Tag Archives: medicine

28 December 2022
3 Comments
AI

Telesurgery. Worthwhile or dangerous?

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Would you ever believe that surgeons will be able to operate on a patient even though they are 400 km away? That is exactly what telesurgery can allow. It is an innovative surgical tool that connects patients and surgeons who are geographically distant. The surgeon observes the surgical area on the screen and uses a haptic arm to move the robotic arm during the operation.

On the one hand, there are many benefits of telesurgery in comparison to conventional surgical methods. First and foremost, telesurgery is an excellent solution for those who for some reason can not travel to get medical care. Not only financial constraints but also travel-related health issues can pose a problem for some people. Secondly, it enables surgery through smaller incisions and its robotic arms are able to reach hard-to-access areas in the body. It also eliminates a surgeon’s possible tremor resulting in improved surgical accuracy. Consequently, the risk of damaging surrounding structures, the risk of blood loss, and the risk of infection are alleviated. Aside from this, telesurgery gives surgeons from different centres an opportunity to collaborate and operate on a patient simultaneously. 

On the other hand, there are some issues in the field of telerobotic surgery. Firstly, a time lag is considered to be a major drawback while using telesurgery. It was determined that a time delay of more than 2 seconds can be a threat. Secondly, being operated on by a surgeon, a patient has never met face-to-face, can cause distrust and anxiety. And finally, a researcher at Obuda University in Budapest who studies space telesurgery, Tamas Haidegger, noted that despite having a master surgical plan, things can go wrong. For example, blood circulation can collapse, or there is an unforeseen reaction to certain drugs. That is why there is still a necessity to have a trained surgeon on-site. Nonetheless, he believes that soon robots will be augmented with artificial intelligence and will be able to go into autopilot mode. It would be a significant breakthrough in human history! 

Having considered all possible pros and cons of telesurgery, in my opinion, the technology is worth being widely embedded. I would agree that it can scare some people that a robot is performing an operation. However, in reality, surgeons are in full control of the machine at all times and the robot’s movements are far more precise. 

https://www.cureus.com/articles/54068-telesurgery-and-robotics-an-improved-and-efficient-era

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20140516-i-operate-on-people-400km-away

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/treatments/22178-robotic-surgery

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zdnet.com%2Farticle%2Fsurgery-digitized-telesurgery-becoming-a-reality%2F&psig=AOvVaw24ZZag0koxCxL8Q79N4bMp&ust=1672333433108000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CBAQjRxqFwoTCIjfz9PlnPwCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAj

Tagged , ,
15 December 2022
3 Comments
AI

AI in medicine

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Artificial intelligence has a wide range of use in every industry that we can think off. It is meant to make people’s work more efficient and more accurate. But the biggest advantage of using this algorithms is that they can conduct hard and time consuming tasks with the imperceptible margin of error.

But how AI is used in medicine?

Thanks to AI algorithms and machine learning models there are a lot of possibilities in which professionals are able to use them. Currently the most common roles of AI in this field are supporting clinical decisions and imaging analysis. The idea of clinical decision programs is to help specialist make decisions about the treatment, medications and other things that patients need. Whereas the imaging analysis is intended to analyse X-rays scans and many others to provide the information faster and more accurate. It also speeds up some process considering developing new medicine.

Recent Applications of AI in Medicine

1.Diagnose Diseases

The diagnosis part of treatment is the most crucial one. It takes years of medical training to do them correctly. What’s more it is time-consuming process, which might directly influence patients that are waiting for the treatment. That why machine learning is particularly helpful in this area. However not all diseases can be diagnosed by machines, because lack of digitalized data. Luckily there are few that AI and doctors decided to start with, here are some examples:

2.Personalized treatment

There are many different patients and they respond differently to drugs and the ways of treatment. Actually it’s not an easy task to decide what medicine will work the best in your scenario. So that specialist came up with an idea of personalized treatment method. They use the machine learning algorithms to automate the process of discovering characteristic that a specific patient will have a good response to a particular treatment. The system learns this by cross-referencing similar cases with the outcome of the treatment. It all makes much more easier work for doctors.

3. Remote medicine

Ai in this industry isn’t only meant for doctors and specialists. It is also deployed for patients directly. Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic there has been a significant growth of Ai chatbots in hospitals and small clinics to help patients recognize their health problems. They have also significantly reduced challenges people had to overcome while searching for help.

