AVIE: Personal Home Lab

1. Urinary infections are a common problem in women. Late diagnosis of urinary tract infections can lead to important health complications especially in the elderly. In Mexico alone, there are 3 million urinary infections in women reported every year.

2. AVIE is a home laboratory based on Artificial Intelligence image recognition to detect infections in urine samples. 

The technology could also be adapted to detect conditions in other fluids like blood or saliva by training the IA image recognition algorithm.

3. Our solution democratises microscopy analysis and is capable of delivering quick results from the comfort of home. Allowing urine infection testing to be easy and routinary for women at home.

Our vision is that in the future every home will have a home lab to constantly monitor peoples health and prevent disease and infections.

AVIE will become a staple product as common and as used as a toothbrush

The problem: Late diagnosis of urinary tract infections in women.

Each year there are on average 4 million registers of people suffering a urinary tract infection in Mexico, plus many more that pass unnoticed.

Three of every four cases happens in women. Overall, urinary infections are the 2nd most common infection in women.

AVIE is a home laboratory based on Artificial Intelligence image recognition to detect infections in urine samples. 

Our design uses a digital microscope to amplify urinary samples images, then with the use of an AI image recognition algorithm, AVIE is capable of detecting patterns that inform of possible urinary infections.

AVIE works as a monitoring system for people at risk of urinary tract infections, comprising hardware to collect samples, a proprietary algorithm to analyse urine samples using AI image recognition, and an online platform to store and display the historical data of the user.

Although our solution was initially thought of for the elderly, AVIE can serve women of any age. Urinary tract infections are a common and constant health problem for women of every age, is so prevalent that on many occasions they pass unnoticed, yet they bring discomfort and in some cases, for health compromised patients like the elderly, the situation could put the person in grave danger.

AVIE from the personal experience of one of the team members (Catalina de Leon) who lost her grandmother due to an undetected and prevalent urinary tract infection.

For some women, the symptoms of a urinary tract infection are so routinary and persistent that they become used to them and do not identify them as a health problem to be treated.

We are working in collaboration with a local maternity hospital (an hospital specialised in pregnant women) to develop AVIE. In the process, we are getting feedback and recommendations from Medic Doctors and patients alike.

We envision a future of smart health in which people will have technological tools at home to constantly monitor their health with the accuracy and reliability of current medical labs. Studies that were once troublesome and carried on specialised labs will be carried seamlessly as part of our routinary hygiene habits.

The use of AVIE to monitor urinary tract infections will be as common as it is today to have pregnancy tests at home, and the monitoring experience will be akin to today's smartwatches monitoring your physical activity.

We look to digitalise a current chemical process, to democratising a solution for the population.

We are currently working on testing the technology in the lab, creating an image database of urine samples to be analysed by the AI algorithm.

The current state of work is being carried as part of the Masters Degree thesis of two of the team members.

We are working with the department of electronic engineering and bioengineering at Tec de Monterrey, with the school of medical sciences at Tec de Monterrey, and with a private hospital in Monterrey, Mexico.

The use of AI algorithm along with the integration of a low-cost digital microscope and specialised data collection and analysis platforms makes our solution (AVIE) a frugal innovation of high capacity and world-class quality.

Our solution is currently at the concept stage, developing and testing the technology.

However, regarding the number of people to serve. In Mexico alone, there are over 65 million women who could use our solution. If we take this to Latin America and North America, the number could be increased tenfold.

We are measuring progress by meeting the goals set in our development plan.

2021 we are looking to have a working AVIE home lab.

2022 we expect to have the first pool of users, under a controlled environment and working in collaboration with a private hospital.

2023 we expect to have the first pool of open users outside the controlled environment.

2024 we expect to have the first 100,000 users.

2025 we expect to be on the exponential growth path.

2 full-time development engineers.

3 part-time technical advisors and project managers.

The team is in a good position to successfully deliver this product.

Catalina de Leon is the originator of the idea, shes a masters student working full time in the development of AVIE as her master thesis. Her grandfather is the founder of a private maternity hospital in Monterrey, Mexico, and she has the support of the hospital to work in the development.

Sergio Anaya is the second originator of the idea, he's a master student working full time on the development of the AI algorithms for AVIE. He has expertise in software development and AI algorithms.

Dr. Azael Capetillo has the role of project manager and works a the main thesis supervisor for Catalina and Sergio. Azael is the director of the Innovaction GYM at Tec de Monterrey, a lab for product design, development and entrepreneurship. He also holds industry and entrepreneurship experience launching new technology products.

Dr. Jorge Lozoya has expertise in AI systems, he is the director of the BRAIN institute at Tec de Monterrey, an institute for the development of interactive intelligent technologies. He has experience developing AI algorithms integrated into robotic solutions for the industry.

Dr. David Guemes is an experienced professor in technology management and development at Tec de Monterrey. He has a wide record of industrial consultancy for the development and commercialisation of new technology.

We understand that Innovation is not a single person effort, nor a single field of expertise.

We have work and continue to work on having a diverse team of knowledge and expertise with us.

For example, Catalina de Leon background is in product design, Sergio Anaya's is in software development, Dr. Azael Capetillo is in product development and entrepreneurship, Dr Jorge Lozoya is in AI algorithms and Dr. David Guemes is in technology development strategy.

We are working with the bioengineering department at Tec de Monterrey to leverage their bioengineering expertise, and as well we are working with a private medical hospital to deal with the medical considerations of our product.

We believe our solutions are greatly aligned with the interest of solve, as AVIE is conceived as a digital technological solution for a vulnerable group (elderly women).

The funding support and network from solve could greatly help the development of our product and technology.

Although we have an initial Business Model, we still need to adjust it and look for more sources of income.

Financial, financial funds would help us to build prototypes faster.

Regulatory matters, as we are dealing with health issues, we need to deal with stringent regulations.

Public relationship, part of the product-market-fit includes finding the best strategy to position and make our product known in the market.

No specific names in mind.

AVIE is conceived as a digital technological solution for a vulnerable group (elderly women). Moreover, the originator of the idea and one of the leaders of the project is Catalina de Leon, a young women engineer with an impressive track of work.

The core technology of our product is an AI convolutional neural network.

AI intelligence is the main technological leverage of our solutions, it will helo democratise the technology to make safe urinal tract infection testing available for the world.

Moreover, our technology could be used to check for other health situations beyond urinary tract infections by adjusting the algorithm in the future.