#Elizabeth holmes theranos skin
#Elizabeth holmes theranos series

Holmes herself appeared to know little about this revolutionary scientific process she had apparently engineered. Also, Neil Jurkiewicz states in the same book: “Another problem was that the composition of the blood taken from a finger prick would not have a common concentration like what would be found if taken from a vein… this would distort the data.” The problem with the science - according to Cases and Tools in Biotechnology Management by Trent Tucker - was that by using just a pin-prick of blood (which was a non-negotiable USP for Holmes), the volume wouldn’t be enough to read, so the blood would need to be diluted, which would skew the data on analysis. This minuscule amount of blood would then be analysed by a secretive device called the Edison, which could run up to 200 tests on it, it was claimed, as evidenced by this Wayback Machine cache of what Theranos actually offered at the time.

The technology was sketchy from the off: a finger prick’s worth of blood would be placed into a tiny, one-centimetre vial called a nanotainer possibly inspired by the 2005 iPod Nano, the creator of which, Steve Jobs, was Holmes’s hero. A world in which no one ever has to say goodbye too soon.” Alongside democratising healthcare (a much-needed move in America, even now) she added in a 2014 TED talk: “We see a world in which no one ever has to say, ‘If only I’d known sooner’. Gone would be the days of invasive blood tests with needles and larger vials of blood, and, with a newer, easier process, it meant medical conditions could be detected earlier, giving people a better chance of survival with earlier treatment. Unperturbed, Holmes continued, launching a company called Real-Time Cures - which later became Theranos - until she landed on the idea of a pin-prick blood test which could be examined for numerous health tests. This was given an unequivocal “nope” from a professor at Stanford (“I don't think your idea is going to work”, she politely put it), and several other literal experts she contacted also agreed in the negative.

#Elizabeth holmes theranos skin

Holmes’s initial idea was to somehow engineer a skin patch that would not only be able to diagnose health issues, but be able to also dose any required medication as well. There was just one problem: it didn’t exist. In real life, back in 2004 when she was just 19, Holmes dropped out of Stanford University to make that vision a reality through her new technology. Her vision, she promised people, was that her company was going to be the Apple of healthcare not only disrupting it, but entirely revolutionising it.

#Elizabeth holmes theranos series

Throughout the beginning of The Dropout, the dramatised Disney+ series about the fraudulent health-tech entrepreneur, Elizabeth Holmes (played by Amanda Seyfried), we see her staring at a chunky iPod in her hand.