You've heard of smartwatches tracking your steps, but what about tracking Parkinson's symptoms? That's the reality with StrivePD, an incredible app developed by the team at Rune Labs. In a unique conversation, Brianna unveils how this free app, compatible with the Apple ecosystem, enables Parkinson's patients to closely monitor their symptoms, including tremors and dyskinesia. Originally created by Aura Oslapas, a PD patient herself, StrivePD was acquired by Rune Labs in 2018. Brianna shares how StrivePD can revolutionize the way patients and clinicians communicate, leading to a more informed health journey. It's time to get savvy about your health, and this conversation is a great start.
The chat takes a futuristic turn as we plunge into the fascinating world of Rune Labs' brain sense technology. Imagine a world where Parkinson's patients can track symptoms more effectively and clinicians can adjust programming and medications based on the tracking with the StrivePD App ! Well, it's happening. With the integration of fall detection technology and an activity logging system, Brianna highlights how StrivePD provides users with an in-depth understanding of their health. But that's not all; there are exciting developments on the horizon, including the integration of heart rate metrics into the clinician portal. Tune in to learn how technology like StrivePD is not just changing, but truly revolutionizing care and treatment for Parkinson's.
Buzzsprout - Let's get your podcast launched!
Start for FREE
Check out our website www.safeathompt.com
give us a call at (585)398-6050
or send us an email at robin@safeathomept.com
Thanks for listening!
You've heard of smartwatches tracking your steps, but what about tracking Parkinson's symptoms? That's the reality with StrivePD, an incredible app developed by the team at Rune Labs. In a unique conversation, Brianna unveils how this free app, compatible with the Apple ecosystem, enables Parkinson's patients to closely monitor their symptoms, including tremors and dyskinesia. Originally created by Aura Oslapas, a PD patient herself, StrivePD was acquired by Rune Labs in 2018. Brianna shares how StrivePD can revolutionize the way patients and clinicians communicate, leading to a more informed health journey. It's time to get savvy about your health, and this conversation is a great start.
The chat takes a futuristic turn as we plunge into the fascinating world of Rune Labs' brain sense technology. Imagine a world where Parkinson's patients can track symptoms more effectively and clinicians can adjust programming and medications based on the tracking with the StrivePD App ! Well, it's happening. With the integration of fall detection technology and an activity logging system, Brianna highlights how StrivePD provides users with an in-depth understanding of their health. But that's not all; there are exciting developments on the horizon, including the integration of heart rate metrics into the clinician portal. Tune in to learn how technology like StrivePD is not just changing, but truly revolutionizing care and treatment for Parkinson's.
Buzzsprout - Let's get your podcast launched!
Start for FREE
Check out our website www.safeathompt.com
give us a call at (585)398-6050
or send us an email at robin@safeathomept.com
Thanks for listening!
Hello, I'm Robin Barclay and I'm here today with Brianna Hood from Rune Labs and she's going to tell us more about the Strive PD app. Welcome, brianna.
Speaker 2:Perfect. Yes, hi, thank you, robin. I'm so excited to be here to chat about Strive PD. So, as Robin said, I am a patient specialist for Rune Labs. My background is also as a physical therapist, specializing in neurologic disorders, specifically Parkinson's, and I also am a rock study boxing coach. So very excited to be here and chat about Strive PD and how amazing it can be for the Parkinson's population.
Speaker 1:I wanted to learn more today. I wanted to get the word about the app, because it's such a great idea. How did it come about?
Speaker 2:So Rune Labs we started back in 2018. We're a precision neurology company. The app was actually started by a woman who had Parkinson's herself and she decided to develop an app. She was tired of utilizing spreadsheets and notebooks to bring to her doctor's appointments, so she created an app Strive PD and then we bought the app from her. She still sits on our patient advisory board, so she has say in all the decision making and the features that we put into the app. And her name is Aura Aslopis and yes, so she just wanted to do this to make her life a bit easier with her clinical visits and be able to really tell her clinicians what her symptoms were doing and what her journey was looking like with Parkinson's.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. Some of the best ideas come from people who are experiencing the disease and know it best. That's great, so tell me a little more about well, first of all, you can get it on the Apple, in the Apple Store, right, yeah?
