This is actually how existing diagnostic machines work generally - mix blood or plasma with a reagent, incubate at body temp for some time, measure how the light properties of the sample (color, turbidity, depends on the test) change over time. Some tests measure 1 point at the end of the test, some measure several and construct a non-linear function.<p>The interesting part is that they're building a machine that can get accurate results with low-cost off-the-shelf components. State-of-the-art systems typically cost somewhere between 50k and 500k, which may or may not include service agreements (they break down all the time - wet chemistry) and ongoing costs for supplies.<p>I imagine the main wins in this area would be:<p>- built with low-cost/commodity components (done)<p>- small physical size for transport (done)<p><pre><code> -- systems come in a variety of sizes from bedside to the size of a small car, depending on where you want to run them (operating suite/doctor's office vs central lab) and the volume you need.
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- expanded operating temperature and humidity<p><pre><code> -- existing systems have fairly tight tolerances on humidity especially, all the systems I worked with had environmental sensors installed nearby.
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- low-power enough to run on batteries or small generators easily in remote environments<p>That these women are working their way down the list is impressive and much needed. As mentioned in the article, reagents are available commercially so that part is relatively "solved," although depending on the test they can be quite expensive and have their own cold-storage and transport problems for remote areas. The other big problem is affordable control material to ensure the systems are still accurate, and calibration material to adjust system constants when they inevitably drift (same cost/storage/transport problems as reagents). Still though, I'm glad they're making progress.<p>I look forward to more!<p>Source: worked in lab diagnostics for a while
I have a common medical condition which is easily monitored via a common blood test.<p>It seems to fluctuate quite a bit, and if I could get frequent readings I could figure out what is affecting it, and I could better understand it's effect on me.<p>But the medical system in my country does not allow for frequent readings, probably for good reason - it would be very expensive. And a hassle going to a lab frequently.<p>So I'm excited to read about this device and hope the tech matures quickly.
Here’s a link to the actual paper: <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9524612" rel="nofollow">https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9524612</a><p>Abstract: <i>The development of a cost-efficient and sensitive platform for biochemical analysis of blood serum and its realization in the low resource areas is one of the imperative challenges to establish a robust healthcare ecosystem. The present work demonstrates the design of a universal platform, capable of performing all biochemical analyses of blood serum by measuring the absorbance of light through the test sample. To verify the working of the developed platform, the concentration of glucose was estimated in blood serum. The detection of glucose has been accomplished in a linear range of 1 mg/dL to 400 mg/dL with detection of limit 1 mg/dL (R2 = 0.9875, n=3). The stability analysis demonstrates improved stability in the output as compared to the conventional analyzer with an average standard deviation of 0.32 calculated for n=5. Human blood samples were tested with the developed platform and the results were in line with the pathology laboratory. The developed platform offers the advantages of automation, low cost, portability, simple instrumentation, flexibility, and an easily accessible interface. Due to the use of a huge processing capability processor, the analysis time reduces to half a minute which yields fast analysis and high throughput. The stability and accuracy also improve owing to the employment of high-resolution electronics components. Overall, the proposed framework is an attractive solution to be incorporated in the low resource area as a universal platform for all biochemistry analysis simply by varying the wavelength of light and reagent.</i>
Why aren't more low cost Medical devices available easily and cheaply? Given the power/price ratio we have achieved with cellphones, why can't the same be done in the field of Medical devices?<p>For example, i was looking for a all-in-one monitoring device for an elderly patient and came across "PM6100" made by "Shanghai Berry Electronics" (<a href="https://shberrymed.com/products/patient-monitor-pm6100" rel="nofollow">https://shberrymed.com/products/patient-monitor-pm6100</a>) Low-cost but still more expensive than many cellphones. These things should be commodity priced. It almost feels like there is some "organized cartel" preventing the invention and marketing of low-cost medical devices.