There are also applications in which you can define what are your symptoms and the algorithm will automatically say what disease are you struggling with. It will also advise you to go to see the doctor if necessary. It was especially useful during pandemic to reduce number of patients coming for appointments.

Video:

To sum up, Ai is already helping us in many aspects of medicine. There are lot more things that it optimizes and helps with. But it is just the beginning , the more we digitize medical data the more we can use AI to search new patterns. It surely is the future of our Medicine.

If you want to learn something more I advise you watching the video below. Let me know what do you think about such algorithms.

Sources:

IBM: https://www.ibm.com/topics/artificial-intelligence-medicine

Data revenue: https://www.datarevenue.com/en-blog/artificial-intelligence-in-medicine

Tagged , , ,
5 December 2022
Leave a comment
Business

‘Fake it, till you make it’ – end of Elizabeth Holmes saga.

Reading Time: 3 minutes
Elizabeth Holmes Appeals Theranos Fraud Conviction, Prison Term - Bloomberg

In 2013 the whole world was astonished by the revolutionary idea of 30-year-old entrepreneur Elizabeth Holmes, which would have started a new era of blood testings.

‘Edison’ – the machine of the future: compact, cheap, and paramount, with no more need for intravenous blood tests. It would allow the prevention of earnest diseases like cancer with a diminutive drop of vital fluid. Those promises were made by Elizabeth Holmes to investors that subsequently poured a fortune into Theranos (the company founded by her in 2003). Initial funding was raised by using family connections, accounted around $6 million.

In mid-2014 and the beginning of 2015, the net worth of the company was gradually raising, and reached the point of approximately $9 Billion, with Rupert Murdoch holding the biggest amount of shares worth $125 million.

The amount of money invested helped Elizabeth with vast success, by storming Silicon Valley with Theranos, she became the first female self-made billionaire in the USA with a net worth of $4.5 million.

What could have gone wrong?

WSJ investigative journalist John Carreyrou on Recode Decode: transcript - Vox

In 2015 John Carreyrou, a journalist from Wall Street Journal, started his investigation after a tip-off from a skeptical pathologist. Not long time after this, all popular newspapers were full of controversial headlines.

The revolutionary idea was extraordinary fraud! The results of tests taken by the machine were misleading and in most cases not correct. Theranos’ invention simply did not exist.

‘It was not just business or corporate fraud, it is the one that had big implications for public health”,- John Carreyrou said.

After the investigation started in 2015, within a year Elizabeth Holmes was disclosed as a fake. By the end of 2018, the company felt apart.

In July 2018, she was charged with two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and ten counts of wire fraud. She was facing a maximum of 20 years in prison and a fine of $250 000.

However, the trial was not as smooth as it was expected, firstly it was delayed because of the pandemic of COVID-19, and this allowed Elizabeth Holmes to continue her game. In March 2021, the prosecutor received unexpected news that the defendant is 5-month pregnant. This led to even bigger delays.

“Being a new mother can only help get her sympathy from jurors,” – said Danny Cevallos, NBC News legal analyst.

However, the jury convicted E. Holmes of the investor wire fraud conspiracy count and three counts of actual fraud in connection with a scheme to defraud investors, with the wire transfer of approximately $140 million. Only on November 19, 2022, Elizabeth Holmes’ trial was finally settled, and as a result of it she was plead guilty and was sentenced to 11 years and 3 months in a prison.

This puts a bold period at the end of the Elizabeth Holmes saga and shows society, the danger of Silicon Valley culture that allows fraudsters to have an influential and leading voice.

To read more about the lates update of the court process:

https://www.ft.com/content/3ab080c9-c13d-40b3-a697-9c58fd9e218c

To read more about the trial itself:

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndca/pr/theranos-founder-elizabeth-holmes-found-guilty-investor-fraud

Tagged , ,
25 October 2022
1 Comment
AI, Devices

AI in medicine: the device with the help of the retina of the eye can predict the risk of heart disease

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Artificial intelligence has made our lives much easier since its inception. In the real world, everything is so connected with new technologies that it is simply impossible to imagine life without AI. And without any doubt, the contribution of technology to the field of medicine is the most important.

So, the issue of my talk, as it is easy to guess by the heading, is the contribution of AI to medicine.

