Researchers at University of California San Diego have developed tiny micromotors that propel themselves around the stomach, neutralizing the acids within, eventually releasing a cargo of drugs once the pH is at a desired level. This approach can change how antibiotics and other pH sensitive drugs are delivered, as currently proton pump inhibitors have to […]
Tag: Medicine
SOZO High End Bioimpedance Spectroscopy System Being Released
ImpediMed, a company with offices in California and Australia, is releasing its new SOZO bioimpedance spectroscopy system that performs advanced body composition analysis. The technology involves sending out electric current through the arms and legs and detecting how the body affects it as it passes through. Though this technology has been in existence for a […]
Paper Test for Zika Powered by Gold Nanoparticles
Zika is often a silent disease that might not display any symptoms in infected persons, making screening particularly important. In the developing world, mobile testing systems that can be easily transported and used are not available, so sending a sample to a lab is still required to detect Zika infected individuals. Researchers at Washington University […]
Incentive-Based Systems to Improve Patient Compliance: Interview with Matt Loper, CEO of Wellth
Wellth, a digital health company based in New York, has developed a system that provides patients with daily financial incentives to improve their compliance with drug regimens. Low patient compliance results in significant issues in terms of patient health and increased financial costs. The company is particularly interested in targeting type 2 diabetes, congestive heart […]
Data Mined Insurance Records Point to Interesting Disease Relationships
Data about who has what disease holds a lot of clues about the diseases themselves and their causes. Researchers at the University of Chicago undertook a data mining effort to figure out what genetic and environmental patterns that a few dozen common diseases share with each other. The team gathered data from insurance claims related […]
New Automatic Technique to Measure Blood Pressure with Greater Accuracy
Existing and commonly used automatic blood pressure meters suffer from inaccuracies. An old fashioned auscultatory blood pressure test can avoid inaccurate results, but it has to be performed by a medical professional. Now researchers at the Jerusalem College of Technology in Israel have developed a new method that may be more accurate than common oscillometric automatic […]
Automatic Heart Analyzing CADence System Cleared by FDA to Help Primary Care Physicians
AUM Cardiovascular, a company out of Northfield, Minnesota, won FDA clearance for its CADence system, which is a novel combination of a stethoscope and ECG in one device. The CADence is intended to be used by primary care physicians to help spot suspicious cardiac murmurs that should be referred to cardiologists. The physician places the device […]
Ultrasound to Improve Effectiveness of Cancer Drugs: Interview with Focused Ultrasound Foundation’s Jessica Foley, PhD
Most people think of ultrasound as an imaging modality. Yet, there are many other clinical uses for the high frequency soundwaves. Focused ultrasound waves can promote the opening of the blood-brain barrier, and they can be used to ablate fibroids, among other uses. Yet the potential of ultrasound in clinical medicine is far from fully […]
Dehydration Monitoring System to Help Prevent Common Cause of Death in Young Children
Dehydration is so dangerous that in the developing world it is one of the most prevalent causes of mortality in young children. The summer heat can be particularly brutal, but preventing dehydration is fairly easy as long as parents and caretakers are aware that a child needs to be attended to. To help detect that […]
Skin Grafts for Gene Therapy Could Treat Type II Diabetes and Obesity
Scientists at the University of Chicago genetically modified skin cells to produce glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP1) protein that is beneficial in diabetes and reduces appetite, and these investigators grew the cells in a dish to form a skin graft. The grafts could potentially be used to treat diabetes and obesity, and could provide a new […]
Flexible Biopsy Catheter for Sampling Lung Tissue Coming to da Vinci Surgical Robots
Intuitive Surgical, the company that makes the popular da Vinci surgical robotic systems, is working on releasing a flexible biopsy catheter designed to take tissue samples from deep within the lungs. The company announced about a year ago that it is working with Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group, a Chinese firm, on the technology, and there were […]
ART MEDICAL’s Technology to Prevent Pneumonia in ICU: Interview with CEO Liron Elia
Pneumonia arising from the use of ventilators and feeding tubes in the ICU are disturbingly common and often life threatening. ART MEDICAL, a company based in Netanya, Israel, has developed technology that may help prevent aspiration pneumonia and ventilator associated pneumonia. We were curious about this development and spoke with Liron Elia, CEO of ART MEDICAL, about […]
Micro-Sized Silk Cocoons for Drug Delivery
An international team of researchers has used a microfluidic system to produce microsized silk capsules that could be used to deliver delicate proteins or drugs in the body. They extracted silk proteins directly from the glands on silkworms and ran them through small channels on a microfluidic chip to produce the silk capsules. The process […]
New, More Effective Flu Vaccine Delivered Using Dissolvable Microneedle Patch
Researchers at Georgia State University have developed a more effective way of delivering influenza vaccines thanks to a dissolvable microneedle array and a special formulation of the vaccine. The microneedle device is made of a biocompatible polymer, the needles of which are tightly packed with the vaccine. The vaccine works well thanks to a novel […]
Non-Invasive gammaCore Device to Fight Pain of Cluster Headaches Released in U.S.
The gammaCore non-invasive vagus nerve stimulator from electroCore, a Basking Ridge, New Jersey company, is now available for adult patients to treat acute pain arising from episodic cluster headaches. Currently only available with a doctor’s prescription, the gammaCore device is used to transmit an electric current through the neck and to the vagus nerve. This is done […]
Hemopurifier Filters Ebola, Hep C, Metastatic Melanoma: Interview with James A. Joyce, CEO of Aethlon Medical
Filtering infectious pathogens and cancer cells directly from whole blood has been an almost fantastic proposition, but the Hemopurifier from Aethlon Medical does just that. We’ve been covering it for over 10 years on Medgadget as it proves itself in clinical trials and new applications for it are discovered. It has already been studied as a treatment […]
Podimetrics System Helps Prevent Diabetic Foot Ulcers: Interview
Podimetrics is a company that has developed a special foot temperature monitoring pad that can keep track of a diabetic’s feet to help detect the onset of foot ulcers. The Podimetrics Mat and the rest of the company’s Remote Temperature Monitoring System allow clinicians to receive high resolution temperature scans of the soles of their […]
Toxic Nanoparticles Coated with Antibiotics Safely Kill Drug Resistant Bacteria
A team of Brazilian scientists may have come up with a practical way of killing off resistant bacteria by targeting them with toxic silver-silica nanoparticles coated with an antibiotic. Since antibiotics don’t have the full punch to eliminate bacteria resistant to them, the researchers instead used the antibiotic ampicillin as a mechanism to deliver the killer nanoparticles to […]
PET Tracer to Directly Detect Blood Clots
Researchers in Germany have developed a fluorine-based tracer compound that can bind with high affinity to small clots, allowing doctors to image them using positron emission tomography (PET). Blood clots can cause heart attacks and strokes. Doctors often need to find clots using imaging techniques, so that they can treat them or identify where thrombi […]
Masimo’s EU Approved Super Sensor Monitors Variety of Physiologic Parameters
Masimo just announced receiving European approval for its new rainbow Super DCI-mini sensor, a pulse oximeter that can simultaneously monitor arterial oxygen saturation (SpO2), hemoglobin (SpHb), carboxyhemoglobin (SpCO), methemoglobin (SpMet), pleth variability index (PVi), index of perfusion (Pi), and pulse rate (PR). This is the first non-invasive fingertip sensor capable of monitoring all these parameters, indicated […]