Elaine Schmidt/Newsroom UCLA
Talk about merging technology with health: With a $6 million grant by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, Vietnamese professor of radiological sciences at the David Geen School of Medicine at UCLA Dr. Alex Bui, hopes to recreate technology that will enable users’ smartphones and smart watches to identify them of their unique triggers for asthma attacks.
Asthma affects close to 6.8 million children in the U.S. (Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)
The four-year grant is part of a national $144 million initiative called Pediatric Research using Integrated Sensor Monitoring Systems, or PRISMS, which aims to blend big data with mobile technology to develop tools that shed light on the environment’s role in children’s health. The UCLA-USC award was the largest of the nine projects funded by the program.
“Our goal is to predict where and when a child is at risk for an asthma attack so we can prevent one from happening,” said Bui.
UCLA will create a platform that funnels data to the user’s smart device from sensors that will be worn by the children and placed in various locations at their homes and schools. The device will securely transmit the information to a cloud-based system where it will be integrated with each individual patient’s electronic health record and real-time reports on weather conditions, air quality, pollen count and other factors that could trigger asthma attacks.
The app would let kids track asthma attacks and will be unveiled in 2016. (Courtesy: Alex Bui)
Bui said one of the biggest challenges the researchers face is creating a user-friendly app for young children. USC is also a part of this grant and will work with researchers from UCLA to create this app.
“Kids like intuitive interfaces with bright colors, simple language, big text and quirky noises,” said Bui. “We’re having fun exploring how to build those facets into our design.”
The platform also will incorporate a calendar that tracks asthma attacks and, based on that information, can alert users when conditions might be right for another attack.
Initial beta-testing will take place during 2016; during 2017 Bui’s team will test the technology with children being treated at UCLA for asthma. Researchers will evaluate how the sensors work as the children go about their daily routines at home, in school and at play.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, 6.8 million U.S. children currently live with asthma.
To read more, click here:
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/6-million-grant-will-help-uclausc-team-develop-kid-friendly-technology-to-predict-asthma-attacks
