PONS The consumer ultrasound

The shift from in-hospital primary care to home hospital care has been gaining momentum. Today the healthcare system is too centralized, we are still focused on building large and expensive hospitals in city centers, and existing ultrasound systems ( even the new versions ) are that they still depend on a doctor to look at the image, analyze it and interpret it. 50% of the readmissions are happening because of not following discharge orders and regular visits after being released from the hospital. Especially people living in rural areas, low-income communities don't have access to regular visits or medical monitoring.  The result of those disconnections between the hospital and the field is every increasing health expense that could be prevented by decentralized medical imaging.

Sixty years after its first introduction into the professional medical domain, ultrasound imaging is now ready to enter the consumer market space so that ultrasound can be used at home, in pharmacies, ain nd mobile Medicare teams. PONS`s AI-driven mobile Ultrasound technology will allow for continuous monitoring of bodily functions, not only on the surface of the skin but also deep inside the body. PONS autonomously carries out the risk assessment of tissues, smart image processing, segmentation, and reporting of medical images to the doctor. By using PONS, doctors can monitor patients' complications anywhere and instantly Applications include risk assessment of critical health conditions like lung, liver, kidney, women's health conditions, bladder monitoring, and on-field injury monitoring. Shifting continuous medical care from the hospital to the home environment will help in reducing the increase in the cost of healthcare.

Our goal is 

"To improve access to healthcare and the quality of life for all, regardless of their location or income so that nobody loses their loved ones too early because of preventable diseases." 

For the first time, consumers will be able to carry out ultrasound scans at home without a doctor or technician on the side. PONS is a high-performance, professional ultrasound system in a compact, low-cost version for home use. It can scan organs and muscles; screen for bladder and cervix diseases; monitor sports or on-field injuries, and measure the development of embryo and fetus. PONS may also scan blood vessels; check the heart (especially in the elderly); help detect cavities or tooth problems; assess brain hemorrhage; detect cancers like lung cancer, breast cancer, liver cancer, and breast cancer (a light source is needed on this one); check drainage condition after mastectomy surgery, and monitor blood flow behind retina before cataract surgery

Doctors in remote locations like Rural India and Africa do not have access to modern medical technologies. They want to have a tool that can take ultrasound images without the need for a doctor's assistance. They want to use PONS AI software and their phone to take ultrasound images of their patients and receive reports on their health status. They want a system that can be used at home or in rural communities with limited access to decent health care.

Prof. Dr. Ilker Hacihaliloglu is the director of the Computer-Assisted Surgery and Therapy Laboratory (CompAST) at Rutgers University’s multidisciplinary research laboratory focusing on developing image-guided surgical systems. He has over 15 years of experience in computer-aided surgery and early diagnostics systems in orthopedics, internal medicine, and oncology fields.
Soner Hacıhaliloğlu,multi-time startup CEO founded deep-tech companies in different industries and has been working in Siemens Building Technologies for the last 15 years and was responsible for business development and strategy in emerging markets and the EU/MENA/US region.
 Our co-founder Asst.Prof.Dr. Ilker Haci has been developing Medtech for over 10 years at Rutgers. His research and development have been focused on integrating deep learning and AI algorithms into mobile ultrasound probes and make them intelligent and to be used outside the hospital as a point of diagnostics and monitoring systems.

Today, we need to democratize and decentralize the healthcare system especially primary care and monitoring in health care. Pre-hospital monitoring should be done anytime, anywhere, instantly, and should be accessible by everyone in order to prevent overcrowding of hospitals and save time.

In order to be able to do that we have to be close to key decision-makers and stakeholders in the healthcare system, the challenge can help us to access those people so that we can develop the technology further and provide the system to people and countries that need the most