10-07-2016, 12:30 PM
Yes, there is a brobdingnagian market for reliable, small-volume blood diagnostic tests that would enable people to skip the doctor's office.
I feel like the target diagnostic markets for Theranos have to be the ones that are already using blood for sampling. Something like pregnancy, which uses urine, is much simpler and palatable to patients since blood isn't involved. I think you'll find that patients will go to great lengths to avoid having to draw their own blood or prick their own fingers if they can (the bloodless glucometer is still not market-ready, I guess).
IIRC, Theranos' purported value proposition wasn't just the small volume of blood required for testing but also the immediacy of the results (lab-on-a-chip type stuff). That's a game-changer for things like flu, Zika, HIV, etc. diagnoses. In hot zones where time is even more critical, disease control efforts would be greatly enhanced by accurate, on-the-spot tests for Ebola, SARS/MERS, etc.
I feel like the target diagnostic markets for Theranos have to be the ones that are already using blood for sampling. Something like pregnancy, which uses urine, is much simpler and palatable to patients since blood isn't involved. I think you'll find that patients will go to great lengths to avoid having to draw their own blood or prick their own fingers if they can (the bloodless glucometer is still not market-ready, I guess).
IIRC, Theranos' purported value proposition wasn't just the small volume of blood required for testing but also the immediacy of the results (lab-on-a-chip type stuff). That's a game-changer for things like flu, Zika, HIV, etc. diagnoses. In hot zones where time is even more critical, disease control efforts would be greatly enhanced by accurate, on-the-spot tests for Ebola, SARS/MERS, etc.