Researchers develop smartphone accessory to test for HIV, syphilis

 

 

WASHINGTON — The self-care diagnostics functionality of tomorrow may soon be found in a smartphone accessory, according to a Washington Post article published Thursday. 

 

A team of researchers at Columbia Engineering has developed a low-cost smartphone accessory that can perform a point-of-care test that simultaneously detects three infectious disease markers from a finger prick of blood in just 15 minutes. The device replicates, for the first time, all mechanical, optical and electronic functions of a lab-based blood test that would otherwise identify an HIV antibody, a treponemal-specific antibody for syphilis or a non-treponemal antibody for active syphilis infection.

 

The small device was recently piloted by healthcare workers in Rwanda who tested whole blood obtained via a finger prick from 96 patients who were enrolling into prevention-of-mother-to-child-transmission clinics or voluntary counseling and testing centers. The work is published Feb. 4 in Science Translational Medicine. 

 

"Our dongle presents new capabilities for a broad range of users, from health care providers to consumers," stated Samuel Sia, associate professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia Engineering. "By increasing detection of syphilis infections, we might be able to reduce deaths by 10-fold. And for large-scale screening where the dongle's high sensitivity with few false negatives is critical, we might be able to scale up HIV testing at the community level with immediate antiretroviral therapy that could nearly stop HIV transmissions and approach elimination of this devastating disease," he said. "We are really excited about the next steps in bringing this product to the market in developing countries. ... And we are equally excited about exploring how this technology can benefit patients and consumers back home."