ITB Students Developed HEMOCARE, a New Way to Measure Blood Cells without Injection
BANDUNG, itb.ac.id – On 22nd-24th May 2018, final year students from School of Electrical Engineering and Informatics (STEI) ITB held innovation exhibition titled Electrical Engineering Days 2018 (EEDays 2018) at Aula Timur ITB. It displays various final projects that use electrical system to solve problems. Among those final projects, one product engages in health care issue. The product is called Hemocare.
The product was initiated by Resti Oktia, Clinton Elian, and Putut Dewantoro which can measure hemoglobin levels in patient’s blood non-invasively. It means that the measurement is done without taking blood sample.
According to Resti, one of the initiator, current invasive blood test method is not effective because it uses syringe. “All this time, blood test need taking blood sample using syringe, while many people are afraid of injection. Syringe can also cause infection,” He said.
Besides causing fear, blood test in laboratory need to be done holistically, even though the patient need to check the hemoglobin only. “Blood test in laboratory should be done holistically, and that’s expensive. Hence we want to make a device that only need to be bought once for repeated use,” Resti said.
Measurement on laboratory also need longer time for the result, “About the time, laboratory result need time to come, this device only need 30 seconds to show the result.”
In the utilization of this product, all three students is mentored by Dr. Hasballah Zakaria, ST. M.Sc and Dr. Yoke Saadia Irawan MT. According to Resti, Hemocare was initiated from design making in August until the end of 2017. And the making of the device start on January to April 2018.
In the utilization, the patient only need to clamp their finger onto the device. The patient then wait several seconds until the result is displayed on the smartphone apps that is connected to Bluetooth.
So, how does Hemocare work, and how this device measure hemoglobin without taking blood sample? Resti explained how Hemocare works, “Inside fingers there are blood, and in the blood there are colors that can be absorbed by Photoplethysmograph signal (PPG), and then forwarded to diode sensor that will receive light absorption.
Resti hopes the product can be mass produced in the future, “If it is mass produced, we estimate the price would be less than 100,000 IDR,” He said. That price is much more affordable than the price of a blood test in laboratory.
But before mass production, there are several things to fix, such as the sensor and the casing, which is currently too big for the components.
There are 46 products displayed during EEDays 2018. There were also seminar that invite speakers from SIGFOX Indonesia, Technologist at Airbus Defence and Space, PT. KAI, and PT. MRT Jakarta.
Reporter: Ajani Raushanfikra
Photo: Personal Documentation
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