A specially developed device in the future will be able to detect and predict the risks of heart disease. According to the British Journal of Ophthalmology,  it soon will be quite possible to produce special cardiovascular screenings. In just 1 minute patients will be able to learn about the risks of heart disease. There will be no need to conduct any additional blood tests and similar frauds. Everything will be reduced to the greatest efficiency and the minimum time. This is how artificial intelligence works!

Personally, I think it’s a very cool idea. Firstly, nowadays cardiovascular diseases are very common. This is a real problem not only for older people. In addition, that’s a common fact that after the Covid-19 many people began to have heart problems. It turns out that there have become more issues concerning health.

The task of scientists is to save human lives. In many cases, medical care for late detection of the disease is already ineffective. And nothing can be done! In addition, high-quality medical care is an expensive thing. As a result, poor people do not get the necessary medical examinations. A very good thing about this new tool is that the inventors talk about its cheapness. I believe that quality medicine should be available to all segments of society, regardless of wealth.

The tool studies the blood vessels that are located in the retina of the eye. The tool takes into account various changes, makes all kinds of measurements. It turns out that blood vessels in retina and heart are closely connected, which provides a special opportunity to determine the state of the heart and even predict all sorts of risks through the retina.

Of course, this is very convenient. Any analyses require time, specified conditions, reagents or equipment. It seems to me that using this software will require less resources and human’s participation.

After all, I think it’s a wonderful invention. So far, of course, this is just an idea, confirmed by several studies. It will be quite difficult to transfer the code to real medicine. But still, artificial intelligence plays for the benefit of humanity and this is wonderful.

Sources:

AI eye checks can predict heart disease risk in less than minute, finds study | Heart disease | The Guardian

AI can identify heart disease from an eye scan | University of Leeds

Tagged , ,
18 April 2021
Leave a comment
Bez kategorii

Lifestyle Medicine

Reading Time: 3 minutes

It is a concept that puts one’s health at the center of day-to-day activities.

Lifestyle
For an average European, the most iconic is an Italian lifestyle where you drink espresso and smoke a cigarette while vividly talking to your comrades. However, each country or even region got some original lifestyle, a mixture of various influences. All of them have a central point around which all of the other activities are orbiting. For thousands of years, it was food. Growing it, preparing, eating, and the loop goes on. The prioritization applied by our ancestors was smart and reasonable. However, in the 21st century, in most developing and developed countries, food is no longer a central point.

Medicine
We are full, we are warm, and we are sick. Not even to mention the last case of increased virus infections worldwide. In short chronic diseases are the plague of modern societies. Earlier mentioned central point of life has turned to one’s health management. People live longer does not necessarily mean that people are, on average, more satisfied with their lives. On the one hand, medicine increased life expectancy by applying advanced treatment methods to fight the disease. On the other hand, improving quality of life after diagnosis was not a case of medical research, and a similar situation happened to preventive medicine.

Photo by Daniel Korpai on Unsplash

Lifestyle Medicine
Here is where lifestyle medicine enters as the bridge between lifestyle and disease treatment. It focuses on preventing diseases and fast reactions to any early symptoms. It consists of the four pillars: stress management, physical activity, relationships, nutrition.

The concept is relatively new both among the patients and health care professionals. However, there already exists an American College of Lifestyle Medicine, which is primarily an educational organization. Web analytics indicate that it is the most viewed one in this matter. It plays the central role of medical lifestyle topics on the web, with 10 thousand visitors a month. As we can see, the statistics for ACLM are impressive considering its yet short existence. The area that lifestyle medicine touches upon is yet to discover and learn more. “All of the diseases we worry about in our patients, ourselves or family members result from lifestyle-related behaviors that we often don’t talk about” says Sarah Keyes, a certified lifestyle medicine professional at Baylor College of Medicine.

The role of LM in chronic disease prevention and treatment is promising as “Lifestyle medicine approaches medical care of chronic non-communicable diseases from a new dimension,” says Dr. Vernes, who sees a big future in LM as a key to the patient-centric relationship between patients and doctors.

Lifestyle medicine is the concept present for decades and already know as the so-called healthy lifestyle. Hence, it is not new, but it has scientific support this time. Its wide adoption is in the good interest of many sides. Governments see it as a key to a healthy population, which will live long enough to fulfill tax-based strategies. Pharmaceutical corporations support the trend and already establish grants for studies in this area. All that seems like a very slow-growing turning point, which will change healthcare for the better.

