來自科幻世界的醫療利器

????如果一切都在新創企業Scanadu掌握，未來不會出現機器人醫生。雖然醫療設備變得越來越高科技，但位于加州山景城的Scanadu還是希望未來的醫療活動仍然由人類來掌控。

????這家公司希望自己能脫穎而出，率先開發出能掃描病人身體并得到醫學診斷數據的設備。該設備可謂醫療設計領域的“三錄儀”，是健康工程領域夢寐以求的終極目標之一?！尽缎请H迷航》（Star Trek）的粉絲們肯定知道這個名字，它是這部科幻片中的一款設備，具備傳感掃描、記錄和分析數據等功能。】多年來，工程師們一直對這樣的設備津津樂道，不過自去年五月以來，各廠商間的競爭陡然加劇。原因是，位于南加州的公益基金X Prize和高通（Qualcomm）合作宣布了一項競賽，將給予率先研發出該設備的團隊1,000萬美元獎勵。

????無處不在的智能手機，飛速發展的人工智能和云計算，這一切都讓三錄儀變得更加真實。X Prize首席執行官皮特?戴曼迪斯稱：“當我們意識到一項技術已經到了臨界點，我們就會啟動X-Prizes基金”（該機構過去舉辦的競賽曾誕生過第一架私人制造的宇宙飛船。）三錄儀競賽于上周在拉斯維加斯國際電子消費展（CES）上正式啟動。

????消費性健康產品的市場正日益成熟。去年第三季度，消費電子公司Jawbone發布了UP——一款能監控用戶日常活動的個人健康手環。不過這塊新開墾的市場顯然布滿了荊棘。Jawbone最近就宣布了一項“無條件退款”活動，以平息消費者的不滿。消費性健康產品市場非常前衛，目前還很難確定該前瞻性市場的價值，但調研機構Frost & Sullivan表示，醫療影像市場價值近60億美元。

????Scanadu（名字來自其首席執行官最喜愛的詩）對此胸有成竹，現在，它也加入了這場競爭激烈的競賽。其第一代產品計劃于2013年面世，具備一些基本功能。它內置溫度計，能夠根據醫學網站的信息給出建議，還擁有GPS功能，能將用戶導航至最近的醫院。用戶還能在脖子上帶上感應裝置，向這款產品發送生命體征信息。該產品還配有“高感光攝像頭”，意味著它能根據顏色生成可視化數據。德?布勞威爾表示，掃描肺癌病人可能會得到相同的顏色，而這款產品本質上就是分析各種模式。

????不過Scanadu對其產品升級版本的構想已相當明確。德?布勞威爾在該產品身后看到了一整套全新的醫療基礎設備。他表示，自己的產品將來會和OnStar服務有些類似，后者是通用汽車（General Motors）開發的一套系統，能在發生事故時為司機提供緊急救助服務。Scanadu的未來產品能收集病人的身體數據，然后像OnStar一樣，將病人帶到相關代理人的面前，他們會聯系醫生進行進一步診斷。雖然仍少不了醫生，但德?布勞威爾認為這能減少實體診所的數量。

????There will be no robot doctors in the future -- at least not if Scanadu can help it. Even as hospital rooms become more high tech, the Mountain View, CA-based startup wants to make sure the future of medicine remains a human-centered experience.

????The company is vying to be the first to create a device that can scan a patient's body and return a medical diagnosis. The device, known in medical design lore as the "tricorder," is one of the elusive holy grails of health engineering. (Star Trek geeks will recognize the name from the fictional device from the show used for sensor scanning, recording data, and analyzing it.) Engineers have been talking about such a device for years, but the race intensified last May, when the X Prize Foundation, a Southern California-based nonprofit, and Qualcomm (QCOM) announced a contest promising $10 million to the first team to create one.

????The ubiquity of smartphones, and rapid developments in artificial intelligence and cloud computing have turned the tricorder into more than a pipedream. "We launch X-Prizes when we think the technology is at a tipping point," says X Prize CEO Peter Diamandis. (One of the organization's past contests generated the first privately-built spacecraft.) This contest officially launched last week at the consumer electronics trade show CES.

????The market for consumer health products is beginning to ripen. This fall the consumer electronics firm Jawbone released UP, a personal medical bracelet that monitors the user's daily routines. But the untested market is rocky. Jawbone has recently started offering "no questions asked" discounts to unsatisfied customers. While numbers for the forward thinking market are hard to pin, the medical imaging market is worth almost $6 billion, according to analysts Frost & Sullivan.

????Scanadu -- the name comes from the CEO's favorite poem -- has its work cut out for it. The company is tackling the contest in waves. The first iteration of the product is expected in 2013 and will be basic, providing a thermometer, suggestions from medical websites, and GPS functions that can lead you to a nearby hospital. A neck patch worn by users gives the device information on vital signs. The product works with "hyperspectral camera" technology, meaning it organizes visual data by color. For example, says de Brouwer, the scans of people with lung cancer might show up the same color, and the device essentially analyzes the patterns.

????But the company already has a concrete vision for advanced versions. De Brouwer sees an entirely new medical infrastructure around the device in the future. He says it will look a bit like the OnStar service, a system from General Motors (GM) that helps drivers during road disasters. The device will collect internal information from a user who is ill, and, like OnStar, will send the user to a tracking agent, who can then connect to a doctor for the diagnosis. While this preserves the role of the doctor, it will eliminate the need for doctor's offices, says de Brouwer.