Theranos Is Subject of Criminal Probe by U.S

Post by Fede_V » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 11:42 PM UTC

lvs wrote: post #35

jackcn wrote: post #11

Like I've mentioned before, Theranos needs to shut down. The technology doesn't work (and likely it never will since blood constituents are not evenly distributed at small volumes) and its investors and executives are complicit in fraud. While half-completed/non-working solutions are fine in software world and with consumer electronics, a misreading or missed reading of blood parts can easily cost the health or life…

> blood constituents are not evenly distributed at small volumes You're saying they're running into statistical stochasticity? Are you claiming they were sampling femtoliter volumes? That's the how small you'd have to get for your claim to be true.

Post by Apocryphon » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 11:46 PM UTC

Animats wrote: post #14

seehafer wrote: post #4

When I first read this headline I was thinking "Uh oh, Theranos must have very badly handled its interactions with FDA". But this is apparently the SEC investigating the company. Does anyone know how often the SEC investigates a private company with a product that's still essentially in beta testing?

The SEC is getting more aggressive about regulating large pseudo-public companies that haven't had a formal IPO, but which have many "qualified" investors.[1] Mutual funds now invest in these companies, which means ordinary investors are at risk. The SEC chair on "unicorns": "It is axiomatic that all private and public securities transactions, no matter the sophistication of the parties, must be free from fraud. Exch…

Post by lvs » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 11:48 PM UTC

Fede_V wrote: post #41

lvs wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> blood constituents are not evenly distributed at small volumes You're saying they're running into statistical stochasticity? Are you claiming they were sampling femtoliter volumes? That's the how small you'd have to get for your claim to be true.

Actually, yeah. The variance in the amount of quantities present in the blood draws by Theranos is too high to get useful measurements (without very many replicates, defeating its purpose) according to published research: http://ajcp.oxfordjournals.org/content/144/6/885.abstract I was also utterly astonished when I read this. Even if the experimental error of the instrument was zero, you cannot reduce the biological…

Post by ChrisLomont » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 11:50 PM UTC

lvs wrote: post #35

jackcn wrote: post #11

Like I've mentioned before, Theranos needs to shut down. The technology doesn't work (and likely it never will since blood constituents are not evenly distributed at small volumes) and its investors and executives are complicit in fraud. While half-completed/non-working solutions are fine in software world and with consumer electronics, a misreading or missed reading of blood parts can easily cost the health or life…

> blood constituents are not evenly distributed at small volumes You're saying they're running into statistical stochasticity? Are you claiming they were sampling femtoliter volumes? That's the how small you'd have to get for your claim to be true.

Post by lvs » Mon, Apr 18, 2016, 11:53 PM UTC

ChrisLomont wrote: post #47

lvs wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> blood constituents are not evenly distributed at small volumes You're saying they're running into statistical stochasticity? Are you claiming they were sampling femtoliter volumes? That's the how small you'd have to get for your claim to be true.

You're wrong; a single red blood cell is several femtoliters. To get a good statistical count of much more rare (yet important) features one can sample much, much more than this and still get anomalies from having too small a sample. Here's [1] a cool graphic showing the tip of the iceberg. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Reference_ranges_for_bloo...