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Biomedical Engineering

Lithium blood level analyser for patients with Bipolar Mood Disorder

Principle investigator

Professor P. A. Kyriacou

Co-investigators

Dr I. Triantis

Dr M. Hickey

Collaborator

Professor E. Palazidou, Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry

Project overview

Bipolar disorder is a serious life-long condition characterised by recurrent episodes of depressed and manic mood states. Lithium is the most effective and widely used medication for treating bipolar disorder, however, lithium concentrations require regular monitoring as it is only effective within a narrow therapeutic range, and at higher levels it has serious toxic effects which are potentially dangerous for patients. It is recognised in the UK lithium monitoring falls short of recommended standards and so, this projects aims to develop a low cost, personal, healthcare technology to monitor blood lithium levels at home using smart optical and/or electrical sensing technology.