A Decade in Digital Health Innovation: Highlights from the 2016 USC Body Computing Conference

On September 23, 2016, Karten Design participated in the tenth annual USC Body Computing Conference, where we heard leaders in public health, design, military, technology, and athletics discuss how digital health and virtual/augmented reality are disrupting healthcare delivery. Karten Design is proud to be a founding member of the USC Center for Body Computing and is honored to join the USC Institute for Creative Technologies, Google, Yahoo, and several other leading Silicon Beach tech companies as founding partners of USC's Virtual Care Clinic.

Download our 2016 USC Body Computing Conference Snapshot here.

Digital Health Accessibility
Dr. Leslie Saxon and Scott Dorman, Managing Director, USC Center for Body Computing, introduced the Digital Health Access Initiative, a comprehensive effort aimed at providing digital healthcare access and information to underserved communities. A main focus of this initiative is to provide vital access to digital technologies, such as cell phones and tablets, which are needed to tap into the latest digital health innovations.

Meeting Patients’ Needs
Presenters stressed that in order to support the latest digital health solutions/services, it is key to understand patients’ needs, rather than wants. Stuart Karten noted that patients need simplicity in digital health solutions. In order to accomplish this, service providers must focus on connecting with patients emotionally and creating amazing experiences.

Power of VR in Health
We witnessed how VR is continuing to have an influence over digital health, ranging from disease management, anxiety treatment, and cognitive training to surgical simulation, physician training, and psychotherapy. We got an inside peek into the latest VR digital health solutions, including surgical simulation training, an immersive pre-operative experience, and a VR experience designed to teach medical students about the aging experience from the first-person patient perspective.

To learn more about the outcomes from this year’s USC Body Computing Conference, download our Snapshot here.