Ahmed: Electronic tattoos a mixed blessing

Technology has engulfed our lives to such an extent that a power outage, like the one we… Technology has engulfed our lives to such an extent that a power outage, like the one we experienced a few weeks ago, leaves us baffled, clicking furiously away at our phones.

The battery, we reason, has some juice left, so we might as well enjoy social media down to the last drop (or electron for you physics majors). Our generation especially has built its lives on and around technology — and in some instances, for better or for worse, our lives literally depend on it.

Consider what medical professionals are able to achieve with technology. As Dr. Lawrence K. Altman reminisces in The New York Times about advancements during the last four decades, he concludes, “ … it is clear that technology has accounted for the greatest changes in medicine.”

In the past, the medical community has welcomed innovations that proved to be effective in diagnostics and improvement of patient life. It would be rather difficult to perform open-heart surgery on a patient without a mechanical heart assuming control of supplying blood to the body in the meantime. But thanks to the 1952 work of Dr. Forest Dodrill and his team, such surgeries are possible.

Now, as has happened many times before, a new, ostensibly valuable piece of equipment is knocking on the ward doors and wants in. This time, it’s tattoo electronics.

Researchers at Northwestern University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have developed wireless electronics so small and flexible that they can be applied to the skin and left as a tattoo. Yonggang Huang, the Ph.D. who led the study at Northwestern, has a few words to share. “The blurring of electronics and biology is the key point here. All established forms of electronics are hard, rigid. Biology is soft, elastic. It’s two different worlds. We found a way to truly integrate them.”

The tattoo attaches to the skin without glue or tape. Simply put, Van der Waals forces — the natural forces that exist between atoms at the molecular level — are enough. Therefore, the marks are easy to remove. The hope is that if this idea did develop into new medical technologies, the tattoos would replace clunky outdated equipment.

Tattoo electronics have incredibly wide-ranging applications. But because of the technology’s proximity with the body, applications in medicine have been discussed the most. The tattoo could monitor brain, heart and muscle activity and transmit the information wirelessly to medical monitoring systems. This would allow for real-time updates on patients, whether they are recipients of chemotherapy or survivors of heart replacements.

Although what Huang and his team accomplished is quite simply amazing, I think some prudence is in order. Is there really a need for this sort of technology in medicine? Sure, bulkier electronics and their associated wires are cumbersome, and wireless technology allows patients to trasmit information from outside of the hospital, but in most cases, machines like health monitors and EKGs haven’t been considered impediments. Although I trust this technology would have the best wireless ability, I for one always have a greater sense of security when using physical cables. There are always ‘full bars’ with copper wires.

Another reason for my concern is security. With this technology, medical information is being sent through the air. Patient confidentiality is of utmost importance in the medical environment. As the American Medical Association reminds us, confidentiality allows “the patient to feel free to make a full and frank disclosure of information to the physician with the knowledge that the physician will protect the confidential nature of the information disclosed.” As with the certainty of connection with physical cables, there is the certainty that information coursing through them is difficult to access. Wireless is just too open.

Personal medical information has the power to affect one’s social life, employment opportunities and even insurance premiums. Extreme measures must be taken to guarantee confidentiality before this technology is adopted.

Society is always skeptical of new technologies and the changes they bring. This is healthy, as it is important to question to what we subject ourselves. It’s also wise not to knock down new ideas too quickly. What Huang invented might advance medicine, but this technology could nonetheless have downsides, and must be approached with caution.