Detect carriers of the virus Sars-CoV-2 at a very early stage to recede before they become contagious... and it's all thanks to a simple ring or a watch connected ? This is what offers a team of american researchers, led by neurosurgeon Ali Rezai. This doctor, who is also the director of the Institute Rockefeller neurosciences (NRI), officiates at the hospital of the university of West-Virginia, United States. It has developed, with a other specialist of neurosciences, Victor Finomore, an algorithm to predict 24 hours before the onset of the first symptoms, that a patient is on the point of developing the Covid-19.
The ring used is manufactured by the Finnish company Oura. © DRPour do this, it uses a scandinavian : a ring, made by the start-up Finnish Oura, whose headquarters is located in Oulu, the birthplace of Nokia. It stores the heartbeat, but also some of the impulses of the nervous system in order to determine if these parameters change over time. This information captured, day or night – hence the importance of wearing this ring during his sleep (some people sleep with the watch connected to the wrist), are then analyzed by an artificial intelligence that responds to smaller defects. The scientific principle of the device seems simple. At least on paper !
Read also When the artificial intelligence will help combat the Ebola virus
health data recorded are likely to signal that an infection is underway. A few days before the first fever, the body of an infected person begins to react : his heart begins to beat in a less regular (of the order of a few microseconds per beat) and his sleep is disturbed. But, at this time, the future patient is not likely to transmit the virus to her entourage.
"The idea is to identify these weak signals and interpret them in a manner that is sufficiently fine so that we can treat as early as possible, the carriers of the virus and, especially, to isolate them to avoid spread of the disease," explains Ali Rezai. Imagined, at the outset, to detect other health problems (risks of relapse for people addicted to opioids, in particular, but also the shots of hot athletes and / or soldiers after an intense physical effort), this device has been tested on nearly 6 000 people in West Virginia, from 27 march. This detection system seems to work well enough for the us national guard has decided to deploy his men. Several hospitals are equipped with them from the beginning of the epidemic : in New York, but also in Nashville and Philadelphia.
An alternative tracking
Funded by the institute Rockefeller for the development of neurosciences and a half-dozen philanthropists in the u.s. (the amount of their aid is not given), the project has, for the moment, no commercial purpose. "It mainly aims to imagine how one can prevent the spread of the virus without the need for applications of tracking are well wring out the limitations of the current ", explains Pierre-François d'haese, director of the department of "connected health and artificial intelligence" of the organization.
In Europe, the belgian authorities are preparing to distribute these rings are connected with personal health. Pierre-François d'haese is in the process of canvassing the French ministry of Health to see to what extent, the Hex could benefit, also, of this device. The next goal of the team of professor Rezai is to identify weak signals, which showed the infection Covid-19, three days before the first symptoms observable which would track the presence of the virus, including asymptomatic individuals.
