07.30.09
Microscope on Mobiles
Imagine a new mobile based gadget that could be utilised in the developing world to diagnose a number of diseases that kill thousands each month.
A microscope has been developed that will fit onto most old mobile phones and let doctors and other medics to examine samples including blood; thus allowing them to make a diagnosis of a number of killer diseases early. This gadget could save thousands of lives in the field.
The inventers of the device are pushng for the essential equipment to be given out to clinicians who operate in areas where basic diagnostic test are not available.
Currently advanced medical imaging systems and computerised medical equipment remain the privilege of the rich, mobiles are now ubiquitous - this is backed up following the release of data which suggests that over 4 billion mobile connections are currently live across the globe.
An ordinary mobile phone is used, and the CellScope microscope is attached to the back of it, in order to use the inbuilt camera to process the microsope images. This allows for medics to analyse the microscopic samples for diseases which include tuberculosis and sicle cell anemia. Doctors can perform intricate high-resolution light microscopy on a blood or sputum sample placed on a slide.
In a paper published in the journal PloS One, the team said that, although some of the tests would be more accurate or complete with higher-powered technology, they still proved adequate when performed on a standard Nokia N73 handset, which comes with a 3.2 megapixel camera.
The team stated that there is the possibility of performing realtime sample analysis now instead of patients having to wait until results are sent back from a lab.
“Since we are developing a technology that makes the current and long-standing internationally accepted standards for disease screening in developing countries more portable, we anticipate that a relatively fast time to adoption by clinicians and health workers may be possible.”
Furthermore many of the newer smart phones have special features including GPS and internet connectivity, which when combined with the disease screening data from the CellScope could immediatley be used to identify disease outbreaks.