Sources:

https://medicalfuturist.com/lifestyle-medicine-could-be-the-key-for-digital-health-adoption/

https://www.lifestylemedicine.org/ACLM/Lifestyle_Medicine/Research/ACLM/About/What_is_Lifestyle_Medicine_/LM_Research.aspx?hkey=dde46b29-faec-459b-b719-6432ad5172d0

https://blogs.bcm.edu/topics/momentum/

Tagged , ,
16 November 2020
Leave a comment
Bez kategorii

Medical Augmented Reality

Reading Time: 2 minutesAugmented reality in medicine is a great opportunity to expand the range of possibilities for doctors. With this technology in medicine, the success of an operation can rise exponentially. Also, using AR doctors can avoid further complications for patients.

How does it work?

During the operation, different tools are implanted, and then you can see the 3d organ on the screen. AR facilities offer diagnostic imaging data and other patient knowledge superimposed on the operation area in the most visible manner during the treatment process. In addition, AR-assisted navigation systems will minimize the risk of injuries and improve clinical safety and accuracy, educate tomorrow’s surgeons to learn vital skills in AR education courses, and help patients to recover more quickly from operations through AR recovery techniques. But augmented reality is not the only one, that helps doctors and patients during the treatment – also there is a virtual reality. It’s often used for people with cancer. During chemotherapy, people sit in virtual reality glasses and it helps them cope with pain.

I can’t say that I think this idea is totally cool, so it’s easier to write down the pros and cons that I think are important:

Advantages of AR&VR:

  • Operation accuracy increases
  • It is possible to avoid complications
  • Some patients can avoid the pain
  • New features

Disadvantages of AR&VR:

  • Now it’s not developed enough
  • The major part of patients are not sure in a truthfulness of this technology
  • Few doctors can use such technologies (and a lot of money will be spent on trainings)

I think it’s a great technology in medicine. Yes, I can say that I am not particularly agree with all of this (I’ve given my arguments above). And if we say that this is going to help to take another step in the evolution of medicine, I will totally agree. Personally, I think that we should use these technologies and know that they exist.

 

https://www.medicalaugmentedreality.org

Tagged ,
2 November 2020
2 Comments
Bez kategorii

Innovations That Will Change Health Care and Medicine in the 2020s

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Charles Taylor: 3-D digital hearts

HeartFlow has developed technology to help clinicians diagnose coronary heart disease. In order to generate a personalized, digital 3D model of the patient’s coronary arteries, the HeartFlow Analysis uses deep learning first, using data from a typical cardiac CTA scan. HeartFlow then applies computational fluid dynamics and sophisticated algorithms to the model to quantify the effects of blockages on blood flow. This study will help clinicians diagnose CHD and improve the app.

https://www.heartflow.com

 

Thomas Reardon: A wristband that can read your mind

The technology could open up new forms of rehabilitation and access for patients recovering from:

  • a stroke
  • or amputation,
  • as well as those with Parkinson’s disease
  • multiple sclerosis
  • and other neuro degenerative conditions!

A guy wearing what looks like a chunky black wristwatch stares in front of him at a tiny robotic dinosaur jumping over barriers on a computer screen. The man’s hands are motionless, but with his brain, he controls the dinosaur. The unit on his wrist is the CTRL package, which senses the motor neurons’ electrical impulses that travel down the muscles of the arm and to the hand almost as soon as a person thinks of a specific movement.

https://www.ctrl-labs.com

 

Jonathan Rothberg: An ultrasound in your pocket

The Butterfly iQ is the first all-body ultrasound device ever to be handheld. It replaces costly and fragile piezo crystals used with a single silicon chip in conventional systems. To capture precise imaging depths and frequencies to view different parts of the entire body, the chip can emit all three types of ultrasonic waves required.

Butterfly uses an app for smartphones that provides real-time AI analysis and ultrasound imaging. Butterfly iQ allows ultrasound healthcare practitioners to help detect and treat discovered diseases. Users will have access to a HIPAA-compliant cloud network that links healthcare professionals from around the world in order to receive up-to – date diagnoses and shared insights into complex diseases.

https://www.butterflynetwork.com/press-releases/butterfly-ce-mark

 

So, in my opinion, new medicine will give us a lot of opportunities to live healthy and active life using innovational technologies.

