When you go to the doctor's office, ever wish that your doctor actually had your full medical history, including what medications can and can't be prescribed to you?
The Med-O-Card, an impressive USB card the size of a credit card, intends to make that wish come true. Created by Israeli health management company, CEPCO Holding Ltd., the Med-O-Card is an alternative to having a centralized medical information system for patients histories. Cepco, short for CEntral Patient COmmunication, is already providing this technology to the NAV Virchow Bund, a major doctors' association in Germany, and is in talks with other health care groups around the world, including the U.S., to make this technology available to everyone.
I recently had the chance to ask Cepco founder and Chairman, Gil (Gunter) Pollanz, a few questions about this revolutionary new technology that's coming to you soon.
Can you give a brief background about what your company does?
The company was started seven years ago to collect data in structured form so that individuals could have access to the same information and software quality as hospitals and medical practices have. We originally created web-based patient portals to hold this information. Today, our Med-O-Card allows for the storage of not just data that would be in a file usually, but also the installation of an entire operating system with software that can act on a hospital information system and will be offered to health care providers for their patients.
You have an interesting story about how you came up with the idea for this company, can you explain?
I am an economist and lawyer by profession and consider myself pretty active in sports. I didn't think health was an issue for me because I was active. However, 11 years ago doctors found cancer in my lymph nodes. I was given a few weeks to survive and the option of taking a medicine that would destroy 99% of my immune system and would give me a 30% chance of surviving only. After doing my own research, I decided to reject hospital treatment and managed to survive.
About a year after the diagnosis, when I realized I was still here, I decided to create a firm which deals exclusively with providing a technical way to have data and information available at the moment when catastrophe strikes, if it is needed. That's when I created this company.
Are you solely based in Israel?
We are based in Hod HaSharon, but part of our team is in Germany as well.
What's the background of Cepco's funding?
I started this company using $1 million from my family business. Now that we are working with health funds in Switzerland and the United States, any production costs is beyond our financial means though.
What type of funding are you currently looking for?
We're currently looking for two stages. The first stage is seed money to finance the trials and tests in Germany and the second stage we need money for the launch. For the first stage we need about 1.5 million euro and for the second stage we need about 3 million euro. Once we've proven the need for this product, there's a good chance investors can exit with 10 times the amount that was put in.
What's the Med-O-Card's advantage over other solutions?
Using Walletex's USB storage card technology, the Med-O-Card has a technical unique advantage over other solutions. It looks like a credit card or any other card you might have in your wallet and can have ID information on it like but it also functions as a storage card that can hold one to 8 gigabyte of data and can have an entire operating system on it like a computer.
Using this technology, we rewrote the entire software for the Web portal system that we created, and the card is able to act on hospital information system. For a patient it allows input of data in a structured form. It provides a diagnostic health database for any country in the world and can combine different information to create on the card an instant high-tech risk analysis of a patient, including what prescription medications conflict with each other.
What are some other benefits of having the card?
The card has three major benefits. The first is that it is a storage card and not just a "smart card." As such, this allows for the storage of all the necessary data, and instant access to vital information for the doctor and/or patient. The second is that most medical data is on large servers that make it hard for patients and doctors to easily access or meaningfully analyze and the information is vulnerable to serious security breaches. This card was designed to prevent any security breaches and as a decentralized method, it decreases those risks as well. The third benefit is that with the card in your wallet, it makes the patient an active knowledgeable partner to the health care system and gives the patient more control over their health care.
How much should individuals expect to pay for the card once it is on the market?
In Germany, patients on participating plans should expect to pay 4 euro a month for the card.
For more information on the Med-O-Card, check the Cepco Homepage.
During the week of May 4, 2008, Israel turned 60 and a few technology companies announced that they will be featured "Enterprises of Tomorrow" during the Israeli Presidential Conference Facing Tomorrow taking place on May 13 to May 15, 2008. The Conference has been organized by Israeli President Shimon Peres and, as the title implies, will focus on the future. 
