Old cell phones for use in medicine

Millions of cell phones are put aside in the corners of homes every year, and are being replaced by better ones, with the newness of the moment, by those who have a bigger screen … But that does not mean that they cannot be used at all.

There are many people who decided to change them On a webcam, as a wifi duplicate or as a security cameraBut there is another, more noble destiny, which is saving lives.

That’s what Samsung does with the Galaxy Upcycling program, created in 2017, that turns “old” cell phones into scanners.

They are cameras with a processor capable of making decisions and drawing conclusions, and from Galaxy Upcycling they indicate that they have been working on creating eye scanners since 2018 with excellent results. The goal now is to reach areas where it is difficult to obtain “high-end” medical supplies.

The scanner in question is called Samsung Eyelike, and it is capable of taking photos from the fundus. The app is responsible for using artificial intelligence to analyze the image and detect potential complications in real time.

This unique and affordable diagnostic camera can screen patients for conditions that can lead to blindness, including diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration.

In the article published in news.samsung.com They indicate that they are already helping communities in Vietnam, India, Morocco and Papua New Guinea. In 2019 alone, it provided 90 portable ophthalmoscopes to healthcare professionals working in remote areas of the country without access to inpatient clinics, and serving more than 19,000 Vietnamese residents with a portable retina camera.

Samsung is also expanding its capabilities into new areas of screening, including the use of recycled Galaxy devices to create a portable, smartphone-based vaginal speculum to detect cervical cancer and improve women’s access to quality healthcare.