Last month, we attended HLTH in Las Vegas, the largest digital and connected health conference. We were part of the Australian Trade delegation, and alongside with our Director of Research, Michael Lusis, we joined some of Australia’s brightest and best young health tech entrepreneurs and investors. The conference offered invaluable insights into where our industry is heading. Here are Mic and my key takeaways.
The Self-Monitoring Revolution: Promise and Peril
One of the strongest themes at HLTH was personal health monitoring as part of the wider “wellness” movement. Blood markers, home testing, mail-out services-analyse of your own data. A panel of 50+ biomarkers tracking everything from comprehensive health testing and metabolomics to sleep analysis, stool and urine monitoring, steps, heart rate, respiration rate, blood pressure, and stress levels. All accessible via smartphone and telehealth applications using computer cameras.
44% of Americans* are now tracking their sleep, steps, heart rate variability and more, creating a treasure trove of health data that is perhaps healthcare’s most expensive yet unused asset. Despite 80%* of patients being willing to share wearable data with doctors to improve their care, the information highway between your Apple Watch and your physician’s EHR remains about as connected as a dial-up modem.
Here’s a critical question: Are we building infrastructure for personalised precision medicine that will improve outcomes, or are we creating more digital noise in an already overwhelmed healthcare system?
An alternate vision is that, with personal health monitoring exploding, people will take greater responsibility for their own health and rely less on medical practitioners and a “broken” health system. Certainly this seemed to be the vision of Calley Means and MAHA folk (Make America Healthy Again), riffing on about a healthcare system that rewards sickness rather than wellness.
Tech giants are doubling down on turning biometric data into personalised health insights, but frontline medicine struggles to integrate these data streams meaningfully. Even as 60% * of patients manage chronic conditions and 90%* of prescribed medications have zero adherence tracking, the uncomfortable truth is that we might be building solutions for the worried well rather than those who need it most.
The next stage promises AI diagnostics, against the startling revelation that “50% of doctors are below average.” Perhaps. Or perhaps we step down from doctors entirely, with nurse practitioners filling the gap. And neither addresses a fundamental challenge: Social Determinants of Health.
AI Everywhere: Opportunity or Overcrowding?
The sheer density of AI companies at HLTH was staggering. Machine learning, artificial intelligence, analytics – every booth, every conversation circled back to AI.
But will AI follow the same path as wearables? Five years ago, that market was crowded with innovative wearables startups. Today, the giants survived: Samsung, Apple, Google, and Fitbit. And Oura.
Oura is the maker of the Oura Ring. They recently raised $900M at a staggering $11B valuation. Oura has moved on from being a fitness wearable to a health data company with a focus on sleep, women’s health and heart health. Oura supplies health insurers, corporates, government and defence. A seriously impressive execution of a single form factor, and valued entirely on its impact on wellness and personalised healthcare.
Is this a parable for AI startups in five years? At Eevi, our answer is clear: purposeful AI that solves real operational challenges, not AI for AI’s sake.
AI in Aged Care: Augmentation, Not Replacement
One session featured an AI companion claiming to reduce loneliness and depression in aged care with measurable results. Residents reportedly liked it. Yet experts slammed it as “not offering personal care” and “the wrong direction for AI.”
This tension is fundamental. At Eevi, our philosophy is clear: AI should extend care team capabilities, not replace human connection. Technology should handle monitoring, data analysis, and pattern recognition- freeing care staff for meaningful resident interactions.
AI shouldn’t be the friendly caller. AI should alert staff when a resident needs a human connection, armed with insights about why they might be struggling.
Remote Monitoring: From Innovation to Standard Practice
The most impressive presentation came from Houston Methodist’s Smart Hospital Beta program. They’ve started with a blank sheet and envisioned a system wide technology platform, employing proven technologies, across all parts of the hospital. In the area of remote care monitoring, patients wear a BioButton device and the hospital has established a central care control desk monitoring patients’ vital signs and behaviours in real-time. Staff watch screens showing dozens of patients simultaneously, with AI prioritising alerts.
This is exactly the kind of model that could transform aged care. In aged care, operators have longitudinal responsibility for each resident’s care outcomes. The technology exists today to monitor residents wellness across broad acre communities from centralised care hubs. One skilled clinician can oversee hundreds of residents, responding when needed rather than conducting endless routine checks. It would require a fundamental re-think of care governance and standard operating procedures.
Houston Methodist proves this isn’t science fiction- it’s operational reality. The question for Australian aged care: when do we make this leap from reactive to proactive care?
Emerging Technologies Worth Watching
LoRaWAN for Real-Time Location Systems offers lower-cost deployment across large campuses. For broad acre retirement villages, this could enable location tracking without prohibitive infrastructure costs.
mmWave radar alternatives are maturing rapidly, with multiple vendors now offering contactless fall detection and vital signs monitoring. Our open architecture means we can integrate the best solutions as they emerge- the key differentiator isn’t sensor hardware, it’s what you do with the data.
Wellness technology going mainstream. Sleep monitoring and continuous health tracking are becoming clinically useful for aged care- poor sleep correlates directly with cognitive decline, fall risk, and health deterioration.
What This Means for Australian Aged Care
HLTH reinforced critical lessons:
AI is inevitable, but purpose matters. Winning applications augment care teams rather than replace them.
Platform integration wins over point solutions. Operators want comprehensive platforms, not dozens of disconnected vendors.
Remote monitoring is becoming the standard of care. Central monitoring with clinical oversight will define leading organisations.
But we must also confront uncomfortable truths. The self-monitoring revolution creates mountains of data that healthcare systems struggle to use meaningfully. Technology built for the worried well may not address the needs of vulnerable populations managing chronic conditions and social determinants of health. The impact of the US government’s investment in “wellness” rather than “medicine” will have long-lasting effects on all of us, both good and bad.
At Eevi, our focus remains clear: AI that augments human care, open architecture integrating best-of-breed solutions, practical implementation solving real operational challenges, and data-driven insights enabling proactive, person-centred care that actually improves outcomes- not just collects more data.
The future is bright- but it requires thoughtful implementation. We would love to hear your views on these topics, especially if you disagree.
David Waldie, Managing Director, Eevi
*Source: “Is wearable data hitting a dead end?” Presentation, (HLTH 2025)