Inkjet Cartridges To Save Your Kidneys

Sometimes it's hard to remember that inkjet printers are good for anything other than ripping you off, but news today from HP's own intellectual property czar may change that: the technology that regulates the precise mixture of pigments down to the last picoliter will soon make home kidney dialysis machines more accurate by regulating mixtures of dialysis fluid with similar accuracy.

People with kidney problems often have to undergo dialysis treatments several times per day, so doing so at home is a necessity; unfortunately, home dialysis is prone to errors because the dialysis solution must be mixed precisely, often at varying concentrations. The HP-licensed inkjet tech will allow for dialysis solution to come in easy-to-swap cartridges that handle precise mixtures automatically. OK, you're off the hook for now, HP. For now.

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Amazing DSI Brain Scanning Visualizes Your Mind's Inner Workings In 3D

What's that monkey thinking about when he's mushing down that banana or tossing feces at you? Well, you're looking at it—this is a map of where a macaque's thoughts live. It's made possible by new 3D visualization algorithms developed by neuroscientists at Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston which render a brain's billions of individual neuron connections in full-color 3D, with each visible strand representing several tens of thousands of the too-small-to-image neural pathways. It's all done by simply applying new processing to existing MRI scan data, and thankfully, it works on human brains too.

The tech, called diffusion spectrum imaging, takes current data from MRI scans and analyzes it for the passage of water molecules along the individual neuron connections in the brain. It then processes it to spit out the 3D maps. It's possible to do on live subjects (like the human brain image above), but more detail can be achieved by scanning non-living samples for up to 24 hours.

Doctors are using the new images to better understand our brain's infinitely complicated wiring, and to avoid important neural nets during surgeries.

Philips iPill Senses Location in Body, Delivers Doses to Precise Spots

Philips' Intelligent Pill is a robotic capsule that can carry out a number of advanced medical functions, such as knowing its location in the body. According to Reuters, the pint-sized devices measures acidity and temperature in the stomach, determines it's position in the stomach, and knows whether or not it should release its dose of medicine. Making use of a microprocessor, wireless radio and battery, along with a pump and a deposit for the drugs, the pill could greatly help patients with disorders like Crohn's disease; because the iPill can deliver drugs to a more exact spot, less drugs would be required (leading to less side effects). Researchers say the prototype is ready for mass manufacturing.

Capshell Texts Grandma If She Doesn't Take Her Medicine

Medication adherence is a legitimate issue, especially in the older population. And the Capshell concept, a system that tracks how often patients take their medicine, gets it about half right.

Basically, the Capshell dispenses individual doses of medicine upon request. These doses are both tracked for study by a doctor at a later date (to see if the patient is taking their medicine) and monitored by a system that will automatically text message a patient that forgets to take their pill.

Oh, and it looks super cool and glossy, featuring a neat slide-out cartridge design that eliminates the pain of turning child-proof caps—a few points that make it a bit different than competing products already on the market.

But the Capshell is ultimately a pretty superficial attempt at dealing with medication adherence. Taking medicine at the right time is only a small part of the real problem. For instance, did the patient take their medicine with food when they weren't supposed to? Is the patient supposed to take the pill twice daily, but only in the presence of symptoms? Did the patient even take the medicine at all, or did they just open the container?

Essentially, there are a multitude of ways that, seniors especially, don't take their medicine properly. And this system deals with one on them. Sort of.