Physical by smart phone becoming real possibility


It's not a "Star Trek" tricorder, but by hooking a variety of gadgets onto a smart phone you could almost get a complete physical -- without the paper gown or even a visit to the doctor's office.



Plug in a few more devices, and you could have photos of your eardrum (Look, no infection!) and the back of your eye, listen to your heartbeat, chart your lung function, even get a sonogram.


But companies are rapidly developing miniature medical devices that tap the power of the ubiquitous smart phone in hopes of changing how people monitor their own health.

"We wanted to make sure they have all the right tools available in their pocket" is how Joseph Flaherty, of AgaMatrix, describes his company's tiny glucose monitor.



In March, prominent San Diego cardiologist Eric Topol tweeted "no emergency landing req'd" when he used his smart phone EKG to diagnose a distressing but not immediately dangerous irregular heartbeat in a fellow airplane passenger at 30,000 feet.

And the University of California, San Francisco, hopes to enroll a staggering 1 million people in its Health eHeart Study to see whether using mobile technology, including smart phone tracking of people's heart rate and blood pressure, could help treat and prevent cardiovascular disease.

The question: Do smart phone devices really work well enough for the average patient and primary care doctor to dive in, or are early adopters just going for the cool factor? Many of the tools cost $100 to $200. There's little public sales information yet and it's not clear how insurers will handle the fledgling trend.