Changing the way the world takes temperature

By Francesco Pompei, Ph.D., Exergen Corporation

The Exergen Temporal Thermometer was recently honored in a list of 25 Smartest Products of the Decade, along with iPod, Netflix, Blackberry, Google, and other well known innovations. The list was compiled in the December 2009 issue of Inc. Magazine, a widely read and respected journal focused on entrepreneur executives. The Temporal Thermometer was described as making a "world of difference" and an example of how "inexpensive medical technologies pay huge dividends."

A few years earlier, Exergen received the New England Innovation Award "For revolutionizing the old-fashioned, often awkward thermometer into an accurate and easy magic wand." A sitting Governor volunteered to have his temperature taken for TV and newspapers, with an Exergen Temporal Thermometer, during a visit to Exergen to promote jobs growth in Massachusetts.

Why all the attention to a medical device in the public press?
Francesco Pompei. Taking temperature is by far the most common medical test performed - approximately 10 billion times per year worldwide, performed at all care levels including at home, and is a shared experience by all people. It is also one of the few things in medical care that everyone, including the patient, understands. The idea of accurate temperatures with a gentle forehead scan renders the insertion of thermometers into body cavities obsolete, which immediately improves everyone's medical care experience, appears to be a natural attention-getter.

Was cost a major issue?
FP. Yes. Improving care without reducing costs is only one-half of an innovation. Both are necessary in order for an innovation to succeed in a lasting way. The reduction in disposable use associated with Temporal Thermometry is a major financial benefit, as well as a major reduction in waste. Combined with the care benefits of gentleness, speed, and non-invasiveness, everyone wins.

Governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts having his temperature taken with an Exergen Temporal Thermometer

Was reluctance to change a major issue?
FP. Yes. There is a natural predisposition in medical care to resist change, which is healthy and appropriate most of the time. In our case, we were proposing a new method of taking temperature employing the forehead, a site which has been used for 5000 years for fever detection, but no one had ever been able to be make it accurate enough to replace the body cavity thermometers. It has taken us 10 years from the initial market introduction, more than 30 published studies, and about 2.5 billion temperatures taken with the Temporal Thermometer, to achieve today's level of acceptance. There still remains some skepticism, which we are working to overcome.

It appears perseverance is important to change what we do.
FP. Perseverance is absolutely essential. It really starts with the scientific development of the technology, which in our case took about 15 years, making the total perseverance time about 25 years. In addition there are always entrenched competitors protecting traditional technologies, many of them much larger than the innovating company, which need to be overcome. Fortunately early adopters, particularly large teaching hospitals, are usually willing to give an innovation an opportunity to succeed in the face of fierce entrenched competition. However, a successful new technology draws other competitors who try to copy the idea, which requires (expensive) perseverance to protect patented technology - 10 years and still ongoing for us.

There is always an opportunity for a good idea to succeed, but the entrepreneurial company must have both the will and wherewithal to persevere. Big changes in any field do not happen overnight.

Where do you expect to be in the next 5 years?
FP. We continue to move both the science and technology of Temporal Thermometry forward, integrating it with the latest patient care methods, and making it the standard for patient care. Hopefully in 5 years we will all be wondering why we ever used such primitive methods as inserting thermometers into body cavities. As stated in the Inc. Magazine article naming the Exergen Temporal Thermometer one of the Smartest Products of the Decade, everyone will wonder: "How did we ever live without them?"

Francesco Pompei is Founder and CEO of Exergen Corporation, and holds 60 US patents in non-invasive thermometry for medical and industrial applications. Earning BS and MS degrees from MIT, and SM and PhD from Harvard, Dr. Pompei also holds an appointment as Research Scholar in the Dept of Physics at Harvard in cancer research.