HACKING A reader FOR medical test STRIPS

[Rahul] works at a startup that produces cutting edge diagnostic test cards. These basic cards can test for enzymes, antibodies, and diseases swiftly and easily. For one test, this greatly speeds up the process of testing and diagnosis, but considering that these tests can now be administered en masse, health services the world over now have the problem of reading, categorizing, and logging thousands of these diagnostic test cards.

The normal option to this problem is a dedicated card scanner, but these cost tens of thousands of dollars. At a 24-hour hackathon, [Rahul] made a decision to bring down the cost of the card scanners by whipping up his own, built from a CD drive and an Arduino.

The card [Rahul] used, an A1c card that tests for glucose bound to hemoglobin, has a few lines on the card that fluoresce with different intensify depending on the test results. This can be easily read with a photodiode connected to an Arduino. The mechanical part of the build consisted of an old CD drive with a 3D printed test strip adapter. operation is very basic – just put the test strip in the test strip holder, press a button, and the results of the test are transmitted over Bluetooth.

Not only is [Rahul]’s build very simple, it’s also very beneficial and was enough to net him the ‘Most innovative Project’ prize at the hackathon in his native Singapore.