Yuri Milner and Google’s Matt Cutts back $2.8 M round in medical app, DrChrono

There is no cure for the headache induced by excessive paperwork every time you visit the doctor’s office. So its no surprise that as tablet computer come to replace clipboards and smartphones become ubiquitous among patients, the medical app DrChrono is gaining some traction.

The service, which claims to have signed up 50,000 doctors and 400,000 patients, has raised a $2.8 million round of seed funding, reports the NY Times, from Russian billionaire Yuri … Continue Reading

Eight technologies for a healthier 2012

Welcome to 2012 and a new list of New Year’s resolutions — a list that likely includes some variation on adopting a healthier lifestyle. Thanks to the acceleration of technology, fulfilling your resolutions this time around may be easier than it was in 2011.

The combination of diet, exercise and sleep, according to my Singularity University colleague Daniel Kraft, are keys to good health. Kraft, a physician-scientist who chairs the medicine track and runs the … Continue Reading

Keas wants to keep your employees healthy with games and social media

Keas, a social game that promotes health and wellness within companies, received $6.5 million in funding on Tuesday. The second fundraising round was led by Atlas Venture and Ignition Partners.

Keas was developed by former Google Health leader Adam Bosworth to promote corporate wellness. It combines game play and socialization to motivate employees to adopt healthy lifestyles. Employees form teams and work together to complete three fitness and health goals each week. Goals range from … Continue Reading

BitGym’s new workout-as-game iPad app sees healthy amount of in-app purchases (video)

Exercise good for your health (but boring), while video games are fun (but make you fat). A startup called BitGym is hoping to combine the best aspects of the two with a workout app for the iPhone and iPad that turns exercise equipment into video game machines.

The company has just released Virtual Active, an immersive fitness app with 10 different workout environments. Put your iPhone 4 or or iPad 2 on the magazine rack … Continue Reading

4 RockHealth startups that will keep you healthy and sane over the holidays (video)

The holidays are supposed to be joyous, but they’re mostly a stressful time full of rich meals, grueling travel and over-commitment. It’s easy to neglect our personal health, or let an exercise regime lapse, when we’re busy and its cold and dark outside.

But thanks to cool new technology, it doesn’t have to be this way.

We recently invited four startups from health-startup accelerator RockHealth to share some some holiday wellness tips. The San Francisco-based … Continue Reading

Jawbone suspends production of Up wristband, offers refund even if you keep it

Bluetooth headset maker Jawbone issued an apology today and will be giving broad refunds with “no questions asked” on its recently launched Up health wristband after many users complained of issues, including battery and syncing problems.

“While many of you continue to enjoy the Up experience, we know that some of you have experienced issues with your Up band,” Jawbone CEO Hosain Rahman said, in a statement. “Given our commitment to delivering the highest quality … Continue Reading

With Eric Schmidt as backer, HealthTap raises $11.5M for mobile patient-doctor Q&A network

HealthTap has raised $11.5 million in a first round of funding to expand its expert online physician community, which answers questions that patients pose online or via smartphones.

The backers include Google chairman Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavors fund and Mohr Davidow Ventures, while Mayfield Fund led the round.

Palo Alto, Calif.-based HealthTap’s interactive health network started just two months ago and it already has more than 6,000 doctors and 500 healthcare institutions. Patients ask questions … Continue Reading

RunKeeper scores $10M round to expand its fitness platform

RunKeeper, a small startup that makes a run- and workout-tracking platform, has raised an impressive $10 million second round of funding.

The money will give the company a shot at its greatest ambition: Becoming a widely-used platform for measuring, tracking and reporting a variety of health and fitness data, including exercise, nutrition, sleep and other factors.

The company started out making an iPhone app that tracks runs, using the GPS built into the phone to … Continue Reading

Jawbone’s new Up health wristband is equal parts cool and creepy

Bluetooth headset maker Jawbone will soon release its new Up life monitoring wristband that’s designed to help you live a move healthy life by tracking every move you make, what you’re eating, how long you’re sleeping and how many calories you burn.

The Jawbone Up, in many ways, is a cool use of technology to tackle the problem of not being active enough. Using the wristband and an iOS app, you can get prompts to … Continue Reading

Your cell phone doesn’t give you cancer, 18-year Danish study shows

You’re as likely to get cancer from using your cell phone as from drinking coffee. Say what? That’s right, cell phone radiation is not dangerous.

