Smart Phone could be Disease Diagnosis Microscope

News Health Articles - Smart Phone could be Disease Diagnosis Microscope. The application of smart phones or smart phones can help check vision, blood glucose monitoring, and tracking of blood pressure levels. Earlier this year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved an application that lets doctors see the medical scans on the iPhone or iPad to help make a diagnosis on the go.

Apart from the application of this luxury, the camera on this device can help health workers in remote areas submit photos to the conditions of a complicated disease that doctors can be verified or make a diagnosis.



One question is whether the camera phone is good enough to send the microscopic information to the doctor? A recent study found that many simple camera phones can capture images through a microscope good enough standard to allow assessment of the sample.

"The population is poor and the vulnerable are most affected by the service laboratories because it has caused the greatest burden of poor health services," said the researcher, Coosje Tuijn of the Royal Tropical Institute of Biomedical Research in Amsterdam.

Microscope important in diagnosing common diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis, and bacterial or other parasitic diseases. But in poor areas, microscopy services are often less than optimal. And the result, many common illnesses are not diagnosed or treated properly.

In Uganda, there are only eight doctors for every 100,000 people, so to get a clear diagnosis can be difficult. The research team asked local health officials to try to use their own cell phone or a loan to take photos and video of microscopic images and then sends the diagnosis of remote areas.

The best image is obtained with a two-megapixel camera or higher are commonly found in smart phones, or Nokia, Samsung, and Sony with a more slender type. Some of the most successful is the diagnosis of malaria parasite samples that are often clearly identifiable.

While TB is a bit more challenging because the size of small bacteria and fluorescent lighting that is required at least a five-megapixel camera. Mobile phones with video also can take video that shows the movement of some other microbes in the surrounding areas to help improve diagnosis.

Having seen the photos, health workers can be sent directly to a website to be accessible by experts to be diagnosed. Immediate feedback can be given by telephone or SMS could then be sent to mobile users.

According to an article published in the journal PLoS ONE, innovation using cell phones to help read the microscopic images has been done for years.

"Linking mobile technology for diagnosis has great potential in improving diagnostic services to areas with poor resources and health centers are widespread but isolated," the researchers said as quoted HuffingtonPost, Thursday (12/22/2011).

So far, the team found that the biggest obstacle is getting a cell phone attached to the microscope, which is trying to be solved by researchers.