Speaker 2:So it's a free app. It works with the Apple ecosystem, so meaning the Apple iPhone and the Apple Watch, you do need an Apple iPhone 8 or more recent and then an Apple Watch 5 or more recent, but you don't have to have an Apple Watch to utilize Strive PD. If you just have the iPhone, you can download it and use it as well. So how it works is back in June of 2022, the Apple Watch received FDA clearance 510K clearance to track two things for people with Parkinson's it will track tremors and it will track dyskinesia. So those two things happen passively, just by wearing the Apple Watch. That information gets uploaded onto the Strive PD so you can actually see your daily fluctuations of tremor and dyskinesia every day. And then, on top of that, if you're a neurologist or a movement disorder specialist or now your rock study boxing coach is part of our Strive PD network they can access that data as well. They can log into their clinician portal and be able to see every day the tremors and dyskinesia, when they're happening and how often they're happening. On top of that, anything that you put into the app.
Speaker 2:So if you're trunpping medications and we have medication reminders too to help you stay on track with your medications If you're trunpping, other kinds of symptoms like constipation or rigidity, anxiety any of those other kinds of symptoms you can track and your physical activity, because we know how important that is your rock study, boxing classes, your physical therapy appointments, you can track.
Speaker 2:All of that information also gets uploaded onto the clinician portal so they will be able to see that information as well. So it's just a really great way to open up that communication between you and your clinician or your rock study coach. We kind of created this ecosystem because people only get to see their neurologist or movement disorder specialist maybe, you know, two, three times a year or they're lucky and doctors usually only have a short amount of time to spend with you. So this allows you to really have a better handle on what you want to discuss and the clinician will be able to see that information ahead of time and really just open up a communication about what's going on with your symptoms. And now, of course, the rock city coaches as well can see this information and tailor their Classes to better assist their boxers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great. And as someone who sees mostly people with Parkinson's, as a physical therapist, I see people for physical therapy in the clinic and at their houses, but we also have the rock study programs In Victor and Geneva, new York. So to have this Tool as something, hey, let's take a look at your data and see you know when they come in for their evaluations or if we're doing a little tune up for physical therapy. You know we try to track, we try to keep people on target to come in, kind of like they do go to a dentist, like we say, at least every six months, some people a little more. So to have this additional tool is wonderful. It can also. It also monitors your sleep patterns too, right.
Speaker 2:This is correct. Yes, so I should mention, specifically for physical therapists and for rock study coaches, the iPhone. So even if the person does not have an Apple watch, the iPhone can track Mobility metrics. So it will track your stepling, your walking speed and something called double support percentage time, which is how often both feet are on the ground during the gate cycle. So basically, if they're shuffling, both feet are on the ground more and that percentage goes up so you want it to be lower. Those things can be also. They're on the portal for the clinician to see, so a physical therapist or a rock study coach can Compare two different time periods and be able to see if their gate is going down or improving.
Speaker 2:Along with that, like you said, sleep the Apple watch. If you sleep with it On your wrist and you set up your sleep schedule in the little health app, it will track your sleep. So it will tell you how many hours you get, how often you wake up throughout the night, how often you're in REM sleep, deep sleep. It will give you that whole nice breakdown to see, because we know how important sleep is For the population. And then it will also do heart rate metrics. Now, right now, the heart rate metric metrics are not in the strive PD portal for clinicians to see yet, but that is something that is on our list of things that we are going to be bringing in. But User can still go into their health app and see their heart rate metrics throughout the day or, if they did a workout you know, see what kind of zone they were in or what heart rate Metis percentage they were in, to see how you know intense they were doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great, because we know that the intensity matters big time for what's going to change the trajectory of the disease. So to be able to look and say, hey, look, you know, and for some people that's really hard, so you have to work up to it. So it's a motivational tool as well. Yeah, that's great. And the you were mentioning the double stance time, that all that stuff is measured on the Apple watch but it's through or or the phone.
