Telemedicine utilizing integrated microfluidic system for insulin detection

This paper presents a telemedicine system utilizing an integrated microfluidic chip for fast, automatic detection of insulin. The telemedicine system expedites the insulin assay results digitally from the assay site to medical professionals located off-site, while the off-site specialist can directly provide diagnosis through the Internet. The integrated microfluidic chip contains pneumatic micropumps, a micromixer and several microvalves to automatically perform the entire protocol for insulin detection. The detection protocol is based on double-antibody sandwich chemiluminescence immunoassay. The microfluidic system carries out the detection procedures including sample/reagent transportation, incubation between the target insulin and insulin antibodies, washing processes, and the chemiluminescence development process. The chemiluminescence signal is measured and quantifies the concentration of insulin in the testing sample. Experimental data show that the developed system can automatically complete the entire protocol within 10 min with a detection limit of 260 pmol/L. This microfluidic-based telemedicine system is promising for point-of-care diabetes screening in the future.