Anemia or the red blood cell deficiency has often been taken for granted or even unrealized by the patients. No wonder the number of anemia patients in Indonesia is high, reaching the level of 30 – 55% of the total number of 500-600 million patients in the world. Anemia is commonly caused by the nutritional deficiency causing the abnormalhaemoglobin (Hb) level in the blood.
In fact, Hb plays an important role to take oxygen into human’s body. The anemia patients will loose their appetite, have some headaches and sluggish feeling as well asdecrease the productivity to the level of 20%. The fact is anemia also affects the IQ of kids. Even, anemia is dangerous for pregrant mothers and can cause the death after birth.
o the present time, the Hb level test is conducted invasively, i.e. taking the blood sample by hurting a body part. In fact, there is another way to check the Hb level without hurting the body. One of the methods is by checking the condition of the lower eyelid (conjunctive). Therefore the researchers of Telkom University (Tel-U) try to develop a product to measure the Hb level by processing the digital image of conjunctive integrated to smartphone. This study is conducted since 2015 through different schemes that the last scheme was conducted through Prospective Technology Based Start-Up(Calon Perusahaan Pemula Berbasis Teknologi, CPPBT) scheme research 2017 funded by the Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education (Kementerian Riset Teknologi dan Pendidikan Tinggi, Kemenristekdikti).
The product resulted from the research is an application called as Hbey which is recently available in android appstore and can be freely download. The development of Hbey application can be divided into different research steps including the test, data validation and analysis as well as the packaging process of the application to be then accessed by the application users.
Hbey is a research work product involving a number of lecturers from thegroup of expertiseof Information Signal Processing of the School of Electrical Engineering (Fakultas Teknik Elektro) and the students of IMV (Image Processing and Computer Vision) laboratory research program.
Hbey designatedly offers two main advantages including convenience and accessibility. Hbey is an application easily used by different parties used to use android based smartphone with camera feature inside. Besides, Hbey is easily operated since the features are designed to be user friendly and it can be used whenever wherever. It is not only the accessibility offered by Hbey, but also the convenience in using it. It is convenient since it does not cause any injury in any parts of body.
Hbey has been listed in copy right ownersat the Ministry of Law and Human Rights (Kementerian Hukum dan HAM, Kemenkumham) on October 12, 2016 by the record number of 084476.
However, the researchers also admitted that though it offers some advantages, Hbey willlikely not be able to replace the Hb test result obtained from the blood test yet, particularly in terms of accuracy. Hbey has the accuracy tolerance of 2% compared to thatof image scanning via smartphone under a certain conditions. Hbey can be used as an early warning towards one’s health condition, i.e. from the level of haemoglobin.
Dreaming of Having a Healthier Indonesia
Research development towards Hbey continues to run and it is hoped that the development can give some contribution towards a healthier Indonesia. The socialization on the application of Hbey
has been conducted by the research team, as joining different research product exhibitions, cooperating with a number of mass media as well as holding a direct socialization to the public and to different institutions. Hbey has been listed in copy right ownersat the Ministry of Law and Human Rights (Kementerian Hukum dan HAM, Kemenkumham) on October 12, 2016
