<h2>Deadly Infection</h2>
<p>Each year, pneumonia and other lower respiratory infections kill nearly <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/pneumonia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">1 million children</a> — more than malaria and HIV combined.</p>
<p>Some of those deaths could be avoided if every child on Earth had access to advanced healthcare, but that&#8217;s not the case. In fact, more than 95 percent of people in the developing world lack access to the X-ray imaging technology that&#8217;s ideal for pneumonia diagnosis.</p>
<p>Researchers from Johns Hopkins University may have a <a href="https://engineering.jhu.edu/ece/2019/02/01/a-smart-stethoscope-puts-ai-in-medics-ears/#.XFtXyM9KiV5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">solution to this problem</a>: a &#8220;smart stethoscope&#8221; that uses artificial intelligence to diagnose pneumonia on its own.</p>
<h2>Listen Up</h2>
<p>A standard stethoscope is a low-cost, highly valuable tool for detecting lung disorders. Unfortunately, its value is lost if the person wielding it doesn&#8217;t know what to listen for or if ambient noise masks the sound of a patient&#8217;s breathing.</p>
<p>With those limitations in mind, the Johns Hopkins team set out to reimagine the stethoscope. They designed a device capable of capturing the sound of the lungs while filtering out outside noise, and then they created an AI-powered app that &#8220;listens&#8221; to the lung sound for signs of pneumonia.</p>
<p>According to a <a href="https://engineering.jhu.edu/ece/2019/02/01/a-smart-stethoscope-puts-ai-in-medics-ears/#.XFtXyM9KiV5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">blog post</a> written by the researchers, the app was 87 percent accurate at distinguishing between the lung sounds of people with pneumonia and healthy people, &#8220;far surpassing other automatic diagnosis methods.&#8221;</p>
<h2>Saving Lives</h2>
<p>The Johns Hopkins team is currently field testing prototypes of its smart stethoscope in Peru, Bangladesh, Malawi, and the U.S., and it has high hopes for the future of the final version of the device, which it expects to be &#8220;significantly cheaper&#8221; than the $500 electronic stethoscopes currently on the market.</p>
<p>&#8220;By enabling on-the-spot screenings with a cheap device that can be handled by local health workers, we hope our reengineered scope will make a difference in the global health crisis of childhood pneumonia,&#8221; the researchers wrote.</p>
<p>&#8220;Viewed on the macro level, we hope to scale up our efforts so that hundreds of thousands of lives can be saved,&#8221; they continued. &#8220;But on the micro level, we feel that if even one parent sees her child recover because of early diagnosis, all our hard work will have been worth it.&#8221;</p>
<p><strong>READ MORE:</strong> <a href="https://engineering.jhu.edu/ece/2019/02/01/a-smart-stethoscope-puts-ai-in-medics-ears/#.XFtXyM9KiV5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A Smart Stethoscope Puts AI in Medics’ Ears</a> [Johns Hopkins University]</p>
<p><em><strong>More on AI healthcare: <a href="https://futurism.com/ai-medicine-doctor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Your Future Doctor May Not Be Human. This Is the Rise of AI in Medicine.</a></strong></em></p>


"If even one parent sees her child recover because of early diagnosis, all our hard work will have been worth it."

"Smart stethoscope" can diagnose pneumonia on its own

Breathe Easier

An AI-powered "smart stethoscope" listens to the sounds in a person's lungs and diagnoses pneumonia with a high degree of accuracy.

“Smart Stethoscope” Can Diagnose Pneumonia on Its Own

It uses AI to take the guesswork out of pneumonia diagnosis.

<h2>Better Protected</h2>
<p>For healthy people, pneumonia isn&#8217;t typically a life-threatening illness – but for anyone in less-than-good health, children, or the elderly, it can have life-threatening effects. That&#8217;s why a vaccine to prevent the infection is in such high demand.</p>
<p>Between 2004 and 2015, the World Health Organization&#8217;s annual estimates for the number of children killed by pneumonia worldwide dropped from two million to one million. And, while the availability of antibiotics and widespread improvements to nutrition account for some of this decline, the introduction of powerful vaccines in the early 2000s is considered the largest contributor.</p>
<p>These vaccines are capable of targeting up to 23 of the deadliest forms of <a href="https://futurism.com/researchers-have-discovered-a-new-type-of-cell-that-helps-our-lungs-fight-infections/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Streptococcus pneumoniae</a>, the bacterium that infects people with pneumonia. A <a href="https://www.buffalo.edu/ubnow/stories/2017/10/pneumonia-vaccine.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">new vaccine is now being developed</a> that could increase that number to 72, including all 23 forms previously covered.</p>
<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve made tremendous progress <a href="https://futurism.com/researchers-created-an-entirely-new-weapon-to-defeat-disease/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fighting the spread of pneumonia</a>, especially among children,&#8221; said Blaine Pfeifer, Ph.D., co-lead author of the study. &#8220;But if we&#8217;re ever going to rid ourselves of the disease, we need to create smarter and more cost-effective vaccines.&#8221;</p>
<p>The vaccine, which has proven to be effective in tests with lab animals, has been described by its creators as providing the &#8220;most comprehensive&#8221; coverage of pneumococcal disease to date.</p>
<h2>Preventing Pneumonia</h2>
<p>The current crop of pneumonia vaccines typically work by attaching a protein called CRM197 to sugars called polysaccharides that are present in each strain. And, while this technique is very effective, creating the necessary bonds takes time and money. Furthermore, it removes the bacteria that&#8217;s being targeted from the body entirely, whether or not it&#8217;s actually on the attack.</p>
<p><iframe width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/dzJNabJAPaE?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
<p>&#8220;We now know that bacteria — and <a href="https://futurism.com/new-study-finds-gut-bacteria-may-inhibit-cancer-drugs/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">in a larger sense, the microbiome</a> — are beneficial to maintaining good health,&#8221; commented co-lead author Charles H. Jones, PhD. &#8220;What&#8217;s really exciting is that we now have the ability — with the vaccine we&#8217;re developing — to watch over bacteria and attack it only if it breaks away from the colony to cause an illness. That&#8217;s important because if we leave the harmless bacteria in place, it prevents other harmful bacteria from filling that space.&#8221;</p>
<p>As a result of the way that <a href="https://futurism.com/scientists-are-developing-a-vaccine-that-could-prevent-tooth-decay/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the vaccine is engineered</a>, it should be relatively easy to add more sugars to offer an even broader <a href="https://futurism.com/neurons-use-a-type-of-adrenaline-rush-to-communicate-with-the-immune-system/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">immune response</a>. This could be crucial in years to come, as the strains of S. pneumoniae and other pneumococcal diseases currently prevalent could give way to other strains in the future.</p>
<p>Pfeifer stated that the team expects the vaccine to potentially provide &#8220;universal coverage&#8221; against the bacteria responsible for pneumonia, meningitis, and sepsis, among other diseases. If this is truly the case, it could save countless thousands of lives a year.</p>


Millions die of pneumonia each year — a vaccine could change that

Health & Medicine

Pneumonia can be a life-threating illness for many. A new vaccine provides more coverage for different strains than ever before.

/Pneumonia

Breathe Easier

“Smart Stethoscope” Can Diagnose Pneumonia on Its Own

Health & Medicine

Millions Die of Pneumonia Each Year — A Vaccine Could Change That

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