Area leadership in health care technology was on high display last month as State Sen. Mike Barrett welcomed legislative colleagues to his district during a tour of the Verizon Innovation Center in Waltham. Barrett is an active member of the Legislature’s Tech Hub Caucus, organizer of the event.
Barrett, a health care IT specialist by profession, sits on the Legislature’s Committee on Health Care Financing and co-chairs its Committee on Children, Families and Persons with Disabilities. “World-wide advances in medical technology begin right in our back yard,” says Barrett. “Our leadership on this front boosts the local economy and improves the quality of care. If we’re smart about it, innovation can also help lower costs.”
During the tour, Verizon’s Gagan Puranik discussed a remote patient management system. Run on a tablet similar in appearance to an iPad, the product monitors a patient’s vital signs, delivers multimedia education and even features video conferencing. The device allows chronically ill patients in assisted living to receive live medical care consults over the Internet.
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“Area innovators are so productive that they provide useful competition to each other,” Barrett points out. “This spurs even more innovation.” For remote care, Barrett cited a competing product from Bedford-based iRobot, also in his district. At a State House event earlier this year, the company showed off a robot that lets doctors check on patients remotely by manipulating an iPad.
Back in its headquarters in Waltham, the Verizon Innovation Center operates as a kind of mother ship for health care product developers. As of last year, more than 185 health IT start ups did business in Massachusetts. Overall, reports the Mass. Technology Collaborative, the medical device and bio-pharmaceutical sectors outperformed other industries in the growth of employee wages. Between 2007 and 2011, the two sectors increased worker pay 2.4% annually, compared to an overall state average of just .6%.