ResApp Health Limited, the developer of smartphone medical applications for the diagnosis and management of respiratory disease, has received institutional review board approval at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s Hospital for the SMARTCOUGH-C study. The IRB approval is the third for ResApp after similar approvals at Cleveland Clinic on Oct 21 and Massachusetts General Hospital on Nov 11.
SMARTCOUGH-C is a prospective, multi-site, double blind study that will evaluate the efficacy of the ResAppDx software application in the diagnosis of childhood pneumonia and other respiratory conditions from cough sounds.
The primary endpoints for the study will be the diagnosis of pneumonia with secondary endpoints being diagnosis of other common childhood respiratory diseases such as upper respiratory tract infection, croup, bronchiolitis and asthma. Today, respiratory disease diagnosis is based on a combination of auscultation, imaging and laboratory tests. An instant, accurate diagnostic test delivered via smartphone could greatly improve patient management, give greater access to healthcare and reduce costs.
Worldwide, pneumonia is the leading cause of death of children under five years of age and is the most common reason for US children to be hospitalized. The principal investigator at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s will be Dr. Esther Maria Sampayo, Assistant Professor of Pediatric Emergency Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine.
The details of the study will soon be published on the US National Institutes of Health clinical trials database at www.clinicaltrials.gov.
