PREDICTA - NEXT

In India private health care is expensive. Here people ignore primary symptoms and land up in diseases in the progressed state. Also due to the unavailability of proper guidance and proper care, their primary symptoms often go overlooked. At SCD INNOVATIONS, we plan to develop a solution with basic health check-ups at the doorstep through a mobile clinic consisting of a physician, nurse, and dentist. Complete physical and oral check-ups would be done, using all the diagnostic inventories in the van, as a single diagnostic test is not enough to diagnose a disease. Saliva can prove to be a powerful diagnostic tool as it is highly accessible, painless, non-invasive for all age groups, suitable for differently-abled or un-cooperative patients as well. The aim is to diagnose the diseases in their primary stage and give proper treatment with the help of the domain experts available through PREDICTA-NEXT.

In rural areas, the private sector starts with the informal providers or self-proclaimed doctors who are often the primary caregivers after an illness. They make home visits and give IV fluids on demand are preferred by villagers. They outnumber qualified doctors in rural areas. These give temporary discomfort relief but major underlying diseases often go unnoticed until a major problem arises.

The availability of doctors in general, specialist doctors and other paramedical workers, in particular, is very limited in rural India. We have this 60:40 paradox in rural areas.

The ratio of urban density to rural density for doctors was 3.8, nurses 4.0, and dentists 0.9.

More than 60% of India’s population lives in rural India while only 40% of healthcare providers work here. According to one report, there is 83% shortfall of physicians, 76% for obstetricians and gynaecologists, 82% for paediatricians and 83% for surgeons in community health centres in rural areas.

India’s healthcare indices and global health will not improve unless we improve rural healthcare and healthcare systems. We have to reach these people, do check-ups, diagnose possible diseases, give primary care, guide them, counsel them, arrange video consultations according to the disease and lastly treat the problems.

PREDICTA - NEXT

(Patients Remote Efficient Diagnosis & Intelligent Checkup Through AI)

The solution begins with reaching the most remote locations, where healthcare is scarce with a mobile medical van which shall consist of a physician, dentist and nurse. The van would consist of the following diagnostic kits (inventories): CRP kit, glucometer, pulse oximeter, ECG machine, weighing machine, portable X-Ray machine, digital sensor, blue light, laptop or a system, torch, emergency medicines, nebulizers, oxygen cylinder, salivary diagnostic kit (will indicate increased hormone, enzyme, biomarkers, CA-factors) blood withdrawal kit, CBC test machine, etc. Group of tests along with checkups of the oral cavity are required to rule out differential diagnosis. 

All gathered data of the patient will create his E-CASEPAPER and will be saved in PREDICTA-NEXT. The expert panel will be guiding, counseling and treating the patients based on the checkups done and reports of the on-spot tests done, through video calls. If required patient would be given an appointment at the nearest center for advanced treatment. E-CASEPAPER can be accessed by patient’s mobile number, citizenship number, or unique identification number. The hospital doing further checkups and treatments would be updating the same.

Our solution serves the underprivileged, underserved, and remote communities. These people have no access to proper health care systems. Their diseases often go overlooked and they have to roam around for proper diagnosis and treatments with a proper expert panel at affordable rates. By the time their apt diagnosis is made, they are either exhausted with the money or the disease has progressed to the advanced stage.

Besides availability and affordability, acceptability and adequacy are two other important aspects of access to healthcare. This is because of the limited number of health care systems due to which people who visit doctors complain of long waiting hours, lack of privacy in the consultation rooms, etc.

Through PREDICTA-NEXT and its physical elements that are the inventories in the van, the medical facility will be visiting the villages at the doorstep, so that there won’t be any crowding, so no long waiting hours and patient’s privacy would be maintained. Proper diagnosis with all types of equipment would be done, wherever diseases are suspected as per the signs and symptoms of the patient. The patient's identity, entire medical history, physical check-up, oral cavity check-up, saliva check-up would help PREDICTA-NEXT create an E-CASEPAPER. The expert panel will go through the  E-CASEPAPER and will be guiding and counseling the patients giving them special attention and gaining their confidence in the system and rendering them appropriate treatment. The expert panel will also refer the patient through PREDICTA-NEXT to superspecialists or scientists, if the parameters are unsual or if more consultation is required. As per the condition of patient the domain experts may give an appointment at the nearest center with the required facility for advanced treatment. With this, patients need not go anywhere else and spend undue amounts for primary treatments and diagnostic tests, as it would be done on the spot. Major diseases would be taken care-off in primary stages bringing down the overall morbidity and mortality rates. This shall help to improve the quality and quantity of life of the underserved communities.

