SEATTLE, WA – Shift Labs, Inc., a Seattle-based company building affordable, simple medical devices, announced today that their DripAssist Infusion Rate Monitor has been selected as a 2016 “Best of What’s New” recipient from Popular Science magazine. This honor recognizes the innovative design of DripAssist, both as a medical tool and as a new way to approach solving healthcare challenges: combining great design with the needs of emerging and underserved markets.
DripAssist is a simple, compact device that clips to any IV drip to monitor the rate at which medication or fluids are delivered. It’s different from other expensive and complicated infusion technologies like IV pumps; rather than controlling an infusion, DripAssist allows clinicians to easily set dose rates of gravity drips while the device provides accurate and continuous monitoring to ensure safe dosing. The DripAssist is handheld, runs off one AA battery, and takes about 5 minutes to learn.
“We’re especially excited about the Popular Science BOWN award because it serves as recognition for what great design can accomplish in the medical device space,” says Shift Labs CEO Beth Kolko. “We’ve built a product that is helping nurses in Haiti provide safer labor and delivery for mothers and, at the same time, is helping a hospital in North Carolina better deliver platelets to pediatric cancer patients. That’s global impact.”
IV infusions are one of the most common medical procedures throughout the world. While leading infusion technologies are suitable for US hospitals, complex or costly devices aren’t the right fit for some of the fastest growing healthcare sectors in the world. As the healthcare sector expands in emerging markets, and as health providers face increasing cost pressures in the United States, Shift Labs has positioned itself as a premier provider of innovative solutions that provide best-in-class care with an affordable price tag.
Shift Labs was founded to bring cost-effective innovation to healthcare, so they looked for new infusion technologies that could move the needle and improve care, rather than just de-featuring existing equipment to reduce cost. Kolko explains, “At Shift Labs, we’re pioneering lean design for medical devices and emphasizing customer needs and wants. Once we really looked at global infusion challenges, we discovered clinicians wanted a lightweight, versatile tool that could be used with infusions everywhere.”
DripAssist has been rolling out in US hospitals and infusion centers over the last 6 months, and this month Shift Labs is launching new distribution partnerships in South Africa, Kenya, Malaysia and the Philippines.
“The Best of What’s New awards honor the innovations that shape the future” says Kevin Gray, Executive Editor, Popular Science. From life-saving technology to incredible space engineering to gadgets that are just breathtakingly cool, this is the best of what’s new.”
Each year, the editors of Popular Science review thousands of products in search of the top 100 tech innovations of the year—breakthrough products and technologies that represent a significant leap in their categories. The winners, the Best of What’s New, are awarded inclusion
in the much-anticipated November/December issue of Popular Science, the most widely read issue of the year since the debut of Best of What’s New in 1988. Best of What’s New awards are presented to 100 new products and technologies in 11 categories: Automotive, Aviation,
Computing, Engineering, Gadgets, Entertainment, Security, Software, Home, Health and Recreation.
About Shift Labs
Shift Labs, Inc. is a Seattle-based company that creates well-designed medical devices for fastgrowing healthcare sectors, everywhere from specialty health care in the US to clinical care in emerging markets. The DripAssist Infusion Rate Monitor is their first FDA-cleared product and has previously won a Silver medal from the Industrial Designers Society of America IDEA awards, as well as a grant from USAID as part of the Ebola Grand Challenge.
Learn more at www.shiftlabs.com
About Popular Science
Founded in 1872, Popular Science is the world’s largest science and technology magazine; with
a circulation of 1.3 million and 6.8 million bi- monthly readers. In each issue, Popular Science
reports on the intersection of science and everyday life, with an eye toward what’s new and why
it matters. Popular Science is published by Bonnier Active Media, a subsidiary of Bonnier
Corporation.
Inquiries:
Contact CEO Beth Kolko, beth@shiftlabs.com, or CTO Koji Intlekofer, koji@shiftlabs.com at
+1 206.369.1216.
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