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Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

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Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#41

Post by vixen99 »

Jerry2 wrote: post #34
ccvannorman wrote: post #8

In startup-world, this is known as "faking it until you make it." Well done Theranos, keep at it!

>Well done Theranos, keep at it! Really? What if your family member died because of inaccuracy of Theranos' results? Would you still cheer for them? This whole article is extremely damning. Some stuff just makes your head spin: >Carmen Washington, a nurse who worked at a clinic owned by Walgreens in Phoenix, says she began to question Theranos’s accuracy after seeing abnormal results in potassium and thyroid tests. >…

I thought the 'well done' was ironic.

Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#42

Post by [deleted] »

qq66 wrote: post #22

It's not necessarily bad business or bad practice to launch a company before the technology is ready, and to use a more conventional, cheaper substitute in the interim. I remember reading about a company that offered automated translation, but started out with human translators to validate the increased market size at the lowered price point. They used the validation to raise enough money to continue growing a user b…

[deleted]

Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#43

Post by bhouston »

nrao123 wrote: post #12

I am genuinely confused by the overall thrust of the article. 1st Theme says: Theranos doesn't use Edison (thier in house testing device) & instead use regular equipment from companies like Siemens. This is a marketing problem because the company is saying its using one device but is actually using another one. 2nd theme: lab tests from Theranos differ from generally accepted standards. How do they differ if in fact…

> 2nd theme: lab tests from Theranos differ from generally accepted standards. How do they differ if in fact they are using the same tests as everybody else? Is it just the general variability of lab results and similar variability could be find in quest diagnostics as well?

Because Edison and the dilution procedure produce low quality results. Thus for a large number of the tests Theranos is less accurate than traditional methods.

> 3rd Theme: almost all people say Theranos is dramatically cheaper than competitors. How is that possible when they are using the same equipment as everybody else for most of the tests? Is it a process innovation in operations rather than from Edison/better equipment tech? Or are they just subsidizing these costs and being cheaper and possible have bad unit economics?

The above is possible because they are not currently focused on profit, rather market share. All that money that they have raised has had to go somewhere.

Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#44

Post by downandout »

Like many of us, Elizabeth Holmes is smart and had a good idea to change a large industry. Unlike many of us, she has managed to convince several billionaires to make her one too, based almost solely on the strength of her idea. I don't know how much money she has personally taken off the table during her funding rounds, but for her sake I hope it's enough to last her for the rest of her life.

I don't doubt that she is sincere in wanting to build this business and take over the blood testing industry. But Theranos is looking more and more like a cautionary tale about why VC's and angels shouldn't give any Stanford dropout with little more than an idea and a dream a multi-billion dollar fictional valuation and tens or hundreds of millions of dollars in real cash to burn in the streets.

Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#48

Post by robbiep »

frozenport wrote: post #7

>>Theranos claims that the usual delay of testing in centralized laboratories is approximately 3 days and that they will generate and deliver their data much faster (e.g., within 4 h). The 3-day delay claim is not accurate. The bulk of laboratory testing in centralized laboratories is completed within an hour or two (calculated from time of sample collection to time of results posting for physician review). For examp…

I agree with your turnarounds (I mean, of course, if you don't turn around a trop in under an hour it's pretty much useless) not to mention things like the iStat machines which are used in tonnes of rural Australian hospitals for all range of blood tests, and ABG machines in every emergency department and Icu, all of which require tiny quantities of venous or even capillary blood to work

Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#49

Post by firebones »

bhouston wrote: post #43
nrao123 wrote: post #12

I am genuinely confused by the overall thrust of the article. 1st Theme says: Theranos doesn't use Edison (thier in house testing device) & instead use regular equipment from companies like Siemens. This is a marketing problem because the company is saying its using one device but is actually using another one. 2nd theme: lab tests from Theranos differ from generally accepted standards. How do they differ if in fact…

> 2nd theme: lab tests from Theranos differ from generally accepted standards. How do they differ if in fact they are using the same tests as everybody else? Is it just the general variability of lab results and similar variability could be find in quest diagnostics as well? Because Edison and the dilution procedure produce low quality results. Thus for a large number of the tests Theranos is less accurate than tradi…

It seems more like an investor story time exercise in order to attract capital in order to acquire the companies already holding the market share.

Re: Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests

#50

Post by Gatsky »

Aside from whether their technology actually works or not, the central premise that cheaper, easier and more frequent testing will improve outcomes is unproven. There are many potential downsides. It might increase health spending through extra doctor visits, the need for repeat testing and more invasive and expensive investigations. But will it actually make anyone's life better? Bear in mind that even a single, obvious test performed in a high risk population to screen for say breast cancer or ovarian cancer, either barely moves the needle in saving lives or ends up being useless. What effect does Theranos think indiscriminate widespread testing will have?

With all these competing risks, this frequent testing strategy needs to be evaluated in randomised double blind clinical trials. Before that though, Theranos needs to submit their tests for independent validation in many thousands of patients, and publish the results.

I note this single study which compared Theranos' CRP to a conventional method [1]. The Pearson correlation was 0.85, which I don't think is really good enough.

[1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4091290/

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