Innovating Connected Health with E-Textiles

Article Contributed By: Les Pawlak, Vice President of Business Development, Jabil

There is no lack of challenges in healthcare device manufacturing. Regulatory hurdles, manufacturing issues and end-user adoption barriers make navigation difficult. To further complicate matters, truly understanding the evolution of healthcare connectivity remains elusive. 

It’s no wonder that connected healthcare has been trailing behind connected industries. In fact, all healthcare decision-makers who participated in Jabil’s 2018 Connected Health Technology Trends survey affirmed that the industry lags other connected industries. Download the full survey report.

Connected health presents so many opportunities—better treatment options, earlier detection of symptoms, improved patient outcomes and so much more—that we can’t afford to duck the challenges and risks it will take to achieve them. 

When asked about how connected health companies are currently addressing their challenges, 85 percent of decision-makers say they have a lot of work to do and another 10 percent say they’re so overwhelmed by their challenges that they don’t even know where to begin. But it’s not all dim and grim. Mega trends like the Internet of Things are creating unprecedented disruption in every industry—connected health is just one of them. Transformational innovation is coming.

Partners may be one of the best resources for overcoming challenges and moving the connected health industry forward, as they can contribute valuable experience and knowledge in unfamiliar areas of technology and business. Sixty-five percent of industry decision-makers consider manufacturing partners with expertise in connected devices the most potentially beneficial partners to their woes. This is natural, considering 95 percent of connected health companies admit to facing manufacturing challenges.

That’s what Recovery Force sought out to do. 

Recovery Force is an innovative medical device company providing healthcare professionals, patients, and athletes with a next-generation mobile compression solution for enhancing circulation. The company has developed a platform technology with the ability to embed shape-changing memory fibers into various types of garments and footwear to produce therapeutic compressions.

That same technology is also available to sports enthusiasts and athletes, providing enhanced circulation during warm-up and recovery to achieve optimal performance. Recovery Force’s patented technology works without bladders, pumps, cords or electrical stimulation to increase patient compliance. Instead, the technology centers on embedding woven fibers of nickel-titanium, also called Nitinol, into textiles. These woven fibers have the unique ability to change shape in real-time to deliver sequencing compressions that increase circulation to the body’s cardiovascular and lymphatic systems. 

Unlike the technology that tethered people to beds or wall-mounted devices for the last three or four decades, Recovery Force’s technology mobilizes patients and consumers, giving them a much better experience and quality of life after surgery, sports performances or other activities.