Chris Van Hoof - imec / OnePlanet Research Center

Managing health instead of managing illness is a disruptive view of the future of healthcare: a focus on prediction, prevention or interception of disease rather than on disease management. This will require new sensing tools and digital twin models that provide individuals and their physicians/life coaches with detailed insights into their evolving health. 
 
As many chronic diseases are linked to diet, microbiome, or immune responses, we particularly need new tools to monitor mechanistic effects in the gastrointestinal tract and gut-brain interactions. While there are plenty of tools able to monitor sleep, heartrate, overall fitness, etc., a tool to track personal gut health is missing. The gastro-intestinal tract however is difficult to access. But what if we could really ‘Fitbit-ise’ gut health ? Meaning: what if we could create a device that makes gut health monitoring accessible to everyone, preventing GI-related problems to turn into serious diseases, and even diagnosing – in a very early stage – diseases such as Crohn’s’ and IBD ? imec is developing such new tools – ingestible sensors, enabling biochemical analysis, microbiome sampling for unprecedented insights in individual gut health, immune health, and mental health. And companion tools that provide insights in diet and eating behavior.  
 
To make the data from these new tools actionable, personalized digital twin models are needed. The human digital twin platform we are building is one that simulates one’s personal GI tract characteristics and digestion of specific foods, showcasing the relationship between lifestyle factors, gut health and (chronic) diseases and allowing for personalized prevention and treatment.