Digital Health Technologies Lab 

Digital Health Technologies will help us bridge the capabilities of health monitoring and medical devices for understanding our health far beyond the clinic

The DigiHealth Lab is founded by Professor Edward J. Wang as a joint research laboratory of UCSD Design Lab and the Electrical & Computer Engineering department of Jacobs School of Engineering. Our research focuses on developing new sensing techniques for monitoring a person's health more continuously, conveniently, and cheaply with the goal of ultimately bringing clinical sensing out of the clinic. I am actively creating new solutions in health monitoring with my expertise in mobile and embedded system prototyping, signal processing, machine learning, and a strong command of medical knowledge. We are transforming smartphones into medical devices without any hardware add-ons to screen for anemia, cognitive disfunctions, blood pressure, and even assisting in breastfeeding; developing novel wearable devices that continuously track health and user context; and exploring new ways to support health monitoring devices without batteries. The next generation of medical sensing needs to leave the confines of labs and clinics to be truly usable by everyone. This has to start at even the earliest prototypes, something we strive for in all of our work. Towards this goal, we have tested technologies in patient rooms, performed in-the-wild studies where users take our prototypes home, and even partnered with various NGOs to perform true user testing in places like the Peruvian jungle. 

Medical Domains: Geriatrics, Psychiatry, Pediatrics, Hematology, Cardiology, Neonatal Care, and more! Please reach out if you are a clinician looking to collaborate with technologists who are truly interested in developing usable health tech that pushes the boundary of healthcare. 

Technical Domains: Machine Learning, Neural Networks, Computer Vision & Pattern Recognition,  Edge Computation, Embedded Systems, Non-invasive Sensor Design

Featured

TEDx: What if we can live in a world where we can track our health like the way we do with the weather?

Research Talk: The Next Billion Medical Devices

News

Nov 2024 - Varun Viswanath successfully defends his PhD thesis. Congrats, Dr. Viswanath!

Oct 2024 - Colin Barry et al publishes latest findings on smartphone-based BP monitoring in Nature Scientific Reports. Technology licensed to Billion Labs Inc. 

Sept 2024 - Dr. Wang awarded NIH Trailblazer

June 2024 - Jessica de Souza is awarded the Merkin Fellowship and is going abroad to Sao Paulo in July to develop her work on AI for breastfeeding postpartum support.

June 2024 - Jessica de Souza publishes the latest findings on vision-based AI detection of breastfeeding complications at JMIR AI.

Sep 2023 - Yujia (Nancy) Liu and Ava Fascetti join the DigiHealth Lab. Welcome, Nancy and Ava!

May 2023 - Tom Xuan Publishes the latest findings on ultralow-cost blood pressure monitor at Scientific Reports.  News Coverage: CBS News, San Diego Union Tribune, Ars Technica

Apr 2023 - Dr. Wang gives invited lecture at CU Boulder ATLAS Institute.

Mar 2023 - Jessica de Souza publishes latest findings on technological opportunities in improving lactation consulting in Brazil at  Frontiers in Digital Health

Jan 2023 - Dr. Wang receives the Google Health Equity Research Initiative Award for the lab's work on remote lactation support technologies. 

Jan 2023 - Awarded NIA a2 Collective Pilot Award for work on Ultralow-cost Blood Pressure Monitoring

Dec 2022 - Dr. Wang and Colin Barry starts first DigiHealth Lab spinout company Billion Labs Inc. 

June 2022 - Colin Barry receives Norman Fund to attend 2022 HCIC Meeting on The Future of Health and Wellness Technologies

Apr 2022 - Barry et al. awarded CHI Best paper Honorable Mention for work on Smartphone Pupillometry for cognitive impairment monitoring

Apr 2022 - Dr. Wang receives the Google Research Scholar Award for early career faculty 

Oct 19 2021 - Awarded NIH R21 for work on Smartphone-based Alzheimer’s Screening

Jun 25 2021 - Colin Barry presents at Mobisys workshop on digital biomarkers (DigiBiom) on position paper on Tenets Towards Smartphone-based Medical Tricorder

Sept 2021 - Colin Barry and Yinan (Tom) Xuan join the DigiHealth Lab. Welcome, Colin and Tom!

