ATLANTA — The 2023 Collegiate Inventors Competition Finalists have just been announced and one of the top 10 teams is from right here at Georgia Tech.
Netra Gandhi, Girish Hari, Ethan Damiani and Rhea Prem created the FADpad as way to test for diseases and ultimately prevent deaths.
“We want to detect diseases, especially in cancer," Damiani said. "The biggest problem most times is to find it early."
Damiani said the invention was created initially for a school project as a way to make early detection of gynecological diseases, like cervical cancer, more accessible.
“It’s a non-invasive way to screen for gynecological diseases in menstrual blood,” Damiani said.
Team member Netra Gandhi explained there is a major need for a product like this and there are a number of reasons women may not get pap smears for early detection -- such as healthcare disparity or cost.
“Some due to cultural reasons don't want to get pap smears because they can be invasive and a loss of privacy,” Gandhi said.
Damiani explained how it works:
“It just looks like a typical menstrual product and basically the innovative design is a collection strip that is inserted into the menstrual product that once the user is done they can remove it and ship it to the lab to test it,” Damiani said.
Their team first created the FADpadfor a school project, then submitted it to the 2023 Collegiate Inventors Competition -- where they are now one of the final top 10 teams.
The winning team wins $10,000 and a patent acceleration from the U.S. Office on Patents and Trademarks.
Damiani said winning could help them focus on the FADpad to get the product out there sooner.
“Hopefully something off the shelf or even ordering online, we want to make it as accessible as possible,” Damiani said.
And eventually Damiani said their FADpad could even help test for issues like thyroid disease and diabetes, while decreasing a long-standing stigma.
“Menstrual blood is so under-researched and it’s been heavily stigmatized so there hasn’t been a lot of looking into it,” he explained.
“If it’s already happening, we should be looking into it because there’s so much information we can find out to save people's lives,” Gandhi said.
The Collegiate Inventors Competition final will be in Washington D.C. on Oct. 24, but there’s a People’s Choice award that you can take part in happening right now -- to vote, click here.