The problem that we are tackling with Brilliance is the fact that over six million babies requiring treatment for severe jaundice each year are not receiving the treatment they need. One of the main reasons for this is a lack of access to affordable devices that provide phototherapy, the standard treatment for severe jaundice. By introducing a low-cost, high-quality phototherapy device to the global market, we aim to increase the number of babies receiving treatment who otherwise would not have been treated effectively, and thereby, reduce the number of deaths and disabilities due to untreated severe jaundice.
Health sensing through smartphones has received considerable attention in recent years because of the devices’ ubiquity and promise to lower the barrier for tracking medical conditions. In this paper, we focus on using smartphones to monitor newborn jaundice, which manifests as a yellow discoloration of the skin. Although a degree of jaundice is common in healthy newborns, early detection of extreme jaundice is essential to prevent permanent brain damage or death. Current detection techniques, however, require clinical tests with blood samples or other specialized equipment. Consequently, newborns often depend on visual assessments of their skin color at home, which is known to be unreliable.
Sketch 1 - To explain the Idea
Sketch 2 - Concept Storyboard
