Mobile phones can now be used to detect cancer

We depend on our mobile phones for their ability to communicate with the world through calls or internet connections. We are interested in their camera, we are worried about their battery life and we are attracted by their design. But we rarely decide on the sensors that are on a mobile phone. And just as a phone provides us with information about the environment through connectivity, sensors provide us with data about our bodies. Pressure sensors, accelerometers, blood oxygen levels, heart rate, ambient temperature… All of them, individually and together, can serve to predict our health. “We are increasingly using smartphones, wearables and other technologies in health and wellbeing, whether they are consumer products or medical devices,” explains Suzanne Scott, professor of health psychology and early cancer detection at Queen Mary, University of London. “The National Institute for Health’s long-term plan is that within ten years, people will be able to easily monitor their physiology through wearables and manage their health using digital tools.”

The key question, obviously, is how this will be done. And the answer is wearables: those that are often worn on the wrist, as rings, headphones, or as part of clothing, and that detect and monitor biometric data such as heart rate, blood oxygen saturation, physical activity, or temperature while the user continues to exercise. their normal daily routine. There are more devices

Wearable devices that use skin patches to continuously measure biochemical signals such as glucose are increasingly considered the standard of care for people with certain diseases such as diabetes.

But detecting cancer when it is still small and localized is another challenge. Early symptoms are usually subtle or vague and develop very slowly over time.

Some of these, such as fatigue, weight loss or stomach problems, are not specific to cancer and often have much less serious causes. This means that the first symptoms of cancer can be difficult to spot among the many daily symptoms.

Scott’s team believes that smartphones and wearable technology could make it easier to detect and track body changes that might otherwise be ignored.

“Sensors could detect changes before someone notices them or recognizes them as symptoms of a serious problem,” adds Scott. “For example, a smartwatch could detect a decrease in activity before fatigue, or changes in food intake before weight loss. Tracking changes over weeks or months could provide useful information for doctors who may only have a limited amount of time to see a patient and for whom cancer is a rare occurrence in their practice. “It could also be useful to use internet search history to highlight queries about symptoms, and use smartphones or wearables to alert the user to the need for appropriate medical advice.”

Accurate reading

While this is all good news, there is one more aspect, or perhaps several, that we need to be careful about and watch as the technology evolves. First, robust research and testing is needed to ensure that wearable readings are accurate and sensitive enough to be useful. This could include combining signals with other data (e.g., age, risk factors, medical history) to improve the accuracy of results.

Specific regulatory approvals will also be required to ensure that these tools are not only safe and effective, but can be adopted by different health systems.

For example, a key challenge for wearables and technologies is “the potential for these innovations to increase inequalities in cancer outcomes,” confirms Scott. “Socio-demographic factors such as household income, patient age, level of education attained and gender have been found to influence the use of these types of devices. The development of wearables and cancer screening technologies must be undertaken with equity in mind, to focus on the views and needs of those living or working in more deprived areas and those at risk of having lower levels of health literacy. Similarly, it will be necessary to ensure that the devices and their measurements are not biased and perform equally regardless of skin colour or other physiological differences.

Exchange of medical data, disputes

A delicate issue is that users must agree to share data from phones and wearables with scientists, health professionals or private companies, raising concerns about the data being misused or commercialised, or accessed by unauthorised parties. If we are to predict diagnoses using these technologies, we also need to ensure that these devices cannot be easily hacked and that only authorised people can access the information. “The potential unintended consequences of using these technologies to detect cancer need to be planned for and mitigated,” says Scott. “This includes agreement on how results should be delivered to users, what support will be required in the meantime and who is responsible for everything.”