Smart mouthpiece to help monitor COVID-19 symptoms remotely
ORB, a London-based startup, previously featured by Startups Magazine, is a real-time performance, wellness & health AI data platform, who specialises in the capture, analysis and presentation of human physiological data (Biotelemetry). The platform enables non-invasive, continuous, real-time monitoring in non-controlled environments (e.g. at home or on a sports field), offering accurate deep insights into physiology no other product is able to.
If you have followed ORB's work to date, you will know their first product - Smartguard - is a smart mouthpiece that helps track athletes in real-time in the game to a degree never seen before. The innovative solution, fully developed in-house, measures over 100 parameters about the body including, head impacts, player load, heart and respiratory rates, as well as blood glucose levels to name a few. These are parameters previously seen in the lab, and now recorded in real-time on the field. This makes the solution relevant and much needed in multiple sports and beyond as ORB has seen a lot of interest from wellness, dentistry, broadcasting, military and research sectors.
As the lockdown hit us and all the sports were effectively paused, team ORB thought there is more that the product can do. Over the last three years, it has already seen a lot of interest from the medical community as the Smartguard proves to be collecting hard-to-get data in real-time. After weeks of extensive research, our team concluded there is potential to use our product to help battle COVID-19. This intuition was supported by the British Government, who has awarded the company an Innovate UK grant to conduct a feasibility study.
The study explores two areas:
- The first is using the technology for the remote health monitoring of the vulnerable in isolation or shielding. With the aim to ease the workload on carers and the worries of loved ones by providing a platform to monitor their condition in real-time from afar.
- The second investigates whether the technology can identify and monitor COVID-19 symptoms e.g. Fever, Respiratory Distress, Coughing, Fatigue. Which would help with the early identification or monitoring the recovery of COVID-19 patients.
This Innovate UK funded project is the first step to discovering the true potential of ORB’s technology and its applicability to settings beyond sport. It highlights the platform's capability to easily adapt to the current needs as the exciting thing is, the data they are collecting here is no different to when on a sports field. The difference is merely the context in which the insights are presented. Welcome to the world of Biotelemetry!
If you want to know more - give ORB a shout or sign up to their monthly newsletter here.
You can also play a role in the study and try out the tech for yourself as they are currently recruiting volunteers. Read more here.
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