Here you can read more about other technologies in medicine:

https://time.com/5710295/top-health-innovations/

 

Tagged
10 November 2019
Leave a comment
Bez kategorii

To disrupt the way health is monitored

Reading Time: 3 minutesAfter battling it out on Centre Stage, the audience cast their final votes. A moment of waiting and… we have it! Congratulations to Nutrix, who were crowned on Centre Stage at Web Summit 2019 tech conference this week, for their innovative solution to measuring glucose in the blood without needles.

Maria Hahn, CEO & Founder of Nutrix, receiving the main prize at Web Summit 2019
Source: https://portugalinews.eu/web-summit-announces-nutrix-as-pitch-winner/

 

Diabetes prevalence

Firstly, we will look at the data. It is estimated that 415 million people are living with diabetes in the world, which is estimated to be 1 in 11 of the world’s adult population. 46% of people with diabetes are undiagnosed. The forecast is as follows: the figure is expected to rise to 642 million people living with diabetes worldwide by 2040.

 

Nutrix’s vision

This year’s winner of Web Summit PITCH, powered by Siemens is going to disrupt the way health is monitored. Today it is only when you are unwell that you get the information from your doctor. Nutrix wants to give the people a chance to monitor this before.

Nutrix
Source: https://nutrix.tech/

 

Future of glucose monitoring

Currently, Nutrix is developing a high tech nanosensor that is placed on the tooth which detects glucose level in the saliva and transfers information to an external app. Nutrix is invisible, non-invasive, and patient-friendly. Additionally, it will track food intake and provide valuable information for the patient and artificial pancreas algorithms.

Nutrix’s nanosensor technology
Source: https://nutrix.tech/

 

Progress and development

Nutrix is being incubated at University Children’s Hospital Basel and developed at CSEM lab a private, non-profit Swiss research and technology organization.

 

Advantages

It is not the mere fact of monitoring blood glucose that arouses the greatest enthusiasm. It turns out that you can control the level of other chemicals in the same way. The technology proposed by the startup becomes useful not only for people who are sick and their lives depend on the level of specific substances in the blood. It is also an effective way to control the compounds consumed every day.

Correct blood sugar is important not just for diabetics. Fluctuations in blood sugar levels can contribute to weight gain and fat deposits all over the body. Therefore, it is a mistake to think that glucose levels should be controlled only by those who have diabetes.

So we get to the point where we can confidently say that the use of Nutrix is ​​an effective way to prevent civilization diseases.

Finally, Nutrix has a long-term vision that goes further than just glucose. This is their current focus, but ultimately the company wants to go into how to monitor the reaction of the immune system.

 

Diabetes and the environment

There are more advantages. Blood glucose test strips are the basic equipment of every diabetic. The strips are used for self-monitoring of blood glucose. They are used once and then discarded.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, lancets are medical wastes called sharps. Sharps can be dangerous to that handling garbage if they are thrown in the regular trash. What is more, many people do not pay attention to the safe disposal of their medical waste. The use of a nanosensor eliminates the need for strips and reduces harmful effects on the environment.

 

Cost-effectiveness

An additional advantage of eliminating the need to use measuring instruments is not only the reduction of harmful effects on the environment. The less intrusive (read needleless) device will be sold at half the price of existing devices.

Invisible, non-invasive, patient-friendly. Good for the Earth and still less costly. There is nothing else to do but observe how Nutrix revolutionizes medicine. Soon, checking how many chemicals you ate during the day will be a matter of opening the app.

Can you imagine all of that data on your mobile device’s screen without the need of doing blood tests?

 

References:

[1] https://portugalinews.eu/web-summit-announces-nutrix-as-pitch-winner/

[2] https://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes-prevalence.html

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diabetes

[4] https://nutrix.tech/

[5] https://www.eu-startups.com/2019/11/nutrix-glycose-level-measurement-device-wins-pitch-competition-at-web-summit-2019/

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glucose_meter

[7] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK115277/

Tagged , , , , , , ,
10 February 2019
1 Comment
Bez kategorii

Smart pills to help diabetics?

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Scientists from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Novo Nordisk collaborate on creating a new kind of drug which aim is to make diabetics’ lives easier and less painful.

Nowadays people suffering from diabetes have to inject insulin multiple times per day to maintain a proper blood glucose level. For the last 100 years scientists tried to find a way to make insulin possible to be taken orally, which is quite a challenge, because many pharmaceutical compounds can’t survive the stomach’s harsh, acidic environment.

