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> "It counts and examines the number of red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets in a patient’s blood sample" It sounds like they have a very restricte

> "It counts and examines the number of red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets in a patient’s blood sample" It sounds like they have a very restricted scope compared to Theranos. Testing for one or two things in a drop of finger blood isn't anything new, as many diabetics can attest to. As I understand it the "magic" theranos was originally trying to accomplish [before they decided to scam people instead] was a wide variety of blood tests from a single drop of blood.

klenwell 7y ago
Exactly. > Unlike Theranos, Sight Diagnostics is starting small and working its way up. Holmes claimed her device could do hundreds of tests across the four main classes of blood tests: hematology, immunoassays, general chemistry and DNA amplification. Sight is only focusing on a subset of hematology for now. So, in truth, they're not anywhere close to trying to do what Theranos promised. The book Bad Blood goes into the technical details that made Theranos's mission fantastical if not farcical. The scope of it is very different. This was one of the most telling passages for me in Bad Blood: Tim [Timothy Hamill, Vice Chair of UCSF's Dept of Laboratory Medicine] confirmed to me that both practices were highly questionable. He also explained the pitfalls of using blood pricked from a finger. Unlike venous blood drawn from the arm, capillary blood was polluted by fluids from tissues and cells that interfered with tests and made measurements less accurate. "I'd be less surprised if they told us they were time travelers who came back from the twenty-seventh century than if they told us they cracked that nut," he said. (p. 230) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38799469-bad-blood https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38799469-bad-blood Consider, too, the source here: From The Grapevine was created to provide a fresh perspective on Israel. From the land’s natural beauty to Tel Aviv's vibrant technology scene; from the global culinary world's focus on Israeli food and recipes to the innovative Israelis who are changing the world – From The Grapevine covers the bounty of what Israel is about today, in detail, with great writing, rich photographs, and its own editorial voice – engaging, non-political, and non-religious. From The Grapevine tells the stories about Israel you may have missed, but not for much longer, as our engaged social media community begins to share our words. If you find a story that speaks to you, please pass it along, and tell others you heard about it From The Grapevine. From The Grapevine.com is published by The reThink Israel Initiative, Inc, an American non-profit 501c3 corporation. https://www.fromthegrapevine.com/about https://www.fromthegrapevine.com/about Looks like a platform for fluff.
tehjoker 7y ago
Iirc the problem with Theranos' strategy was that the fingertip blood has highly variable composition compared to mainline blood. For example, getting lipid counts would be off. I would believe you can accurately count the blood cells in your fingertip, but I (a layman) would need a bit more to believe that this is necessarily representative of mainline. It might still be diagnostically useful.
- catalogia 7y ago
  > I would believe you can accurately count the blood cells in your fingertip, but I (a layman) would need a bit more to believe that this is necessarily representative of mainline. It might still be diagnostically useful. I'm skeptical of that, since my impression is that the many of the capillaries in one's finger are so tiny that only one blood cell can fit through at a time. That seems like something that could fuck up the results, but I'm no doctor or biologist and it sounds like regulators might actually be paying attention this time around.
blotter_paper 7y ago
I'm not sure that they decided to scam people instead, my impression is that they took "fake it till you make it" to its logical conclusion but failed to make it before people realised they were faking it. They were scamming people and trying to build the product they claimed already existed, which doesn't make the scamming any better.
- catalogia 7y ago
  > "fake it till you make it" Deciding 'we'll scam people, but only for a short while' is still deciding to scam people.
  - blotter_paper 7y ago
    Agree completely, I tried to make it clear that I wasn't defending their actions.
jliptzin 7y ago
Even this I didn’t really understand. Are there really vast quantities of people so afraid of a little pinch when having your blood drawn that they don’t do regular blood testing? It’s not much worse than having your finger pricked for a drop of blood, once the needle is in you usually don’t feel anything.
- WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
  Once the technology improves, it would be great to have a bracelet that can check your wellbeing semi-continuously (a drop of blood every 2-3 days)
- gus_massa 7y ago
  If the nurse/technician is good and you are lucky, you get pinched at the first try and the extractions is fast. If they can't find the vein, you may get pinched twice or more times. (It is also difficult when the patients is too young, or too old, or dehydrated.)

