A mobile health startup has developed an app that packages tools such as chemotherapy dosage formulas and prognosis tools to help oncologists make clinical decisions in what the company believes is a relatively untapped market.
London-based Portable Medical Technology’s ONCOassist app for smartphones and mobile devices by Kevin Bambury, the chief operating officer and co-founders including his brother Richard, a specialist registrar in medical oncology (a fellow training to be an oncology specialist) and Eoin O’Carroll. The company has been one of seven companies in the Healthbox healthcare accelerator in London for the past three months.
“Current apps on the market are for general medics and are not focused to the needs of specialist medics,” said Kevin Bambury. “We are focused to the needs of the oncologists and update quickly based on user feedback.”
Tools such as a carboplatin dosage calculator, steroid equivalence convertors and opioid equivalence convertors are presented in an interactive format so that clinicians can input patient data and get immediate results. A set of prognostic tools helps oncologists with risk stratification and deciding on eligibility for specific treatments or clinical trials including the Motzer criteria for renal cancer and the IPI score for diffuse large B cell lymphoma, according to the website.
“We are currently exploring opportunities of licensing ONCOassist to large organizations and hospitals,” Kevin Bambury told MedCity news in a phone interview. It has secured CE approval from the EU for the app and is setting its sights on seeking approval for the app from the US Food and Drug Administration in the next six months. The company is exploring the possibility of partnering with a pharmaceutical company.
Bambury added that the company envisions that the device could be integrated with electronic medical records. It also plans to offer the tool for other cancer types such as colon, breast and prostate cancer.
