Smart patch placed on the throat could determine if you have coronavirus before symptoms arise by monitoring coughs and other vitals
- A smart patch can determine if you have coronavirus before symptoms show
- It sits on the base of the throat and measures vitals such as cough and heart rate
- The data is transmitted to a private server where it is transformed into charts
- Healthcare authorities can then monitor people and alert them of changes
- Here’s how to help people impacted by Covid-19
A smart patch claims to catch early symptoms of the coronavirus and alerts healthcare staff before symptoms emerge.
About the size of a postage stamp, the soft, flexible device sits at the base of the throat and uses sensors to measure factors, such as heart rate and cough, associated with the virus.
The device transmits the data to a private server where algorithms create graphical summaries for healthcare authorities to analyze.
Hospitals can use the technology for patients at the facility and at home for continuous care.
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About the size of a postage stamp, the soft, flexible device sits at the base of the throat and uses sensors to measure factors, such as heart rate and cough, associated with the virus
More than two dozen affected individuals are currently using the patch developed by a team at Northwestern University.
John Rogers, an engineer at Northwestern and lead of the technology development said: ‘The most recent studies published in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggest that the earliest signs of a COVID-19 infection are fever, coughing, and difficulty in breathing.
‘Our device sits at the perfect location on the body — the suprasternal notch — to measure respiratory rate, sounds, and activity because that’s where airflow occurs near the surface of the skin.’
Rogers and his team aims to use the patch to help healthcare workers monitor patients both in a hospital and while they are home – allowing for 24/7 supervision without putting staff at risk.
The device transmits the data to a private server where algorithms create graphical summaries for healthcare authorities to analyze
Hospitals can use the technology for patients at the facility and at home for continuous care
The device offers the potential to identify symptoms and to pick up trends before the workers notice them, thereby providing an opportunity to engage in appropriate precautionary measures and to seek further testing as quickly as possible.
It measures a person’s cough, breathing patterns, heart rate, and body temperature, along with other factors associated with the coronavirus.
This data is then transmitted to what the researches call a ‘HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act )-protected cloud’ for monitoring.
‘Nobody has ever collected this type of data before,’ Rogers said.
‘Earlier detection is always better and our devices provide important and unique capabilities in that context.
The device offers the potential to identify symptoms and to pick up trends before the workers notice them, thereby providing an opportunity to engage in appropriate precautionary measures and to seek further testing as quickly as possible
More than two dozen affected individuals are currently using the patch developed by a team at Northwestern University
‘For patients who have contracted the disease, the value is even more clear, as the data represent quantitative information on respiratory behavior, as a mechanism to track the progression and/or the effects of treatments.’
Rogers and his team hopes the device will not just tell physicians how to best treat the illness, but also inform researchers about the nature of the virus itself.
‘The growing amount of information and understanding around COVID-19 as a disease will be critically important to containing and treating the current outbreak as well as those that might occur in the future,’ said Rogers.
‘We hope, and we believe, that these devices may help in these efforts by identifying and quantifying characteristics and essential features of cough and respiratory activity associated with this disease.’
The team is developing dozens of devices every week at a facility in Chicago, Illinois and hopes to expand operations in order to meet the need as the outbreak continues to spread.
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