over $115 million for site preparation, infrastructure improvements, and equipment. The new hospital is planned to open with approximately 50 beds, with the capacity to expand to over 700 beds as community needs evolve. The broader campus will also feature medical offices, research facilities, and additional developments to...

Cityblock Health Acquires Homeward Health and Secures $116M Funding to Expand Rural Healthcare Access

Cityblock Health Acquires Homeward Health and Secures $116M Funding to Expand Rural Healthcare Access

Cityblock Health, a company primarily focused on providing care for urban Medicaid and dual-eligible members, has announced its acquisition of Homeward Health. This strategic move aims to significantly expand Cityblock's reach into rural healthcare markets across the United States. The acquisition, an all-stock transaction with undisclosed financial details, will combine Cityblock's data and care-orchestration platform with Homeward's established rural provider relationships and care model. Concurrently, Brooklyn, New York-based Cityblock Health has secured a $116 million Series E funding round led by General Catalyst, bringing its total funding to over $900 million. The company, which launched in 2017 from Alphabet's Sidewalk Labs, focuses on delivering integrated health and social services to underserved communities, addressing social determinants of health such as transportation and housing. Cityblock currently serves nearly 200,000 members and has an annualized revenue of $2.2 billion, marking a 77% ye...

Biorce Seeks UX Researcher to Advance AI-Powered Clinical Trials in Austin, Texas

Biorce Seeks UX Researcher to Advance AI-Powered Clinical Trials in Austin, Texas

Biorce Seeks UX Researcher to Advance AI-Powered Clinical Trials in Austin, Texas

AI Tool Prioritizes Biomarkers from Wearable Data, Enhancing Medical Discovery

AI Tool Prioritizes Biomarkers from Wearable Data, Enhancing Medical Discovery

Researchers have introduced the Biomarker Discovery Framework, an AI-powered multi-agent system designed to prioritize candidate biomarkers from wearable sensor data. This framework addresses the challenge of transforming continuous physiological signals, such as heart rate and sleep patterns, into clinically meaningful biomarkers. Traditional language model-based agent systems often struggle with physiological time-series data, leading to potential statistical inaccuracies. The Biomarker Discovery Framework, however, structures biomarker prioritization as an iterative research loop under human supervision, integrating hypothesis generation, statistical analysis, model training, adversarial validation, and literature-grounded reasoning. This approach aims to accelerate discovery while maintaining strict statistical rigor. Across three cohorts involving 9,279 participant-observations, the framework successfully identified known clinical signals, discovered convergent biomarkers across independent datasets, ...

Clinical Trials Face Significant Recruitment and Retention Challenges in the U.S.

Clinical Trials Face Significant Recruitment and Retention Challenges in the U.S.

Clinical trials in the United States are encountering substantial hurdles in recruiting and retaining participants, with an estimated 86% of trials failing to meet their recruitment targets. A recent online survey revealed that 71% of chronic condition patients would likely participate in a clinical trial, yet two-thirds reported their healthcare providers had never discussed trials with them. Furthermore, a 2020 study indicated that only 9% of adults had ever been invited to participate. Key challenges include the difficulty for patients to find appropriate trials, the geographic concentration of research at large urban academic medical centers, and financial barriers such as travel, lodging, and childcare costs. Even when trials are identified, patients often face issues with eligibility criteria and the financial implications of participation, despite some costs being covered by trial sponsors and, for routine care, by insurance under the Affordable Care Act, Medicare, and Medicaid.

Health Systems Adopt AI Chatbots to Streamline Patient Record Analysis

Health Systems Adopt AI Chatbots to Streamline Patient Record Analysis

Health systems across the U.S. are increasingly implementing generative AI tools, such as ChatEHR, to search and synthesize extensive patient medical records. These chatbots are designed to help clinicians navigate the often-bloated electronic health records (EHRs) to find critical information. For instance, at Stanford, a physician utilized ChatEHR to uncover a patient's previous diagnosis of sarcomatoid squamous cell carcinoma from a different health system, which subsequently explained current lymph node findings that had stumped multiple pathologists. This adoption marks a significant shift from initial experimental phases to broader implementation of both homegrown and vendor-built AI solutions within healthcare. The primary goal is to improve efficiency in accessing patient data, which has become a major challenge due to the sheer volume of information in modern EHR systems. The utility of these tools extends beyond solving complex diagnostic mysteries, offering broader benefits in daily clinical pra...

