Minze Uroflow: Hopsiflow and Homeflow
UROFLOWMETRY – MINZE UROFLOW
Minze Uroflow consists out of a Bluetooth connected uroflowmeter with accessories that can be used on a normal toilet. Uroflowmetry is an important non-invasive diagnostic tool to assess the lower urinary tract function. A uroflowmeter measures urine flow during urination. Different parameters are calculated from a uroflowmetry study – such as max. flowrate, average flowrate, voiding time, flow time and voided volume – in addition the shape of the flowcurve contains a lot of diagnostic value.
Since the Minze Uroflow can be used on any normal toilet, it can be used in a hospital/private practice setting (1. Hospiflow) or even in a patients’ home setting (2. Homeflow).
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1. HOSPIFLOW: Use at the hospital and private practice
In case of Hospiflow the uroflowmeter is used on a normal toilet in the hospital or private practice of the clinician. The clinician can assess the uroflow results on an online clinician portal. Clinicians benefit from Hospiflow as it enables a more efficient workflow at the Hospital or private practice and reduces the space needed in a hospital to conduct uroflow tests (as it can be used on a normal toilet, no dedicated room is needed for a traditional uroflowmetry set-up). Additionally, a uroflow test on a normal toilet compared to the traditional set-up possibly reduces stress for the patient (more privacy and friendlier look and feel), resulting in more representative results.
Minze Hospiflow is currently being used by 200+ urologists and pelvic floor physiotherapists in The Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Austria and Greece.
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2. HOMEFLOW: Use at the patient’s home
In case of Homeflow, the uroflowmeter is used on a toilet at the patient’s home, eliminating the stress and discomfort of a uroflow test in the hospital. A mobile app allows patients to connect to the Minze uroflowmeter and keep an automated voiding diary. The uroflowmeter registers the time, voided volume and uroflowmetry data of the void automatically. No need for patients to read out and write down this information on a paper, like it is done today. An automated voiding diary increases the efficiency of a clinician as all data is processed and automatically.
Minze Homeflow makes it possible to gather a high amount of data of one individual at the comfort of their own home. This provides clinicians with a more complete view of a patient’s voiding function than the current state of the art single in-clinic uroflowmetry measurement, since circumstantial variables influence a patient’s void, such as bladder volume, urge, time of day and physiological factors. The chance of capturing an outlier in the hospital remains a risk, which would affect the diagnosis outcome. This emphasizes the need of Homeflow to capture a larger dataset, reflecting a more complete image of a patient’s voiding function.