Enter a new smartphone app that aims to use technology to help COPD sufferers to recognize emergencies, and avoid unnecessary doctors’ or ER visits.
 
 
Ted Smith is the CEO of Revon Systems, a tech company based in East Louisville, and the developer of the “Smart COPD” app. The app is designed on a simple premise: that some of those emergency room visits could have been prevented if people were able to track their symptoms.
“The focus of the app is helping you keep track of whether your systems are starting to deteriorate so that you don’t have to get to a point where you have to go to the hospital for emergency care” Smith said.
When you open the app, it poses a series of questions: “Shortness of breath?” “Cough?” and “Running nose or feeling like you have a cold?” It also asks for temperature, and for users to punch in the readings from a separate device that measures oxygen saturation and heart rate.
Finally, the app evaluates the information and tells the user whether they need to head to the ER, call their doctor, check back in a few days or that no medical attention is needed.
It’s simple, and requires only a cell phone and a cheap finger oxygen and heart rate monitor.
 
“People have telephones, they’re our life line. So putting a self-management tool on a cell phone is just a genius idea,” Montague said.
He sees that as a possible opportunity for Smart COPD to reach more people with low-incomes.
“If there’s one thing I wish for, it’s that we take advantage of something we’re already paying for as a society and turn it into health care,” Smith said.
Interested? Search for ‘Revon Systems’ in your App store and look for the “Smart COPD” app.
 
 
Reference: http://wfpl.org/local-entrepreneur-creates-copd-app-shows-hope-for-louisvillians/