Speaker 2:If you have it on you, you can access it through the health app is where they could see their mobility data, but the clinicians can see it on the clinician portal as well for the mobility data and asleep data, or so some people might be a little Skeptical about letting everybody see their data.
Speaker 1:But you can keep it private, I read, and then you can choose. Obviously you choose who to share it with you. It's just not going to be randomly shown to anybody. It can't see your data. It's private and confidential right it is.
Speaker 2:There are consents for when you do download the app, that we can share this data with your care team. But other than that, no, we do not, you know, give out your personal, you know, information. So, yes, we are very, very you. We find, you know, it's very important for us to protect your data, protect your identity. We do take them very seriously. For the rock study boxers who are registering with us, there will be a question on their registration form of if they want to share their data with their coaches, they can click no, so they can still utilize the Strive PDF, but we will not share it with their rock study coaches if they do not want that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, can you tell me how it works with people who've had deep brain stimulation? Sure.
Speaker 2:So if you have a deep brain stimulator, we do have a partnership with Medtronic. Medtronic has a deep brain stimulator called the Percept. The Percept has the ability to sense the brain waves, essentially, so they're able to actually pull the information from your DBS that's implanted in the brain and put it up onto our portal during your visits. So a doctor can actually look at your brain waves that are occurring next to how your tremor and dyskinesia is reacting. So this allows them to make better decision making when it comes to choosing the frequencies and settings of your DBS. Before it was a bit of a guessing game. They would try a certain setting, see how it worked for you, you'd come back in and it, you know, could get a bit exhausting. So now they have the ability to use the brain sense technology to better make those adjustments for each individual.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's pretty cool because I've, over the years, I've worked with people who've had deep brain stimulators, but recently I was able to. We had a boxer who's been with us for quite a while. He was young on set and he was a good candidate for it and he had the implant and he it's amazing to see the before and after, which I've seen people after, but I've never seen them before and after. So it was pretty cool and what a great tool for them to monitor.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, and the really neat feature is the user themselves. If they have StripD downloaded and they have the watch, they can see the tracking of their tremor and maybe before they get turned on with their DBS, they can look every day in the app, see how their tremor is every day and then they can compare it to after they get turned on with the DBS and see how it drastically drops. So it's a really cool thing for for patients and users to see Same thing for medications. If they start a new medication, they'll be able to see how that affects their symptoms. Of course, we all love and know physical activity can be so great for reducing their motor symptoms. So they can start to see a correlation between what they're doing, what intervention is happening whether it's DBS, medication or physical activity and see how that changes their symptoms. And this is great for compliance as well compliance with medications, compliance with a physical therapy program or exercise program because they're really getting to see the data that's changing their lives.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I know that some of the people that I work with have tremors that during different parts of the day can be worse. Where it's to actually enter something on their phone might be more challenging, but they could go home and get on their iPad. Can you download the portal on a desktop so if they wanted to get on their desktop and enter it, they could enter their, like that they took their meds at a certain time or did they box at a certain time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so at this time it's only available on the iPhone and the Apple Watch.
Speaker 2:the StryPD, the portal, is right now only for clinicians and coaches, although we are in the midst of working on a patient portal that would be accessible through a desktop on the computer. It would just be essentially like a website browser that you could go on. So that is in the works because that has been a request from many of our users and we do take feedback very seriously. Any user who reaches out and says we think this would be a great addition or I don't like this, we do take that very seriously. So that's been something that we have gotten requests for and it's something we've been working on. It's just the amount of manpower and time and other projects that we have going on at the same time. Yes, that is something for the future that we are hoping to create.
