Empowering Community Health Workers with Inkjet-printed Diagnostic Test Strips

Community health worker (CHW) programs have emerged as an effective way to address the growing double burden of acute and chronic diseases in developing countries. Affordable and ruggedized biomedical devices can enable CHWs to provide diagnostic and screening services to their communities. However, low profit margins make such devices and markets unattractive to large diagnostics companies. Diagnostic test strips, created with inkjet printers by depositing biochemical reagents on paper, are both practical and cost-effective. Such test strips can rapidly detect pathogens and other abnormalities through readily-interpretable visual results, making them well-suited for use by CHWs in the field.