A new device for detecting Rheumatoid Arthritis

David Vega Morales

Dr. David Vega Morales, from the Department of Rheumatology at the University Hospital, created a robotic hand that applies the exact pressure on the knuckles to diagnose suspected patients with rheumatoid arthritis.

Most non-rheumatologist physicians are not familiar with the specialized clinical techniques used to diagnose rheumatoid arthritis in the early stages in patients with suspected rheumatoid arthritis. Perhaps, even rheumatologists themselves have not been able to standardize the procedure. This has led to most of these patients waiting up to three years to be diagnosed and treated with the appropriate treatment to improve their quality of life. Now it all takes a precise handshake with the exact amount of strength required.

A good handshake makes the difference

Almost 10 years ago, Dr. Vega Morales was studying his major in rheumatology. At that time there was national research -in which Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon also participated-, which aimed to find out how many rheumatologic diseases were present in Mexico.

They found that two percent of the population suffered from rheumatoid arthritis, thousands of them without knowing it, and even though they had sore hands, they were not diagnosed with arthritis because they did not meet some other symptoms on the usual checklist.

“La manita” holds the patent

Dr. Vega related that when he was a resident doctor they studied the way rheumatologists explore patients and found that the compression maneuver was predictive. “I wanted to know how much to squeeze people’s hands”.

“That was my doctoral thesis project. To know how much I had to squeeze patients’ hands and teach those who did not explore, or who were not rheumatologists, how much I had to squeeze patients hands, and when the pain was detected, they would send them to me for examination,” he explained.