AI can Detect Diarrhea Through Bowel Sounds

AI listens to toilet sounds to determine whether or not people have diarrhea

Highlights:

AI technology in smart toilets can help detect diarrhea
The device decodes the sound of bowel movements to detect diarrhea
This technology can help in detecting various //inflammatory bowel diseases

A smart toilet has been developed that can detect early indicators of numerous bowel disorders by listening to the sounds you make when using the toilet.

According to Georgia Institute of Technology researchers, the device has a sensor that detects the sound of people pooping or the audio of them passing gas. The device communicates with an AI (artificial intelligence) system that categorizes bowel movements.

‘An artificial intelligence that can diagnose diarrhea with 98% accuracy from bathroom sound recordings could aid in the tracking of disease outbreaks such as cholera.’

It detected indicators of cholera and other chronic diseases in testing, providing hope for treatment to begin as soon as symptoms develop.

“The hope is that this sensor, which is small in footprint and noninvasive in approach, could be deployed to areas where cholera outbreaks are a persistent risk,” says Maia Gatlin, an aerospace engineer at Georgia Tech, in a media release ().

When someone defecates, urinates, or passes gas, the computer neural network checks for small changes in the sounds. To develop the algorithm, the researchers collected hours of audio and video data from healthy and ill people.

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They converted each into a spectrogram, which is essentially a sound image. Diverse experiences result in different characteristics. Urination and defecation, for example, produce a consistent and distinct tone. In comparison, diarrhea is more unpredictable.

The scans were sent into the study’s algorithm, which learned to rank them. The performance of the toilet was tested against data with and without background noises. This ensured that the sensor was learning the correct sound qualities regardless of its surroundings.

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The Georgia Tech team intends to collect real-world acoustic data to train their machine-learning model to perform in a range of restroom settings.

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Cholera, a bacterial disease, produces diarrhea. Each year, up to four million cases are diagnosed worldwide, resulting in approximately 150,000 deaths. It’s a major issue in places where people are more prone to be malnourished, such as Sub-Saharan Africa and rural South Asia. Cholera is the world’s third biggest cause of child mortality, trailing only pneumonia and premature births.

Identifying potential community disease spread for such an outbreak will inform health experts earlier and optimize resource and help allocation. Monitoring this and other bowel illnesses, however, is a delicate subject for obvious reasons.

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The technology could help doctors track patients with specific illnesses, such as inflammatory bowel disease. Bathrooms of the future, according to smart toilet developers, might become the ultimate health monitoring tool. At some point, it may give lifestyle recommendations, such as eating more fiber or particular nutrients, or determine which foods cause an uncomfortable toilet episode.

Reference:

AI listens to toilet sounds to guess whether people have diarrhoea - (https://www.newscientist.com/article/2350082-ai-listens-to-toilet-sounds-to-guess-whether-people-have-diarrhoea/)

Source-Medindia