Jul 29 2020 - Awarded ACTRI GEM prize for smartphone-based blood pressure monitoring

Jan 2020 - Jessica de Souza joins the DigiHealth Lab. Welcome, Jessica!

Sept 2020 - Varun Viswanath joins the DigiHealth Lab. Welcome Varun!

Publications

Development of a One Dollar Blood Pressure Monitor

Yinan (Tom) Xuan, Ava Fascetti, Colin Barry, and Edward Jay WangUbicomp 2024 Poster

Augmenting Telepostpartum Care With Vision-Based Detection of Breastfeeding-Related Conditions: Algorithm Development and Validation

Jessica De Souza,  Varun Kumar Viswanath,  Jessica Maria Echterhoff, Kristina Chamberlain, Edward Jay WangJMIR AI: June 26, 2024Media Coverage: UC San Diego Today

LCBuddy: Towards a Smartphone-based Self-Assessment Tool for Postpartum Patients With Breast Pain

Jessica De Souza, Kristina Chamberlain, Edward Jay WangCHI 2024 Late Breaking Work: May 11, 2024

Yinan (Tom) Xuan, Colin Barry, Nick Antipa, Edward Jay WangFrontiers in Digital Health: Nov 24, 2023

Yinan (Tom) Xuan, Colin Barry, Jessica de Souza, Jessica Wen, Nick Antipa, Alison Moore, and Edward Jay WangNature Scientific Reports: May 29, 2023Media Coverage: CBS News, SD Union Tribune, ARS Tecnica

Investigating Interactive Methods in Remote Chestfeeding Support for Lactation Consulting Professionals in Brazil

Jessica de Souza, Cinthia Calsinski, Kristina Chamberlain, Franceli Cibrian, and Edward Jay WangFrontiers in Digital Health: Apr 3, 2023

Smartphone Camera Oximetry in an Induced Hypoxemia Study

Jason S. Hoffman, Varun Viswanath, Xinyi Ding, Matthew J. Thompson, Eric C. Larson, Shwetak N. Patel, Edward Jay WangNature npj Digital Medicine : Sept 19, 2022Media Coverage: 

Colin Barry, Jessica de Souza, Yinan (Tom) Xuan, Jason Holden, Eric Granholm, Edward Jay WangCHI 2022: Apr 29, 2022Best Paper Honorable MentionMedia Coverage: The Verge

Jessica de Souza, Kristina Chamberlain, Sidhant Gupta, Yang Gao, Nabil Alshurafa, Edward Jay WangCHI 2022 Late Breaking Work: Apr 29, 2022

Detection of COVID-19 using multimodal data from a wearable device: Results from the first TemPredict Study

Ashley Mason, [...], Varun Viswanath, Edward Wang, et al.Nature Scientific Reports

PAR: Personal Activity Radius Camera View for Contextual Sensing

Jessica Echterhoff and Edward Jay WangArxiv

Alex Mariakakis, Edward J. Wang, Shwetak N. Patel. and Mayank GoelIEEE Pervasive Computing  2019Best Paper Runner Up

Edward J. Wang, Manuja Sharma, Yiran Zhao, and Shwetak N. Patel.ISWC 2018

Edward J. Wang, Junyi Zhu, Mohit Jain, Tien-Jui Lee, Elliot Saba, Lama Nachman, and Shwetak Patel. CHI 2018Best Paper Honorable Mention

Edward J. Wang, Jake Garrison, Eric Whitmire, Mayank Goel, and Shwetak PatelUIST 2017

Christian Holz and Edward J. Wang.Interactive Mobile, Wearable, and Ubiquitous Technologies (IMWUT) 1,3, Article 5 (September 2017)Distinguished Paper Award

Edward J. Wang, William Li, Doug Hawkins, Terry Gernsheimer, Colette Norby-Slycord, and Shwetak PatelUbicomp 2016Best Paper AwardMedia Coverage: Geekwire, MIT Tech Review, Endgadget

Edward J. Wang, Tien-Jui Lee, Alex Mariakakis, Mayank Goel, Sidhant Gupta, and Shwetak N. PatelUbicomp 2015Media Coverage: Geekwire