Wireless health check

Cambridge Consultants

has joined the Continua Health Alliance, a consortium of healthcare and technology companies collaborating to establish interoperable personal health systems for individuals and organisations.

Cambridge Consultants says it will bring its Vena platform (pictured below) to Continua. Vena is a single-chip communication solution for health devices, with the capability to deliver wired (USB) and wireless (Bluetooth) connectivity to health devices.

Vena includes the three standards needed for the Version One Device Connectivity Standards selected by the Continua Health Alliance. It also embeds the Bluetooth Health Device Profile and the USB Personal Health Device standard, optimised for the secure transport of medical data, onto a single chip, which in turn allows medical devices to communicate.

Vena also offers the IEEE11073 standards for compatible exchange of information between health devices, including thermometers, weighing scales and blood-glucose meters.

Paul Williamson, head of wireless medical at Cambridge Consultants, said: ‘By ensuring interoperability, we can give individuals, patients and healthcare professionals access to health and fitness information through devices and services that have been designed to a common standard and that offer personalised solutions.