A software to detect diabetes

A software to predict the probability of a person turning diabetic later in life may be around the corner, thanks to Indian scientists who have taken up the challenge.

When ready, the software would aid the doctors to inform their patients if medication and life-style modifications are working on them or more changes are required in the treatment regimen.

After figuring out the fundamentals needed to create the software, Translational Health Science and Technology Institute (THSTI) on Wednesday signed an agreement with Hyderabad-based Revelations Biotech Pvt Ltd that would do the computational analysis and undertake product development. “The first software should be ready within the next two years. But it would require improvement and refinement with more patient data, before the product is ready for the market,” Kanury V S Rao who heads the drug discovery research centre at the THSTI said.Going by the World Health Organisation estimates, India houses more than 60 million diabetic patients, whose numbers are likely to shoot up to more than 100 million in the next 15 years. 

The artificial intelligence-based software that the scientists seek to develop would not only identify the individuals who are prediabetic, but also predict the future course of the disease in those, who are already afflicted.