Doctors Health Care System Getting Under Our Skin Literally

""In an apparent effort to further depersonalize medicine, the National Science Foundation (NSF) is funding research into an implantable microchip capable of digitally monitoring the health of patients and reporting their vital statistics to doctors' offices without the need for an actual doctor-patient interaction.

Reports indicate that NSF has given a $5,070 grant to a graduate fellowship project tasked with developing an implantable antenna, of sorts, to keep track of patients' vital signs. The device, after being implanted just below a patient's skin, would be capable of monitoring medical devices, for instance, and both uploading and downloading data for use in patient tracking.

The project has been categorized as a way to attain better "long-term patient monitoring," though idea-makers claim that the chips won't necessarily be permanent. Instead, they would be used for tracking primarily medical devices, though data on patient health would also be accessible remotely to nurses and doctors.

"Antennas operating near or inside the human body are important for a number of applications, including healthcare," reads the project grant. "Implantable medical devices such as cardiac pacemakers and retinal implants are a growing feature of modern healthcare, and implantable antennas for these devices are necessary to monitor battery level and device health, to upload and download data used in patient monitoring, and more."

Medical microchips to be made of special "ink" that resembles a tattoo

Funded in part by the National Research Foundation of Korea, the project aims to develop so-called "ultra high frequency signals" capable of efficient signal transfer to and from the device as implanted underneath the skin. The device would have a large range, in other words, without the need for an internal battery, maximizing its usefulness.

These special tag antennas will reportedly be comprised of "conductive ink" that, in many ways, would resemble a tattoo. Except in this application, electronic readers would have the capacity to capture signals moving to and from the "tattoo," requiring little or no maintenance.

"Ultra High Frequency [radio-frequency identification] RFID tag antennas are printed using conductive ink and have found increased applications due to advantages such as minimal cost, low maintenance, good tag read range, and ability to operate without an integrated battery," adds the grant, as reported by SputnikNews.com.

Implantable chips will allow drug companies to treat people for diseases they don't even have

Such devices won't just monitor patient health status, however. According to reports, companies are already working on next-generation devices that will also be able to detect diseases, in some cases before they even develop (which technically isn't possible), allowing doctors to treat patients for conditions that they may or may not have, or ever develop for that matter.

Drug giant Johnson & Johnson, for instance, is reportedly working on a project called the "Disease Interception Accelerator" that, according to reports, will somehow be able to identify diseases before they actually develop. From this baseline, unscrupulous doctors will then be able to treat patients based on what the device finds or detects, even if the health condition does not actually exists.""