Noom to pilot diabetes prevention app in NY city
Wellness app-maker, Noom is collaborating with CityMD, a network of emergency rooms in New York City to launch a pilot of an app for people at risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes. The pilot aims to enrol around 670 New Yorkers who have been diagnosed with prediabetes. The app runs on Samsung's S Health platform and encourages its prediabetic users towards healthier lifestyles, and plans to incoporate data from connected wearable devices are in the pipeline. 

New York City-based wellness app maker Noom and CityMD, a network of urgent care medical centers in and around New York City, are launching a pilot for people who are at risk for Type 2 diabetes using Samsung's S Health app, integrated with Noom's health program.

The pilot will include, at most, around 670 New Yorkers who have been diagnosed with prediabetes. Noom aims to use the pilot to create a health program that offers users preventive protocols and disease treatment therapies in near-real time.

“CityMD is excited to be a pioneering partner in the development of protocols that impact what happens in between doctor visits," CityMD CEO Richard Park said in a statement. "When brought together, innovative behavior change interventions and leading technology can be powerful tools for delaying and preventing the onset of chronic disease. We understand that the potential impact of programs like this for prediabetic and diabetic populations could be economically significant and highly effective for preventing the onset and complications associated with chronic disease.”

S Health helps users track activity, fitness, and nutrition and also offers digital coaching programs to help users reach their health goals. The app uses this data to create health information summaries for users. People can also personalize their S Health dashboard by adding or removing goals and picking which health metrics they want to track. According to the app store description, S Health has been downloaded between 50 million and 100 million times.

In the pilot program, Noom will initially integrate blood pressure, food logging, exercise tracking, weight data, and progression through curricula, but the company plans to expand the pilot into medical devices and medication adherence information.

At the beginning of 2014, Samsung announced that it received FDA 510(k) clearance for one version of S Health. Later that year, at an event, Samsung Chief Medical Officer and VP for Global Healthcare David Rhew explained that the reason for the company’s FDA clearance was to make S Health work on the enterprise side, with hospitals and physicians, and that S Health, which began as a consumer fitness application, was increasingly moving into the chronic disease and medical space.

Samsung's S Health was first announced in 2012, but only for a select number of Samsung smartphones. It wasn't until a few weeks ago that Samsung added support for all Samsung smartphones, starting with the Galaxy S3. Samsung also extended support for some non-Samsung Android phones that have Android OS 4.4 or above.

In September, a ClinicalTrials.gov posting revealed that Noom work with both the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai hospital in New York and Kaiser Permanente on a 12-week, 200-person trial of a new mobile health app for eating disorders called Noom Monitor.