IIn the 2016 film Passengers, the crew of a spaceship bound for a distant planet had access to a scanning camera known as Autodoc that could instantly diagnose their medical problems and even predict the time of their death.
I was reminded of this, and countless other science fiction plots, as I stripped off my robe and stepped half-naked into the glittering capsule of the Neko Body Scan. As Autodoc, he promises to make a complete examination of my health – inside and out – in a few minutes, and, although he is not able to estimate the timing of my death (yet ), can identify if they are at imminent or future risk of developing. some of the biggest killers and causes of chronic ill health.
Healthy as I can feel outside, the prospect of knowing if there is any misfortune hidden in my health horizon, feels too tempting to refuse. The pod doors closed, and a soothing female voice instructed me to close my eyes and stay still.
Neko is the brainchild of Spotify co-founder Daniel Ek, who hopes to achieve the same for health as he did for music: redesign the industry from scratch, starting with the technologies that exist today, rather than the junk of approaches on which it is based. for decades.
Co-founder and CEO of Neko, Hjalmar Nilsonne, said: “Since 70% of healthcare costs are related to chronic diseases, which are largely preventable or can be greatly delayed by early interventions, it seems quite obvious that the health system everyone really wants is a preventive that creates health, rather than being a dispenser of medicine for people who are already sick.
“The idea we had was very simple. We needed to create a new category of medical device that could collect people’s medical information at a very cheap price and conveniently, then we could start tracking them in time.”
Costing £299, a Neko scan incorporates high-resolution 2D and 3D photography, thermal imaging, then detailed cardiovascular measurements to map how the heart pumps and blood moves through arteries, veins and capillaries.
The patient’s grip strength and eye pressure are also measured, then a small sample of their blood is taken and sent via a vacuum tube to an upstairs laboratory for processing. Finally, these thousands of data points are crunched by artificial intelligence and delivered to an in-house GP, who makes the final health assessment and delivers it to the customer 15 minutes later.
In my case, the verdict was reassuring: my risk of cardiovascular disease and dozens of other relatively common diseases – including skin cancer, diabetes, immune system disorders, gout, the first signs of glaucoma and various skin conditions – is low. The only points of interest were a slightly elevated white blood cell count – possibly triggered by the cold that has since materialized – and only average grip strength for my age: a reminder that I should resume strength training after a summer off
Other customers were treated to a stronger awakening. According to data from Neko’s first year of operation in Stockholm, during which they scanned 2,707 people aged 22 to 75, 14% of individuals required further medical assistance or monitoring for conditions that the vast majority (90%) did not didn’t know they had. In 1% of cases, patients received potentially life-saving interventions for conditions such as aortic aneurysms and malignant melanomas.
“One gentleman had a cardiovascular anomaly that looked strange, so we booked an ultrasound with our sonographer, who confirmed there was a major anomaly,” Nilsonne said. “We sent the referral (to a cardiologist), and within two weeks, this gentleman had surgery. In the normal queue, he would have waited maybe six to nine months.
Professor Louise Thomas, the head of the Optimal Health Research Center at the University of Westminster, agreed that the potential for these types of scans was vast. “Early diagnosis of the disease is very important and could reduce the burden on the NHS,” he said.
“However, at this stage, it is difficult to assess its usefulness without having a complete understanding of its methodology, the way of analyzing the “scans”, and, most importantly, the depth, breadth and diversity of the datasets of training used for the generation of its AI models and algorithms”.
Professor Azeem Majeed, a GP and expert in primary care and public health at Imperial College London, said the Neko Body Scan was more technologically advanced, and included additional tests, compared to the NHS Health Check programme, which screens people aged between 40 and 74 years. for common disease risks.
However, Majeed said that “dealing with the rapid developments in private medical assessments will be a challenge for the NHS and it is essential that these assessments add value to people’s health and do not create additional work (or anxiety for customers ) without clear benefits.”
He added: “It is essential that Neko (and companies offering similar services) audit their results to see how much benefit they bring to customers.
“While Neko will provide initial feedback on test results, responsibility for ongoing care will largely be the responsibility of the NHS. This could potentially increase the workload for general practices and other parts of the NHS, particularly if patients have findings that ultimately do not require additional treatment.”
Nilsonne said Neko would only contact a patient’s GP once the firm’s in-house experts – which include cardiologists, dermatologists and sonographers – had carried out further investigations. “If a referral outside of the Neko system in the NHS is needed, the referral will include a level of detail that will make it immediately obvious how to prioritize that patient,” he said.