klenwell 7y ago

Exactly. > Unlike Theranos, Sight Diagnostics is starting small and working its way up. Holmes claimed her device could do hundreds of tests across the four main classes of blood tests: hematology, immunoassays, general chemistry and DNA amplification. Sight is only focusing on a subset of hematology for now. So, in truth, they're not anywhere close to trying to do what Theranos promised. The book Bad Blood goes into the technical details that made Theranos's mission fantastical if not farcical. The scope of it is very different. This was one of the most telling passages for me in Bad Blood: Tim [Timothy Hamill, Vice Chair of UCSF's Dept of Laboratory Medicine] confirmed to me that both practices were highly questionable. He also explained the pitfalls of using blood pricked from a finger. Unlike venous blood drawn from the arm, capillary blood was polluted by fluids from tissues and cells that interfered with tests and made measurements less accurate. "I'd be less surprised if they told us they were time travelers who came back from the twenty-seventh century than if they told us they cracked that nut," he said. (p. 230) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38799469-bad-blood https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38799469-bad-blood Consider, too, the source here: From The Grapevine was created to provide a fresh perspective on Israel. From the land’s natural beauty to Tel Aviv's vibrant technology scene; from the global culinary world's focus on Israeli food and recipes to the innovative Israelis who are changing the world – From The Grapevine covers the bounty of what Israel is about today, in detail, with great writing, rich photographs, and its own editorial voice – engaging, non-political, and non-religious. From The Grapevine tells the stories about Israel you may have missed, but not for much longer, as our engaged social media community begins to share our words. If you find a story that speaks to you, please pass it along, and tell others you heard about it From The Grapevine. From The Grapevine.com is published by The reThink Israel Initiative, Inc, an American non-profit 501c3 corporation. https://www.fromthegrapevine.com/about https://www.fromthegrapevine.com/about Looks like a platform for fluff.

tehjoker 7y ago

Iirc the problem with Theranos' strategy was that the fingertip blood has highly variable composition compared to mainline blood. For example, getting lipid counts would be off. I would believe you can accurately count the blood cells in your fingertip, but I (a layman) would need a bit more to believe that this is necessarily representative of mainline. It might still be diagnostically useful.

catalogia 7y ago
> I would believe you can accurately count the blood cells in your fingertip, but I (a layman) would need a bit more to believe that this is necessarily representative of mainline. It might still be diagnostically useful. I'm skeptical of that, since my impression is that the many of the capillaries in one's finger are so tiny that only one blood cell can fit through at a time. That seems like something that could fuck up the results, but I'm no doctor or biologist and it sounds like regulators might actually be paying attention this time around.

blotter_paper 7y ago

I'm not sure that they decided to scam people instead, my impression is that they took "fake it till you make it" to its logical conclusion but failed to make it before people realised they were faking it. They were scamming people and trying to build the product they claimed already existed, which doesn't make the scamming any better.

catalogia 7y ago
> "fake it till you make it" Deciding 'we'll scam people, but only for a short while' is still deciding to scam people.
- blotter_paper 7y ago
  Agree completely, I tried to make it clear that I wasn't defending their actions.

jliptzin 7y ago

Even this I didn’t really understand. Are there really vast quantities of people so afraid of a little pinch when having your blood drawn that they don’t do regular blood testing? It’s not much worse than having your finger pricked for a drop of blood, once the needle is in you usually don’t feel anything.

WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
Once the technology improves, it would be great to have a bracelet that can check your wellbeing semi-continuously (a drop of blood every 2-3 days)
gus_massa 7y ago
If the nurse/technician is good and you are lucky, you get pinched at the first try and the extractions is fast. If they can't find the vein, you may get pinched twice or more times. (It is also difficult when the patients is too young, or too old, or dehydrated.)