The results of a an 18-year study by researchers in Denmark, tracked the incidence of certain cancers among cell phone users, and found that cell phone owners, and those who did not own cell phones were equally likely to get cancer.

The study, which was led by the Danish Center … Continue Reading

Need therapy? Get it cheap and online at PrettyPaddedRoom

Everybody needs to vent sometimes. Most of us occasionally need feedback from trained professionals, too.

If you need an inexpensive and insanely (pun intended) convenient option for therapy, look no further than PrettyPaddedRoom.

PPR is an online space for you to safely and securely vent your stresses, frustration, anxiety and depression, either into an online journal, face-to-face with a therapist over video chat, or both.

“There’s still a stigma attached to therapy, and I think … Continue Reading

How one mobile startup is planning to change health services in Africa (video)

When it comes to thinking big, MedAfrica takes the cake. The founders are aiming to revolutionize how people in developing areas, particularly on the African continent, access and use health information.

The startup presented at the Demo Fall 2011 conference last week, and we got a chance to catch up with some of the company’s founders, including CEO Steve Mutinda and business development guy Mbugua Niijhia. In this video, we discuss how the MedAfrica platform … Continue Reading

GravityEight wants to measure your entire life

Ever wanted a dashboard for your life? GravityEight wants to become the “Mint.com of your entire life” by tracking everything from your health to your community contribution and displaying the results in a wellbeing wheel.

The company just signed a partnership with health community Medhelp, which will anchor GravityEight’s health channel. Medhelp has 12 million users and will provide a selection of its 50 tools and applications to GravityEight.

GravityEight’s mission is to measure, manage … Continue Reading

Why Microsoft’s HealthVault ramp-up is good for developers

Despite Google ending its endeavors in the health care industry, Microsoft announced Monday that it’s ramping up efforts to boost its web-based health records platform HealthVault.

The company is trying to attract former Google Health, users and developers to port their data over to HealthVault. Google Health will be discontinued as of Jan. 1, 2012, as previously reported by VentureBeat.

“Microsoft is much better suited to take on the standardization of Health records, and its … Continue Reading

Lean startups, fit entrepreneurs? Share your secrets for staying healthy

As the pace of innovation increases and we’re asked to do more with less — the capital-efficient “lean startup” movement, for example — it’s easy to get overwhelmed by stress. And when you’re out changing the world, thinking about the state of your own body can seem self-indulgent.

All-night hackathons, red-eye flights to raise funds, nonstop blogging, and marathon meetings eat away at the time it takes to tend to our own health. At the … Continue Reading

DEMO: Health in Reach's site cures a sick healthcare system

Health in Reach is one of 70 companies chosen by VentureBeat to launch at the DEMO Fall 2010 event taking place this week in Silicon Valley. After our selection, the companies pay a fee to present. Our coverage of them remains objective.

Healthcare has been a hot topic over the last year. Millions of Americans pay out of pocket for medical care, lack insurance, or face unexpected medical bills. It’s a system riddled with inefficiencies … Continue Reading

Intel and General Electric form healthcare tech joint venture

Building on a previous alliance, General Electric and Intel have created a formal joint venture to develop healthcare technologies aimed at making life easier for chronically ill patients.

The new venture will be headed by Louis Burns (above), chief executive of the venture. He is currently vice president in charge of Intel’s health division. GE’s Omar Ishrak will be chairman of the new venture. Ishrak (below) is currently senior vice president and CEO of GE … Continue Reading

Google search adds medication info

Google has just expanded its search tool to include detailed information on medications. The goal: to give users verified information on a variety of drugs — and take more advantage of the pharmaceutical industry’s annual $900 million online ad spend.

Google started serving up tailored results to health-related search queries last year. Now the same search box can be used to call up fast facts about most medications, with the details being supplied by the … Continue Reading

Your health on the iPhone!

Google has just expanded its search tool to include detailed information on medications. The goal: to give users verified information on a variety of drugs — and take more advantage of the pharmaceutical industry’s annual $900 million online ad spend.

Google started serving up tailored results to health-related search queries last year. Now the same search box can be used to call up fast facts about most medications, with the details being supplied by the … Continue Reading