FDA-Cleared AI Medical Devices Lack Evidence of Patient Benefit, Study Reveals

FDA-Cleared AI Medical Devices Lack Evidence of Patient Benefit, Study Reveals

A new study published in PLOS Digital Health has found that 99.8% of AI-based medical devices cleared by the FDA have not been tested to determine if they improve patient outcomes. Out of 1,357 AI devices cleared for patient care, only three have been evaluated for patient-centered outcomes such as death rates, hospital readmissions, or quality of life. The study, conducted by researchers at MIT Critical Data, highlights significant gaps in the FDA's current evaluation approach. While radiology applications account for 78% of these cleared AI devices, the evidence supporting their impact on patients remains extremely limited. The analysis also revealed that most studies, when conducted, took place in highly resourced healthcare systems and excluded key patient subgroups, raising concerns about performance across diverse populations.

Gov. Larry Rhoden Announces $90 Million in Federal Grants for South Dakota Rural Healthcare

Gov. Larry Rhoden Announces $90 Million in Federal Grants for South Dakota Rural Healthcare

Governor Larry Rhoden has announced the allocation of $90 million in federal grants to 82 rural healthcare organizations across South Dakota. This funding is part of the Rural Health Transformation initiative, which aims to modernize healthcare services, enhance cybersecurity measures, and improve the sharing of patient information within the state's rural areas. The grants were awarded to projects selected from a pool of 144 applications, which collectively requested $336 million in funding. According to Dakota News Now, Governor Rhoden emphasized that these investments in technology and tools for rural providers are intended to build a stronger, more connected healthcare system, ensuring that South Dakotans, particularly those in rural communities, can access quality care without extensive travel, while also securing their data.

Emagine Solutions Technology Launches AI-Enabled Pregnancy App to Combat Arizona's Maternal Health Crisis

Emagine Solutions Technology Launches AI-Enabled Pregnancy App to Combat Arizona's Maternal Health Crisis

Courtney Williams, founder of Emagine Solutions Technology, has launched an AI-enabled pregnancy app called Journey Pregnancy to address the severe maternal health crisis in Arizona. The app, released in early 2024, allows pregnant women to monitor vital signs such as blood pressure and heart rate in real time. An AI-powered assistant named Aria provides 24/7 support and emotional guidance throughout pregnancy and the postpartum period. Williams was inspired to create the app after experiencing a postpartum preeclampsia scare herself, where she lacked visibility into her blood pressure trends. Arizona's maternal mortality rate is 30 deaths per 100,000 live births, significantly higher than the national average, ranking 39th out of 49 states for maternal health outcomes. Rural communities in Arizona are particularly affected, with women often traveling over two hours for maternity care. The Journey app aims to bridge these gaps by offering remote monitoring and accessible health information, alerting users ...

Virginia Hospitals Face Crisis as Labor and Delivery Units Close, Creating Maternity Care Deserts

Virginia Hospitals Face Crisis as Labor and Delivery Units Close, Creating Maternity Care Deserts

Hospitals across Virginia are increasingly closing their labor and delivery units, leading to a significant crisis in maternal healthcare, particularly in rural areas. More than one in three counties in Virginia are now classified as 'maternity care deserts,' meaning they lack birthing facilities and obstetric clinicians. This situation affects an estimated 7,000 births annually in rural parts of the state. Licensed midwives, such as Crystal Fink and DeGranof Singer from Roanoke Birth and Perinatal Center, have witnessed firsthand the severe consequences, including instances where mothers have had to deliver on the side of the road or in church parking lots due to the long distances to the nearest hospital. Several hospitals, including LewisGale Montgomery in 2024 and Sovah Health in Martinsville in 2022, have ceased labor and delivery services, further exacerbating the problem. While facilities like Roanoke Birth and Perinatal Center offer prenatal, birth, and postpartum care, access to fully equipped hos...

Google Research Develops Camera-Based Tool for More Accurate Body Fat Estimation Than Wearables

Google Research Develops Camera-Based Tool for More Accurate Body Fat Estimation Than Wearables

Google Research has developed a new system called PhotoScan that uses AI to analyze a series of 2D images (selfies) to estimate body composition with higher accuracy than traditional wearable devices. This tool was trained using data from X-ray scans (dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry, or DXA) and MRI scans, and further refined with actual smartphone photos. PhotoScan can accurately estimate overall body fat levels, as well as ratios between core and waist/leg fat (A/G ratio) and organ and subcutaneous fat (V/S ratio), which bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) sensors on wearables cannot achieve. Beyond body composition, the system also shows potential in predicting conditions like insulin resistance, aligning with Google's recent focus on health insights, such as the upcoming Insulin Resistance Trends in Health Guardian on the Pixel Watch. While Google has not announced plans to release PhotoScan as a product, it is seen as a potential future offering within Google Health.