Speaker 1:Yeah, great, it's a work in progress. That's how you get better, because I can see that being a huge benefit for a lot of people if they don't have a caregiver to enter it, or just something that they can do on their own easier. But I mean if somebody came into class.
Speaker 1:I had a gentleman who I he was very forgetful on taking his meds. So I Kept. I said you know, put an alarm on your phone. And I said it over and over again and finally I realized he didn't know how to do it, so we said it and now he's so compliant with taking his meds. But to have that right in the app, you know that's great Right? Yes.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's definitely a lot of our users love that feature and I should also say we now have Siri logging as well, so they can log you know if they are having a bad day. Their symptoms are really acting up, they're having a lot of tremor. They can use Siri to log certain things on strive PD, and I also should mention that they can download Strive PD onto their iPads so that bigger screen is easier for them to utilize the input things they can. It's just we don't have a desktop version of it for the computer yet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, that's great. But could they say, hey, Siri, I'm gonna do rocksteady boxing now, or no, like can they say, I mean?
Speaker 2:So they can log medications and symptoms. Right now, a Siri, okay, but coming up is also the activity, so it will be log. I went for a walk and then it will say you know how long did you go for a walk? And you would just answer it. So same thing for rocksteady, but at this moment Siri is fairly new and she only understands certain phrases. That's what we do have to work on her a little bit and get her to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm still trying to get her to give directions to my clinic. I don't. But yes, great, okay, very good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she has a mind of her own sometimes.
Speaker 1:Sometimes I'm not very nice when I talk to her. Okay, yeah, so this is great. Like you said, it's great for physical therapists, clint, any clinicians really neurologists, caregivers and the person with Parkinson's. Is there anything else that you want to tell us? Obviously, the longer you wear it, the better, the more information you're going to get. So if you wear it too bad, it's going to be able to attract your sleep patterns.
Speaker 2:Yes, we encourage you to wear it as much as you can. We say at least six hours a day. So actually, on the app where your little symptom data graph is for your watch, we'll have little rings at the bottom. If the ring is filled, it means that you wore your watch for at least six hours that day. That's kind of a good number to get a good chunk of data to be able to see some patterns within your day.
Speaker 2:But most people love the watch and they wear it. You know as much. Besides charging it, they wear it all day. Most of them are water resistant too depends on which watch you have, but most of them you can swim in and shower with and then, of course, like we said, getting that sleep data as well so you can sleep with it on. And something we love about the Apple Watch is anyone wears an Apple Watch, you know, walking around. It's not a medical device that someone would point out and say, hey, what is that? Why are you wearing that? So it's something that you know doesn't remind them that they have Parkinson's. It's just an Apple Watch which millions of people have.
Speaker 1:So that's something our users really love about our Stripede platform as well, yeah, that's nice, and I will tell you that the fall detector works. We were having actually rock study boxing class last week and we were working on falling down, believe it or not.
Speaker 1:We were working on how to fall better, how to get up from the floor and we were up and down a lot and at the end of class a gentleman was coming in who was there for the afternoon class this was the morning class finishing up and he tapped my shoulder and he's like someone's here, and I turned around and there was a sheriff. He came because someone's Apple Watch went off. Oh my goodness, and she didn't. She thought she turned it off, but she didn't. She was so embarrassed I was like no, it probably happens more often where it's not a false alarm and so don't feel bad. That's, we know it's working now, so she didn't get a ticket or anything.
Speaker 2:We have had some stories about that, but it's a great feature to also have. You know, a lot of people have life alerts, which can be pretty pricey. They have a pricey subscription. Yeah, you know they're great to have, definitely for people, especially who live on their own. So, you know, having an Apple Watch that can also detect hard falls can be a really great feature as well, besides just using it for, you know, your Parkinson's journey or for health reasons. Just that fall detection alone can be so useful.
Speaker 1:All right, well, great. Thank you so much for being here. I'm so excited to spread the word about this great app and we'll connect with you again soon. That sounds great.