Health care technology: New sensors could improve quality and lower costs

Cheap, fast and effective are three words often uttered, especially during recent economic hardships, by manufacturers trying to cost-effectively develop a wide variety of products from new cars to environmental-friendly light bulbs. The idea is simple, by cutting costs in the manufacturing process, the savings can be passed down to the customer; however, when dealing with “cheap, fast and effective,” manufactures will, whether by design or by accident, often ignore the concept of reliability.

These days, how long does your average car last? How long does it take before your kids toys begin to break? How about the fact that my parents old TV lasted twenty-five years, before being replaced, while only after about four years, my fifty-inch flat screen, seems to be on its last legs? Sadly, shoddy craftsmanship, cut corners and lousy customer service doesn’t equate to less money for customers, at least not in the long-run.

So when I start hearing the idea of cheap, fast, and effective being applied to health care, I get a little nervous. Obviously, health care represents price gouging at the most extreme. The new medical device tax will likely make it worse. Reform and innovation is definitely needed; however, unlike a cool toy, a new cell phone or a fancy car, shoddy manufacturing, cut corners and inferior product development in health care is simply unacceptable.

Scientists at top universities have begun to ease my fears about the future of health care technology by using innovative research to drive the cost-effectiveness of health care technology through the development of new diagnostic sensors, rather than strictly focusing on novel manufacturing techniques. At the Stanford University School of Medicine, a microfluidics-waveguide sensor is under development. Originally created as a fast and effective means to rapidly diagnose infants with severe combined immunodeficiency, the microfluidics-waveguide sensor uses lasers to accurately count and distinguish between different types of immune cells. Different diseases create distinct alterations to the immune system. By using this sensor, doctors will have an inexpensive and accurate way to measure the levels of a variety of different immune cells. For doctors, this type of sensor could help accurately determine the underlying sickness in patients, which could be extremely helpful, especially when dealing with subtle inconclusive symptoms.

Chemists at the University of Texas at Austin have taken a slightly different approach to the same problem of disease diagnosis, by using paper-based microfluidics -- they've put a functional biological sensor on paper. Using technology that is the basis of home pregnancy tests and inspired by the concept of origami, researchers have developed a prototype, complex, three-dimensional paper sensor that may one day be able to test for a variety of diseases with one sensor. Folding the sensor is easy. It does not require anything but moderately dexterous fingers. The sensor is also easy to use, highly accurate and very inexpensive (~10 cents a sensor). For tests that might require power, a battery is needed, which, according to the researchers, will only add a few cents to the sensor costs.

At the forefront of health care technology, several other examples of novel innovation and lateral thinking promise to provide better treatment at lower costs. My main hope is that this new technology is kept at a reasonable price -- not price gouged by a greedy entrepreneur and not done too cheaply, which will ultimately cause increased health care costs to replace shoddily built technology.

Counting cells with a low-cost integrated microfluidics-waveguide sensor

Origami-Inspired paper sensor could test for malaria and HIV for less than 10 Cents, report chemists