Masimo Corp. is taking its remote patient monitoring technology beyond hospitals and patients’ homes, in the hope of helping the country safely open for business again.
The Irvine-based device maker (Nasdaq: MASI), Orange County’s fifth-largest public company by market value, recently announced its Masimo SafetyNet-Open product for businesses, schools and governments, to monitor and “responsibly manage employee and student health during COVID-19,” it said.
The wearable product, pricing of which hasn’t been disclosed, uses a disposable wristband, a sensor that wraps around the finger, as well as a chest sensor to monitor respiration rates and oxygen saturation levels.
The info gleaned from the monitoring devices can communicate patterns to organizations through a centralized dashboard, similar to how healthcare providers might remotely manage patients using the technology.
These patterns “could support contract tracing” and “identify when additional actions may be needed,” the $12 billion-valued company said in announcing the rollout of the product.
It’s “more than a simple screening check at the workplace entrance,” the company said.
“We are not in the position to suggest when it’s safe to reopen, but we are in the unique position to help those who are going to open, to open as safely as possible—and hopefully help them stay open,” Chief Executive Joe Kiani said in a statement.
Pandemic Boost
Masimo has been one of the standout stocks in OC amid the pandemic, thanks to its remote patient monitoring products, which are used by hospitals to help keep their patients and front-line workers safe.
Its SafetyNet systems also allow physicians to direct patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 symptoms to return home, where they can be monitored virtually.
Shares in the company are up by more than 40% this year (see public companies list, page 12).
The company expects its products—used in hospital settings and increasingly at home—to have staying power beyond COVID-19.
The pandemic has “changed the definition of telehealth from a cardiac-based or diabetes-based thinking to a respiratory-based thinking,” Kiani said during the company’s latest earnings call.
“And our customers tell us there’s nobody out there that has what we have. We are the only product they can trust. We are the only real product—everything else, it’s wafer wear. And that is reflective of how fast people are taking up this technology.”
The company recently began airing commercials, touting its products’ use under the tagline “Together in Hospital. Together at Home.”
Wellness, Prevention
SafetyNet-Open isn’t the only new addition to Masimo’s suite of monitoring technologies that are non-hospital related.
Over the last three weeks, the company announced a pair of wearable products, one aimed at improving sleep quality, the other for treating opioid withdrawal.
Masimo Sleep uses the company’s MightySat fingertip pulse oximeter—which is used to monitor more than 200 million patients a year in hospital settings—and a lightweight sensor that can be worn for up to 10 nights.
Sleep data is analyzed and displayed on a consumer-facing mobile application. Unlike other home products that use proxies such as how often a user turns over in their sleep as an indicator of health, Masimo’s product measures vital signs such as heart and respiratory rates during sleep to provide personalized insights into health and wellness trends, the company said.
“Masimo Sleep significantly expands consumers’ ability to make healthier decisions, at home, by equipping them with what we believe is the best solution for this need,” Kiani said.
Its first tool aimed at helping with the opioid epidemic, called Bridge, was unveiled last week.
The wearable device sits behind the ear and sends gentle electric impulses to cranial nerves in order to reduce neuron activity associated with withdrawal symptoms, the company said.
Bridge can be applied during an in-office procedure, and allows users to go about their daily lives without interference, the company said.
Fear of the physical and psychological effects of withdrawal is a major barrier for many opioid users to even attempting to seek treatment, the company said.
Other opioid-related products, including those that can send alerts of a possible overdose, are in the works.
“This is the first tool that we are introducing to help with the opioid epidemic,” Kiani said last week. “We are committed to doing what we can to help reduce opioid-related deaths.”
SET Specialist
Masimo makes devices called Signal Extraction Technology (SET) pulse oximetry that help physicians and nurses remotely monitor the blood, oxygen and other key metrics of patients.
Its devices have traditionally been geared toward hospitals. In the past year, Masimo was working on an inexpensive version for home use to help monitor patients using opioids, like the Bridge device.
Once the pandemic struck, company officials decided to use devices to help COVID victims in their homes. It asked the Food and Drug Administration, which responded within two hours.
Within a week, the FDA permitted Masimo to market the product, called Masimo SafetyNet.
Since the full market release in mid-April, 76 hospitals have deployed Masimo SafetyNet and over 650 hospitals are in the pipeline to do so.
“We’ve never had a more successful product rollout,” Kiani said in April.
