Testing urine and stool has long been an important tool in a doctor’s kit for diagnosing infections, diabetes, and some types of cancer. Now an international team of researchers has found a way to integrate the analysis of many health markers, including the flow and viscosity of our bodily functions (anal fingerprints), into a smart toilet that gives users a complete picture of what that is leaving your body. The study has been published in the journal Nature Biomedical Engineering.
The toilet in question uses pressure and motion sensors, test strips that slide automatically when the toilet detects that it is being used, and even video cameras to analyze the flow and biochemical composition of the pee. When it comes to poop, the toilet uses these tools in conjunction with machine learning algorithms to study the structure of the stool and assess whether it shows any signs of health problems. A camera is activated that captures images of the entire process of making each and those images are executed through an artificial intelligence algorithm that can measure the amount of time it took the user to finish the task, which according to the researchers is ” significantly correlated with overall bowel function . ” The camera displays the use of toilet paper or standing as the completion of the process.
“Our concept dates back more than 15 years,” said Sanjiv “Sam” Gambhir, lead author of the study and president of radiology at Stanford Medicine. “When I mentioned it, people laughed because it seemed like an interesting idea, but also a bit strange.”
Anal print?
The “anal fingerprint” is the toilet’s primary tool for identifying each user and, curiously, it is the aspect that has received the most attention since the article describing this invention came to light. The key is in the distinctive features of the anoderm , the lining of the anal canal.
The idea of an anal print was born thanks to the painter Salvador Dalí, who discovered that “the anus has 35 or 37 folds, which are as unique as fingerprints,” wrote one of the study’s authors.
What if someone else sits on the toilet?
The prototype device, which is modular and can be connected to most standard toilets, uses a Raspberry Pi paired with a camera to capture each person’s unique anal fingerprint as they sit down to use the toilet, ensuring that the data it captures are associated with the right person. The device creates a profile for each user; in fact, you can identify a specific person by scanning the anus. “We know it looks strange, but it turns out that her anal print is unique,” Gambhir explained. The data is then sent to a cloud-based system for safekeeping (which the researchers say is very secure).
The smart toilet is not intended to replace doctors or provide an official diagnosis, but rather to monitor bodily waste, identify anything out of the ordinary, and send suspicious data to the doctor to help detect any health problems before they occur. agrave.
How much would it cost?
Since the smart toilet is manufactured as a complement to a standard toilet, the technology could cost between 300 and 600 euros when it is finally made for commercialization.
How effective will this smart toilet be in improving our health?
It is still not entirely clear, as the system currently has limitations as it is not easy to ensure that the unit is sterilized after each use, which could lead to false readings, for example, but experts hope to be able to carry out a clinical trial to evaluate its effectiveness in diagnosing diseases. At the moment, they are convinced of achieving a second fully functional prototype by the end of this 2020.
Referencia: Park, S., Won, D.D., Lee, B.J. et al. A mountable toilet system for personalized health monitoring via the analysis of excreta. Nat Biomed Eng (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-020-0534-9
