Point-of-Care Technologies for Health Care

The increasingly global focus on health care issues continues to underline the importance of point-of-care technologies and their ability to provide cost-effective solutions that address many unmet health care needs. Further, the current crisis in health care costs has critically underscored the need for research and development into highly effective, but low cost means of delivering health care. With a focus on providing clinically actionable information at or near the patient, point-of-care devices provide clinicians with information that is critical to the management of patient care while they are still with the patient. Rapid information results in various advantages for POC testing in different kinds of health care settings. In primary care settings in developed countries, the shortened timeline between testing and availability of results reduces the need for extra office visits or follow-up phone calls to convey testing results and adjust clinical intervention. This strategy can reduce cost and increase access of otherwise underserved populations to medical care. For diseases that are infectious, such as sexually transmitted infections or respiratory diseases, POC testing can facilitate treatment modalities quickly, thus prevent ing further spread of the infection for better and timely clinical management. In acute care settings, timely access to diagnostic information is most critical for providing an effective medical response. In disaster settings, POC diagnostics can speed triage and enable rapid establishment and delivery of medical services. While in the developed world, POC testing is primarily de signed as an adjunct to central lab testing, not as replacement, POC testing can enable local health care providers to deliver cost-effective care in developing countries or at rural locations with lack of access to central laboratory infrastructure. Further, a growing number of point-of-care technologies enable clinicians to remotely assess/monitor patients w- - ho are home bound or unable to meet the clinician in their clinical setting. The underlying theme is to multiply the effectiveness of physicians by providing better/faster information that enables timely delivery and management of health care.