“Since we started using CareWatch by OneCare, it has become an absolutely vital part of how I am taking care of my mom. Especially while she has been quarantined and we are not able to see her,” reads a recent customer testimonial. OneCare’s revolutionary care-as-aservice platform—with the specialty smartwatch “CareWatch” as its cornerstone—simplifies caregivers’ ability to remotely watch over and take care of their loved ones in real time. The Founding Partner, Chairman at OneCare, Tom Glaser, believes, “Distributed, connected virtual care is the new paradigm post-COVID—although it was well on its way pre-COVID, the pandemic really pushed the fast-forward button.” In the following interview, Glaser, along with Tom Taylor, CTO, and James Barfield, President, and chief data officer, elucidates how OneCare effectively delivers remote patient management and mobile continuous monitoring/reporting.

What are the biggest pain points for the customers approaching you today, and how does your platform address them?

Glaser: The primary challenge that our platform solves is allowing the senior population to live longer, independently, and with dignity, and also have a significantly better quality of life. There simply aren’t sufficient facilities and professional caregivers to cater to the rate of senior population growth, which is almost four times faster than any other demographic. Our team of experienced software, data, and wearable professionals is helping address this problem with diverse category-specific technical expertise. The team is an amalgamation of veterans in smartwatch, specialty smartwatch, as well as the overall wearable space. Tom Taylor and James Barfield were a part of the Verizon team that launched one of the first wrist wearables featuring fall detection. Barfield is also known for his experience and proficiency around the application of data analytics in the specific-wearable and senior markets. Furthermore, OneCare’s sister technology partner in Schenzhen, China is thought to be one of the pioneers in smartwatches, having been manufacturing smartwatches since 2011. Our cumulative experience in the wearable, software and data space is the foundation that has produced our careas- a-service platform, a revolutionary service creating separation from the rest of the market. Taylor: Another consumer demand that we are helping to address is revamping the personal emergency response system (PERS) market that has continued to rely on decades-old technology. We have built a care-asa- service platform—the heart and core of OneCare—that not only simplifies caregivers’ tasks but also allows us to use sophisticated data analytics and, in turn, provide valuable insights. Our newly developed “Guardian”independent and decentralized mobile app acts as a companion to the CareWatch, allowing you to see what your loved one, patient, or employee is doing, understand their sleep patterns over the previous week or month, analyze their activity, and so forth without being invasive or having to call.

Barfield: With the help of data analytics, we aspire to solve grander healthcare problems, such as predicting as well as automatically diagnosing outcomes. We are currently in the data collection phase and will soon be able to make accurate predictions related to heart disease, diabetes, and more.

Walk us by the features, applications, and benefits of CareWatch. Also, what kinds of tools are available to users as part of the care-as-a-service platform?

Taylor: The CareWatch that we are currently launching out features a cellular chip, thus helping wearers stay connected even outside their homes. CareWatch provides a comprehensive safety net, meaning if you need help for any reason, press the SOS button and automatically be connected to an ultraemergency call center 24/7. The watch will also send a text message alert to your family and friends. Using our GPS capability, we, as well as your caregivers, will be able to locate you in real time, thus allowing everyone a greater sense of freedom. By measuring biometrics in terms of heart rate, daily activity, quality of sleep, and so forth, we equip caregivers with an informative and decisive toolset—for instance, if my mother starts a new heart medication and the biometrics show me her increased activity levels, I deduce as a remote caregiver that the medication is doing wonders, and vice versa. We are also headed towards adding more parameters in the future, including blood oxygen level and respiration rate, to help deliver more effective care. Glaser: Paired with the OneCare “Guardian” mobile app, CareWatch’s robust set of features and functionalities is revolutionary and incomparable in today’s market. Besides, our care-as-aservice platform analyzes the collected data and recommends actions that may help improve the wearer’s overall health and wellness. We even have wearers who take their CareWatch to the doctor and submit the collected data for better treatment. For us, the Holy Grail is to ultimately populate electronic medical records (EMR) with data from the wrist.

What is the feedback you typically receive from your customers? How has OneCare’s offering impacted their lives?

Glaser: We quite often hear people say how they cannot imagine their lives without using our care-as-a-service platform now. Another prevalent, interesting feedback category involves customers conveying how the platform has proven to be a re-engagement or reconnecting tool for families. As funny as it sounds, members of estranged families have even expressed to us how our platform has facilitated them to start communicating among themselves on a regular basis, which was not the case before. That is precisely why—despite disrupting the PERS market with our mobile (m-PERS) offering—we consider the OneCare platform as a quality-of-life solution (QOLS). The customer feedback is a testimony to how we are enabling seniors who have worked hard throughout their lives to live without anxiety and with more freedom—whether living solo or with a companion. Our tagline is along the same line: “We believe in taking care of those who took care of us.”

How does OneCare’s immediate roadmap look like?

Taylor: We are continuing to expand the capabilities of our platform. Besides assisting enterprises to simultaneously monitor hundreds of people’s performance and associated statistics, OneCare’s platform connects to external devices, including glucometer, blood pressure cuffs, and so forth via Bluetooth. It allows us to collect more information on the wearer and, in turn, provide them a higher quality of life. Barfield: By raising both the quantity and quality of the data that we collect, we aim to create more advanced algorithms—those that will help us make fall propensity prediction, get proactive with the wearer’s health, and eventually transition to prognostics and the associated diagnostics. Glaser: 35 percent users regard OneCare’s customer support as the most important piece. Consequently, we intend to triple our investment in creating a senior customer experience second to none, along with starting our own senior-oriented publication for increased awareness. Further in cards is the OneCare Exchange, a community for users to share their experiences with the care-as-aservice platform, discuss your thoughts, ask questions, and more. We believe it will certainly help ease the burden off the shoulders of overwhelmed first-time caregivers.