In 2015, approximately six million children died before the age of five of pneumonia, the leading cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa.
A diagnosis of pneumonia can be made by a skilled doctor using a traditional stethoscope in a quiet room in a modern hospital or clinic. Quiet is needed when listening with a stethoscope.
Quiet clinics and skilled doctors with stethoscopes, however, are scarce resources in the developing world. Children die from pneumonia for lack of a proper diagnosis. The clinics are too noisy for traditional stethoscopes, even when the health care workers have the skills and experience to use them.
To remedy this, engineers from Johns Hopkins have designed a low-cost, microprocessor-based stethoscope that works in noisy clinics and can be used to diagnose pneumonia by less experienced health care workers. Complex noise canceling software filters out the messy and unpredictable background noise, at the same time exposing the complex sounds in the lungs caused by pneumonia. A display on the smart stethoscope tells the health care worker what is happening inside the patient’s lungs.
Real world test results on the smart stethoscope are promising. You can learn more about this here:
https://engineering.jhu.edu/lcap/data/uploads/pdfs/ieeespectrum2019_elhilali.pdf
A diagnosis of pneumonia can be made by a skilled doctor using a traditional stethoscope in a quiet room in a modern hospital or clinic. Quiet is needed when listening with a stethoscope.
Quiet clinics and skilled doctors with stethoscopes, however, are scarce resources in the developing world. Children die from pneumonia for lack of a proper diagnosis. The clinics are too noisy for traditional stethoscopes, even when the health care workers have the skills and experience to use them.
To remedy this, engineers from Johns Hopkins have designed a low-cost, microprocessor-based stethoscope that works in noisy clinics and can be used to diagnose pneumonia by less experienced health care workers. Complex noise canceling software filters out the messy and unpredictable background noise, at the same time exposing the complex sounds in the lungs caused by pneumonia. A display on the smart stethoscope tells the health care worker what is happening inside the patient’s lungs.
Real world test results on the smart stethoscope are promising. You can learn more about this here:
https://engineering.jhu.edu/lcap/data/uploads/pdfs/ieeespectrum2019_elhilali.pdf