The new device created by previously mentioned scientists is about to finally allow diabetics to put injections off and make the whole process a lot easier. The smart pill works by attaching itself to the inside of the stomach and then injecting a payload through the gastric wall. Once the sugar glass that surrounds it is dissolved by acid in the stomach a tiny needle is released and a patient gets a proper dose of insulin.

The current injection is not the most comfortable process because of the pain related to inserting the needle into veins, right? Taking this smart pill orally means the injection will be done inside your stomach, which exactly means that you will not feel any pain. Why? According to Robert Langer, coauthor of the whole project, there are no pain receptors within the gastrointestinal tract.

Leopard Tortoise (Geochelone pardalis), Kruger National Park, South Africa

Moreover, the shape of the pill is inspired by the shape of a leopard tortoise’s shell, which automatically self-rights no matter how it lands – that kind of structure ensures that the device will attach to the gastric wall every time. It’s worth noting that the whole project is still at the proof-of-concept stage and has only been tested in animals, so the device won’t be available in the nearest future.

So, what are your thoughts on this topic? Do you think that in the futue smart pills will be a common thing? Let me know down below!

 

Sources:

https://www.technologyreview.com/the-download/612917/smart-pills-filled-with-tiny-needles-could-inject-medicine-directly-into-your/

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/02/pills-armed-tiny-needles-could-inject-insulin-other-important-meds-directly-stomach?r3f_986=https://www.google.com/

 

Tagged , , , , ,
18 December 2018
3 Comments
Bez kategorii

LONGEVITY CLOSER THEN WE THINK?

Reading Time: 3 minutesHumans are thinking about immortality since the dawn of time. Thanks to the current progress in technology we are witnessing a discovery that potentially could rewrite our lives. Senolytics are new class of drugs which may provide us with a better, healthier lives.

Judith Campisi is a professor at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging in Novato, California, and cofounder of a company called Unity Biotechnology in 2011. She is known as a leading figure in the biology of ageing since the early 1990s, when her research revealed that cells enter a phase known as senescence that prevents them from becoming cancerous.

Her research is currently focused on the role of cellular senescence in cancer and other age-related diseases. So, what cellular senescence basically means? According to Wikipedia, it is „one phenomenon by which normal cells cease to divide”. In 1960’s, Leonard Hayflick and Paul Moorhead found out that normal human fetal fibroblasts in culture reach a maximum of approximately 50 cell population doublings before becoming senescent. This phenomenon was called Hayflick limit and is known or overturning a 60-year-old dogma which maintained that all cultured cells are immortal.

It is worth noting that senescent cells in some point come to the kind of twilight state where they are still active but no longer dividing. Campisi’s and other scientists’ researches showed that this was a ‘strategy’ of the evolution process to derail incipient cancer cells, which are known to spread thanks to the cells division.

(PRNewsFoto/UNITY Biotechnology)

Now, Campisi is conducting researches on new class of drugs called senolytics, which eliminate senescent cells and restore more youthful characteristics (in animal experiments). The company called Unity Biotechnology, which she cofounded in 2011, launched a human trial of its first senolytic drug last July.

This actions can cause a moral dilemma whether we should live longer than we already do. Campisi points out that we should not confuse aging and death. She expects that, thanks to senolytics, we will be able to extend our “health span”, which basically means that there is a possibility that we will extend the duration of good health condition of our bodies while living the same amount of time as we currently do.

Today we can observe a debate about the limit to the human life span. Some say it can be 110 years, others claims it to be 150 years. Speaking of this case, Campisi provides us with examples such as world record for extending the life span of a little worm called C. elegans, which is 10-fold. On the other hand, most of the really intensive experiences extend mouse life span (which is about 97% genetically identical to human being) by 20-30%. In the end we just simply do not know what the maximum life span of human being, but there is a possibility that we can extend it even more than we already did, for example thanks to the discovery of vaccines.

 

So, what are your expressions on this topic? Would you like to live longer? Why? Or why not? Would you like to extend your “health span” or you believe that ageing is a necessary part of our lives? Let me know in the comment section!

 

Sources:

https://www.wikipedia.org

https://www.technologyreview.com

Tagged , , ,
← Older posts
Newer posts →