https://reasonstobecheerful.world/tuberculosis-cough-sounds-app/>
"In Behror, a hot, dusty town in Rajasthan, people queue outside a free mobile
medical van. Most have come with minor complaints, but every now and then,
there’s a patient who complains of a persistent mysterious cough and
unexplained weight loss, or has been in contact with someone who has
tuberculosis. In such cases, the standard protocol is a TB screening in a
hospital or lab.
“For many who come to our mobile medical units, this means taking time off from
work, or forgoing a day’s wages,” Deepa Bajaj, president of Child Survival
India (CSI), the NGO which operates the mobile units, says. “Many just won’t do
it.”
The data bears this out. The National TB Prevalence Survey of India (2019 to
2021) found that as many as 63.6 percent of those who had TB symptoms simply
did not seek medical help. From a community health perspective, failure to
screen for one of the world’s deadliest infectious diseases is disastrous. TB
is both preventable and curable. Yet it kills more than a million people each
year, despite global eradication goals and decades of public health campaigns.
In India, which contributes a quarter of the global TB burden, the government
aims to screen at least 90 percent of individuals who face a higher risk of TB.
Yet fewer than 8 percent are actually screened, research by the Indian Council
of Medical Research – National Institute of Epidemiology (NIE) has found.
Back in Behror, the mobile medic has a partial solution. All patients who are
contacts of TB patients, elderly, or have risk factors (such as undernutrition,
low socio-economic status, occupational exposure, smoking and alcohol use) are
asked basic questions about their symptoms and made to cough three to four
times into an app called Swaasa® on a cell phone. Within 30 seconds, the app
assesses whether the cough is just a scratchy throat — or needs to be further
assessed for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma or
tuberculosis. Bajaj says that CSI medics, who have used the app to screen over
800 patients, find it useful: “We show the patient the results on the app which
suggest they’re at a higher risk, and this makes it easier to motivate them to
go to the chest clinic,” she says."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
