Disputas: Haakon Karlsen

Graden avlegges ved  Høgskolen i Sørøst-Norge (HSN), Fakultet for teknologi, naturvitenskap og maritime fag.

Om avhandlingen

This work focused on developing a diaper assay compatible with commercially available diapers for automatic collection of urine and screening of urinary biomarkers, accompanied by a smartphone application for analysis of results.

The diaper assay absorbs urine, and isolates it from the environment. Reaction pads with colorimetric chemicals change color depending on the biomarker levels in the urine and preserves result for up to 8 hours.

The smartphone application functionality: 1) A photograph of the reaction colors, 2) detect alignment marks, 3) data extraction and 4) illumination and device independent classification of reaction colors according to a set of color references.

Persons of advanced age have higher risks of developing urinary tract infections than the general population, and increasingly so with declining levels of independence. Elderly patients in home care services are often incontinent and use adult diapers. The lack of control from incontinence combined with potentially declining cognitive abilities and strained human resources (number of visits and time per patient in the home care services) can make standard midstream clean-catch urine sampling slow and difficult. Urine samples can be collected with urinary catheters, but catheterization increases the risk of infection in addition to being uncomfortable. Empirical treatment with antibiotics without urine tests can lead to overuse of antibiotics.

The diaper assay and smartphone app gives home care nurses the opportunity to pre-screen urine tests to rule out negative samples, which do not require further analysis and instead focus on the samples that are likely positive. This pre-screening procedure has a potential to obtain results quicker, save time for the nurses, and prevent unnecessary catheterization, antibiotic treatment and laboratory analysis