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With old age come several problems, the foremost being on the health front. Taking medicines and seeing doctors become routine.
With age, memory also fades. Imagine the plight of people who have to regularly take prescribed medicines! As the old adage goes: 'Necessity is the mother of invention'. So read on.
The sensor necklace
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology (USA) have designed a sensor necklace that records the exact time and date when a pill is swallowed and reminds the user if any doses are missed.
The necklace, called MagneTrace, is equipped with magnetic sensors that detect specially-designed tablets containing a tiny magnet as it passes down a person's esophagus.
For those who aren't too keen on wearing the chain, the sensors can be incorporated into a patch attached to the chest. The date and time when the pill is to be taken can be recorded on a handheld wireless device such as a smartphone. The information can then be sent to the doctor or a family member over the internet. In this way both the patient and the doctor are notified of a missed dose.
The control unit
The magnetic sensors are distributed in different orientations, allowing the pill to be detected regardless of its orientation as it passes through the patient's oesophagus.
The sensors are driven by a control unit on the necklace that consists of a battery, power management circuitry, low-power microcontroller and radio-frequency wireless transceiver. The prototype weighs less than 30 grams.
The researchers claim they have tested the device on simulated models of the human neck and oesophagus with promising results. They will later test it on animals.
The other benefits
This new technology can facilitate more accurate clinical trials of new drugs. Currently, doctors rely on the medication diaries kept by patients, which are not very accurate. Patients at times adjust their dosage to compensate for missed doses, thus leading to inaccuracies in the trials.
This is where MagneTrace can fill in. There is no scope whatsoever for the patients to "cheat" the system; it records only when a pill passes through the oesophagus.
MagneTrace also has the potential to reduce the number and magnitude of clinical trials and the need for repetition. In other words it means less expenditure and thus a reduction in the cost of a new drug. How safe is it?
The magnet used in the pill is very small; it is coated with a thick indigestible, insoluble polymer coating that prevents the absorption of the magnet and prevents magnets from aggregating.
So the magnetic tracer simply passes through the gastrointestinal tract causing no reactions and exits the body in about 24 hours. The magnetic field generated by these tracers is DC (direct current i.e. constant) and has no adverse effect on the human body, so researchers claim.
As for interference with other electronic devices, it won't matter as the field generated by the magnetic tracer is DC and quite weak.
According to Maysam Ghovanloo, the wireless link between the necklace and portable computing device such as a smartphone complies with US FCC (Federal Communications Commission) standards for the ISM (Industrial-Scientific-Medical) Band, which is dedicated to such applications. "Therefore, there will be no interference with other FCC approved devices such as cellphones. Patients who would use the magnetically traceable medications in the future should stop taking them a few days before having a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)," he added.
- The writer is a guru of tech who runs a trading company in Dubai
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