Overview
Pnoi-phone is an innovative acoustic-based respiratory diagnostic tool aimed at providing an affordable, portable, and non-invasive way to evaluate lung function and detect respiratory diseases like asthma and COPD. As such, it has three primary intended users: healthcare providers such as pulmonologists who would perform testing and diagnose, technicians who support testing, and patients getting tested.
(video: st. john: asthma patient struggling to use spirometry.)
User research survey for pnoi-phone.
To gather insights from these user groups, a user research was conducted in-context interviews and observations, seeking answers to questions like:
- What challenges do you face in diagnosing respiratory illnesses today?
- What would make spirometry/other testing easier and more effective?
- Where do current solutions fall short?
- How could a solution like Pnoi-phone fit into your diagnosis workflow?
About 9 to 10 months of interaction with people provided incredibly valuable perspectives. For one, I gained empathy for the difficulty both providers and the trouble patients face today for accurate diagnosis using traditional spirometry. At the same time, I better understood workflow and equipment needs from the technician point of view. Testing also revealed opportunities to simplify the device and testing process itself.
(spirometer image)
To Do:
A detailed report is yet to be made about the core findings and insights from the research. This will provide rationale for the design decisions for the pnoi-phone system.
For further details, refer
- Pnoi-phone: Main post for Pnoi-phone project.
- Pnoi Corpus: A multimodal breath sounds corpus of patients and controls (recorded with a high-end microphone and digital stethoscope) and corresponding PFT values.
- Pnoi Stor: Data collection protocol, organisation scheme and storage for Pnoi-phone project.
- Product Design: Design and development of Pnoi-phone biomedical device integrated with AI models to diagnose and monitor airway diseases.
- Embedded System Design: Design and development of embedded system for Pnoi-phone biomedical device.
- Pnoi-phone App: Design and development of Pnoi-phone android app.