Endiatx PillBot™ and future Endiatx products will be true telemedicine. They will dramatically increase access to care while simultaneously lowering costs and increasing doctors’ effectiveness.
Problem
Many of the 11,000 in the US and 800,000 globally who die from stomach cancer each year are diagnosed too late for doctors to save their lives. They don’t receive traditional upper endoscopy (EGD) because facilities and personnel are overbooked. By enabling telemedicine stomach cancer screening, even for people who don’t live near a hospital, PillBot™ will save lives at the same time that it eases burdens on facilities and allows GI doctors to treat more patients. PillBot™ will be a giant step in telemedicine, permitting equal access to lifesaving technology.
Solution
PillBot™ is the world’s first motorized pill camera for telemedicine. It replaces the upper endoscopy (EGD) by letting doctors have a quick look inside the stomach over a telemedicine call. Not much larger than a pistachio, PillBot™ uses pumpjet thrusters to maneuver like a multicopter drone. With no preparation other than skipping a meal and drinking regular water, the user swallows PillBot™ while awake. The remote physician steers PillBot™ in the patient’s stomach using a smartphone app. PillBot™ shuts down and then passes out of the body 6-24 hours later.
Site Visit by Nextbigfuture, Brian Wang
I saw the components like the tiny propellers used to move the Pillbot. It can be controlled by a smartphone app.
This first version is larger but has been swallowed by people. 10% of people are unable to swallow current Pill cameras that have no propulsion. It is expected that about 20% of people will be unable to swallow this current larger Pillbot.
However, those who can swallow it would not need to have anesthesia and the other complications and costs of Endoscopes.
Endiatx is nearing their first FDA pre-approvals. They will make future smaller versions of Pillbot and then make more features needed for surgery.
Endiatx PillBot™ will use the stomach as the beachhead for confirming the viability of robotics within the human body. PillBot™ will let patients anywhere across the globe receive immediate stomach diagnosis and screening via telemedicine calls.
Building on this revolutionary technological achievement, Endiatx will develop additional robotic devices with increasing features and miniaturization. Next will come PillSurgeon™, which will use the PillBot™ platform but add tools to remove polyps, cauterize bleeds, sample the microbiome, and collect biopsy.
Beyond this, Endiatx envisions a suite of robotic surgeons of ever-decreasing size and broadening scope of applications within the human body. One day an army of rice grain-size surgeons may remove your brain tumor while you go about your day as normal.
When two bicycle mechanics combined their gears and pedals with wood and canvas and experimented with airplanes in 1903, they likely didn’t imagine that 66 years later humans would walk on the moon. Who knows where the micro-robotics adventure will take us?
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.
I need a yearly and a half egd and before that a yearly but I have OeO, they also need to take samples. However if samples were not requiresd this is a big breaktrough, I dont really get the swallowing problem, the endoscope itself is as big as my pink finger, not the most pleasent day of the year I assure.
Half the size and then they will have something for the mass market.
Eh, I could swallow that with no trouble at the current size. I know my wife would have trouble with it, though. She can’t even get those fish oil capsules down.
If it’s small enough for half the population, that’s good enough, given that it would reduce the load on endoscopy clinics.
I agree with Jason, I can’t swallow big pills, a traditional Tylenol capsule is pretty much my limit…I think it’s a mental thing. So the smaller they can make it, the better.