MDB Newsletter 8-17-2009
Posted in Newsletter on
Monday, August 17 2009
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In this edition, sponsored by Fluid Metering and Steute Meditech:
• Portable Device Enables Do-It-Yourself Disease Diagnosis• Hearing-Aid Software Helps Block Out Background Noise
• New Device Gives Patients the Power to Monitor Their Hearts
• Computer System Improves Pain Therapy for Cancer Patients
Portable Device Enables Do-It-Yourself Disease Diagnosis
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| Stanford graduate students Drew Hall (l) and Richard Gaster developed the NanoLab diagnostic tool. |
Hall and Gaster's previous version of the system, called "Lab-on-a-Stick," was designed as a tool to use in airports to reduce the spread of pandemics. The NanoLab, which is the size of a small paperback book, consists of an electronic circuit board and a tiny well, just big enough to hold a few drops of blood from a pipette.
The first step is to add a droplet of a sample such as blood, saliva, or urine into the well. The tester then adds magnetic tags to label the viral proteins, making them detectable by nanosensors. Each tiny magnetic sensor is similar to the read head in a computer hard drive that detects ones and zeros. The NanoLab uses the same technology to sense biological data. The final ingredient is a protein solution containing disease antibodies.
The tester hits start and, 10 to 15 minutes later, tiny green, orange, and red light bulbs illuminate, indicating which disease proteins were detected, and at what level. The availability of antibodies, the proteins that our immune system uses to identify and fight viruses, is the only limit to the diagnostic tool.
Part of making the NanoLab was miniaturizing a 250-pound electromagnet and a desktop computer from a normal-sized lab into tiny wires that fit in the palm of your hand. In addition to its size and portability, the novelty of the NanoLab is its quantitative multiplex protein detection, which means it can find the level of several different diseases in one run. Because the tool is portable and doesn't require skilled technicians to run, it has the potential to sell over-the-counter as a home diagnostic kit.
Click here for the full story.
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Hearing-Aid Software Helps Block Out Background Noise
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Hearing-assistance devices may be useful in a quiet room, but once the background noise levels ramp up, the devices become less useful. The researchers' algorithm helps filter out irrelevant noise so they can better understand voices. The patented technology is now being developed to improve the capabilities of existing cochlear implants and digital hearing aids. Adding Clearcall to current technology requires only add-on software for existing devices.
A mathematical model of the ear was developed that shows how speech recognition works. The researchers "clean" auditory information before it goes to the brain, eliminating some of the information - the background noise. The software was originally developed for use in cell phones, but Clearcall introduced distortions that people with healthy hearing found distracting.
Clearcall works with the brain's own sound recognition faculties to help the hearing aid user filter out background noise. To a person with normal hearing, a Clearcall-filtered voice will sound distorted, the same way it's hard for some people to recognize voices and words over the telephone. And even to the newly hearing impaired, Clearcall will sound different. But with continued use, the software improves the clarity of voices from 30 to 50%.
Click here for the full story.
New Device Gives Patients the Power to Monitor Their Hearts
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| A new trial gives patients the power to monitor their hearts. |
Home monitoring systems are already in use in the Heart Center's Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy Program and Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Program, alerting doctors when a patient's condition changes. The Homeostasis Trial takes the concept a step further by allowing patients to monitor their heart function themselves.
A sensor about the size of a dime was implanted in the left ventricle of Racette's heart. This sensor monitors his left atrial pressure and sends the information twice daily to a small handheld computer. Using his doctor's prescriptive instructions, Racette will be able to adjust his medications on a dose-by-dose basis, similar to how diabetics can adjust their insulin dosage based on the results of at-home glucose monitoring. Racette will also be able to judge if he should make changes like reducing salt and fluid intake to prevent further symptoms.
Currently, doctors are guided by a heart failure patient's symptoms, such as sudden weight changes caused by fluid buildup, swelling, or shortness of breath. The Homeostasis Trial is evaluating whether left atrial pressure measured from within the heart can indicate impending problems hours or days before these more serious symptoms occur.
Mass General is one of six hospitals in the United States participating in the trial, which is sponsored by St. Jude Medical.
Click here for the full story.
Computer System Improves Pain Therapy for Cancer Patients
Heidelberg University Hospital in Germany has successfully tested an electronic system, combined with guidance by an experienced clinical pharmacist, to treat pain in cancer patients. The electronic pain relief guide, AiDPainCare, is an additional instrument of the electronic pharmaceutical guide AiDKlinik, which guides physicians safely through the current pharmaceutical market in Germany with over 64,000 products, and successfully helps avoid false dosages, side effects, dangerous drug interaction, and duplications in prescriptions.The medication prescribed by the physician can be transferred from AiDKlinik directly to a prescription or medical report. The system is currently in use in ten hospitals in Germany and can also be subscribed to by physicians in private practice. AiDKlinik was developed at Heidelberg University Hospital in conjunction with the hospital pharmacy.
The system was tested and successfully implemented for pain therapy of cancer patients on wards at Heidelberg University Hospital Department of Radio-Oncology and Radiation Therapy. The researchers determined that in pain treatment begun outside the hospital, under-dosing with morphine-based analgesics was common, and so-called co-analgesics such as antidepressants or cortisone products were not used sufficiently.
The use of AiDPainCare improved the competent prescribing of such co-analgesics and of opioid (opiate-based) pain medication to treat pain peaks and breakthrough pain. The module provides quick access to general principles on treatment with opioids and legal information to reduce fears about prescribing a narcotic.
Click here for the full story.
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