Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the healthiest of them all? In a twist on the old Snow White fable, NuraLogix’s new Anura MagicMirror is a 21-inch tabletop mirror that uses “Affective AI” to analyze facial blood flow information to assess a host of vital signs and disease risks. Meant to be used at locations varying from gyms to doctor’s offices, the Anura MagicMirror conducts its analysis with a 30-second scan of a user’s face using patented transdermal optical imaging (TDO), a technology the company describes as a novel form of remote photoplethysmography. The data is sent to a cloud-based “DeepAffex” platform which uses AI and machine learning to calculate over 100 health parameters. These include everything from blood pressure to heart rates to facial skin age as well as metabolic health risks like stroke and diabetes. Also included are mental health indicators for anxiety, stress and depression.
The Magic Mirror is perhaps the most eye-catching of all the new devices at this week’s tech event, CES 2024, that utilize AI as a medical assistant for health and wellness and as an aid for medical technology. Many of the new AI devices target specific areas of interest. A good night’s sleep is elusive for many. The $8,250 DeRucci T11 smart mattress employs 23 flexible sleep/health AI sensors to track subtle body movements, body temperature and heart rate (even for a pair of sleepers) so that a ChatGPT-style advisor can make better sleep suggestions, conduct snoring interventions, identify potential health risks and even warm your feet on cold days. TipTraQ, from a company called PranaQ founded by a sleep apnea sufferer, is a sensor that wraps around your finger to collect sleep-related data which is analyzed by AI algorithms to produce sleep coaching advice.
One rising area of broad concern is the monitoring of seniors. One clever solution comes from French startup Zoe Care that makes a fall detector that plugs into a wall socket. Zoe Care uses AI to analyze variations in home WiFi signals to precisely identify a person’s movement and send alerts to a mobile app, eliminating the need for seniors to remember to wear monitors.
At the opposite end of the age spectrum, AI is being used to figure out what a baby wants when it cries. The Maxi Cosi See Pro baby monitor comes from Switzerland’s Zoundstream. The AI Cry Analysis is embedded into the baby monitor and is designed to help parents respond more quickly and accurately to a baby’s needs.
Many new AI medical and wellness devices focus on a specific area of interest. Guidi, for example, is an AI smart belt that can be used by the visually impaired for navigation via combination of cameras, sensors, haptic feedback, voice commands and edge AI analysis.
France’s Glasaaster aims to make homework easier for children with dyslexia by using AI to quickly create a cognitive profile of the student and identify their particular dyslexia disorder. Glaaster then uses a smartphone photo of the text to make changes to things like spacing and fonts that make comprehension easier.
The use of AI to monitor health and wellness isn’t just for humans. Invoxia’s Minitailz Smart Pet Tracker uses AI to track biometric data in cats and dogs to monitor cardio-pulmonary data, stress, aging and pathologies collected from a wearable tag. The device also tracks locations and daily activities of these pets. The reports are presented to pet owners using conversational generative AI. Now you’ll know what that barking was all about.
