Normally, MANY people have to die before health officials are alerted to a unusual health problem. Why? In developing countries, death is so common place, no one is alarmed when a child or anyone dies unexpectedly. It is not apparent to the poor that something is wrong until many more die suddenly.
Fever is common sympton of malaria, Ebola, and many other diseases. But Ebola is quite deadly because it is untreatable or uncurable. It kills 40-90 percent of the infected.
Therefore, a device such as this lens-free imaging device by UCLA could provide village health officials with a quicker diagnostic of the "unusual" deaths.
Better health through your cell phone. "Lens-free imaging advance by UCLA researchers could lead to improved wireless diagnostics for HIV, malaria and other global medical problems
By Mike Rodewald 9/10/2008
In many Third World and developing countries, the distance between people in need of health care and the facilities capable of providing it constitutes a major obstacle to improving health. One solution involves creating medical diagnostic applications small enough to fit into objects already in common use, such as cell phones — in effect, bringing the hospital to the patient.
UCLA researchers have advanced a novel lens-free, high-throughput imaging technique for potential use in such medical diagnostics, which promise to improve global disease monitoring, especially in resource-limited settings such as in Africa. The research, which will be published in the quarterly journal Cellular and Molecular Bioengineering (CMBE) and is currently available online, outlines improvements to a technique known as LUCAS, or Lensless Ultra-wide-field Cell monitoring Array platform based on Shadow imaging."
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