India’s healthcare indices and global health will not improve unless we improve rural healthcare and healthcare systems.

PREDICTA-NEXT system will leverage big data and analytics with its inventories to improve the detection and diagnosis of rare diseases. It will help the burden of rare diseases faced by disinvested communities and historically underrepresented identity groups to come forward and discuss their problem and start the primary treatment with the help of specialists by video conferencing as specialists are less as compared to the vast population and cannot visit personally. This will promote community and connection among rare disease patients and their advocates. Thus PREDICTA-NEXT will help unlock collaboration among patients, healthcare providers, and specialists to improve patient outcomes.

It was in Pandemic when we got some time to think about the situation and what could be done to avoid or curb future Pandemics. In India the study of covid tests and their after effects, basic blood tests were very easy in cities, but in rural areas, people were not getting traced and tested properly. As well as lack of disease education and fear of spending for the disease was prevailing. So we thought of designing a new connected mobile health (mHealth) system, to keep a check on remote populations, explain the importance of early diagnosis, treat their diseases in early stages of development. Thus, help to curb future epidemics and ease of research and treatment for future pandemics.

It is always recommended to have a full-proof concept first, then the hurry of execution. Executions made without a full-proof concept is like rains without clouds which doesn’t last long.

PREDICTA-NEXT

It's a Phy-gital system that includes a physical and digital part. The physical solution includes the use of the inventories as per the requirement and as per the signs and symptoms of the patient. These readings are then reflected into the system where the digital part comes into the picture. In this, the expert panel would discuss the patient and his digital case paper and then guide the patient accordingly. Also, the experts might refer to the superspecialists or scientists online for further consultation, if required. They would also give the appointment at the nearest center where his probable disease-related specialists would be available with high-tech equipment. With this exercise, the patient will directly be treated by the required specialist without wasting much time, which will improve patients’ access to treatment and advice. 

Along with this the most innovative thing here is to include a thorough check-up of the oral cavity and use of saliva as a diagnostic tool. As mouth is considered to be the "mirror of the entire body" it can help us to draw clues to reach the correct diagnosis. Saliva like blood is a complex fluid containing antibodies, hormones, microbial constituents, biomarkers, growth factors,etc. Most of them enter saliva from the blood by passing through the spaces between cells by transcellular and paracellular routes. Because of which saliva is functionally equivalent to serum in reflecting the physiological state of the body. Saliva is also easy to handle during the procedures as it does not clot.

PREDICTA-NEXT is harnessing Artificial Intelligence (AI) to bridge India’s healthcare divide. It's mainly a cross-platform-based mobile health (mHealth) system using data, algorithms, machine learning, and Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI) techniques designed to perform tasks on a connected platform. 

Reference: https://ibm.co/3vKcM8K 

Along with Blockchain Technology, it protects patient data and improves the overall user experience which not only facilitates the secure transfer of patient medical records but also efficiently manages the medical supply chain. Because of BLOCKCHAIN, OUR PATIENTS REMOTE MEDICAL RECORDS CAN BE WELL-ORGANIZED WHICH PREVENTS PETTY MISTAKES. At the same time, the platform itself maintains a record of the origin and protects the patient's personal identity. For this, we are planning to collaborate with SimplyVital Health's Nexus Health platform which is an open-source database that allows our healthcare providers, on a patient’s blockchain, to access pertinent information.

Reference: https://tracxn.com/d/companies...

nature  > review article

Taking connected mobile-health diagnostics of infectious diseases to the field

https://www.nature.com/article...

Examples of narrow AI:

- IBM’s Watson
- Image / facial recognition software
- Disease mapping and prediction tools

Smart Remote Services by Siemens-Healthineers 

https://bit.ly/3gLeeSO

As this technology is having a hypothetical control problem, but the positives of AI outweigh potential negatives.

There are 2 people in our team, all full-time contributors. 

I am working on developing the system design of Connected Mobile Health Diagnostic, which is essential to creating the solution.

My other team member is working on the Qualitative Medical Research proposal and feasibility part of the project.

We at SCD INNOVATIONS strongly believe in a multidisciplinary team sport!

- Our organization is adaptable towards diverse customers, markets, ideas, and talent.

- We make diversity and inclusion our personal priority.

- We create the space for others to contribute.

- We demonstrate an open mindset and deep curiosity about others.

- We empower others, pay attention to the diversity of thinking.

My team and I are applying to the Horizon Prize mainly to get early-stage seed funding for the actual realization of our system design solution.

Potential organizations we would benefit from the partnership are - Maharashtra State Innovation Society (mains) and possibly the World Health Organization (WHO) as well as the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) etc.