FDA OK’s ingestible sensor chip
July 31, 2012
Ingestible sensor chip for electronically confirming adherence to oral medications. (a) A closer view of a sensor chip; (b) Sensor attached directly to a tablet. (c) Sensor co-encapsulated with a drug product using a sensor-enabled capsule carrier. (Credit: Proteus Digital Health)
Proteus Digital Health, Inc. announced Monday that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has cleared its ingestible sensor for marketing as a medical device.
The ingestible sensor (formally referred to as the Ingestion Event Marker or IEM) is part of the Proteus digital health feedback system, an integrated, end-to-end personal health management system designed to help improve patients’ health habits and connections to caregivers.
“The FDA validation represents a major milestone in digital medicine,” said Dr. Eric Topol, professor of genomics at The Scripps Research Institute and author of The Creative Destruction of Medicine: How the Digital Revolution Will Create Better Healthcare. Directly digitizing pills, for the first time, in conjunction with our wireless infrastructure, may prove to be the new standard for influencing medication adherence and significantly aid chronic disease management,”
Wearable health monitor communicates with ingested edible sensors to collect physiologic data such as activity and heart rate. (a) Placement of a wearable health monitor on the body. (b) First-generation clinical version of a wearable health monitor. (c) Second-generation clinical version. (Credit: Proteus Digital Health)
The Proteus ingestible sensor can be integrated into an inert pill or other ingested products, such as pharmaceuticals. Once the ingestible sensor reaches the stomach, it is powered by contact with stomach fluid and communicates a unique signal that determines identity and timing of ingestion.
This information is transferred through the user’s body tissue to a patch worn on the skin that detects the signal and marks the precise time an ingestible sensor has been taken. Additional physiologic and behavioral metrics collected by the patch include heart rate, body position and activity.
The patch relays information to a mobile phone application. With the patient’s consent, the information is accessible by caregivers and clinicians, helping individuals to develop and sustain healthy habits, families to make better health choices, and clinicians to provide more effective, data-driven care.
Comments (16)
by Leslie Morfin
It is written in the old testament that the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year was 666 talants of gold. how else will you be able to buy, trade, or sell, and with the RFID human chip which will be used as e-money this is the mark of the beast. That will be the next step in this process of conditioning people into believing that this is the solution to identity theft. Take the mark of the beast and lose all possibilities of ever entering into the kingdom of God.
by Leslie Morfin
And next it will be e-money because of the identity theft we already use it in a plastic card why not put a micro chip inplant called the RFID HUMAN CHIP to reduce the identity theft and by the way as it is written that no man can buy sell or trade save he that recieves the Mark of the Beast complete set up, why do you think the government has been passin out free phones? And all the advertisments of medication for anything that they can thiink of and unlike other countries that have free medical America gets to pay to be able to bow down to the Beast. And is it not beasts that already have a chip implant being placed in their bodies. If ya stand for nothing ya fall for anything.
by JB
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMzl-4jDI3Q&feature=related
by Bennie Beaver
This sounds like a useful technology, but still, I get the feeling that companies are searching for ways to make money. I want in-body/on-body technologies functioning byway of a home personal smart system for which I may choose to connect to a doctor, or consultation with doctor it’s determine 24/7 professional monitoring is necessary. One that 24/7 wired or wireless helps me keep track of blood pressure, cholesterol and solutions, plaque buildup, pulse, temperature, all basic health conditions without consulting my doctor. I know they’re develop those systems. Of course, they’re also developing genetic technologies to keep us well in the first place. They need to get on with them. However, it may take biohackers to get those less expensive system to the people before we’re all dead. Remember, it’s a for-profit health care system!
by Marcos Marin
Then why you insist they will give you this power?! They won’t, right?
by Mike
This, to me, is an exciting development. I have no “Big Government / Big Brother” concerns as others have stated. And as far as the limited uses of this device, remember…. saying what it does not yet do is kind of like saying to the Wright brothers “That thing will never take 500 of us across the atlantic in 8 hours! What good is a 9 second flight?” Give it time (and not much time, really) and ingestible chips and bots will diagnose just about any condition from within the human body and report those conditions long before traditional detection means could find them! Keep up the great work, all your brainiacs (and computers built by brainiacs)! I want to live to be 300 years old!
by GatorALLin
I understand they have had cameras you can swallow and give you more info… this chip seems like the next step ahead.. http://www.4healthmag.com/gastroenterology/3222-a-camera-you-can-swallow-new-science-helps-diagnose-stomach-ailments.html
by egore
Sounds like working toward mark of the Beast, which no one seems to believe in.
by Gorden Russell
Of course the article didn’t say how much these chips would cost. It would be okay if they were a couple of cents, but not if they were a couple of bucks. Prescriptions cost enough already.
And who are they supposed to help? If you’re too old and forgetful to take your meds, will the computer at your doctor’s office call you up to remind you to take your morning blood pressure pill?
by Jo Dermody
In other words the government or some group will have control of your
health? They will tell you what they think you should be doing?
OK I am not ready for this.
by Dennis
Clearly this technology has lots of potential, though I think this particular unit might have problems. Not that the article was informative enough to really tell. This particular unit measures “physiologic data such as activity and heart rate”. You need to wear an external sensor over your heart to collect the data. Hmm. doesnt that seem redundant ? Maybe the external unit doesnt have to be there all the time ? How long til this thing gets pooped out ? 24 hours max ?
by Editor
The sensor chip is not capable of responding to more than gastrointestinal chemicals.
by p
it’s not about responding to the body, it’s about who has their hands on the remote control
by trakk
I guess eventually these can also be developed to help in diagnosis esp of GIT conditions.
by Gorden Russell
trakk, could you tell us what GIT is? I Googled it but got too many answers and none of them seemed to apply. I’m sure you’re not talking about an old English curse that accuses somebody of being an illegitimate child.
by Marcos Marin
GastroIntestinalTract