UW Medicine Seeks Testers For Outbreak Prediction App

SEATTLE, WA — The University of Washington School of Medicine is looking to recruit 25,000 people to test a new smartphone app designed to help predict the next outbreak before it happens.

The project, funded by the Department of Defense, has been in development for more than two years, initially designed to help track influenza and cold activity. Since the new coronavirus arrived, researchers have tweaked the app to also track COVID-19.

Don't miss the latest coronavirus updates from health and government officials in Washington. Sign up for Patch news alerts and newsletters for what you need to know daily.

"Even though we're in the middle of a pandemic, it's actually a really useful time for us to collect information to build out the predictive signal, or the predictive algorithm, from the phone so that we can start to test it again in the fall and in the winter months," said Patricia Areàn, a behavioral sciences professor at UW Medicine.

The app is called HIPPOCRATIC for short, a nod to the physicians' oath of ethics.

Programmers are looking to collect information from four different participant groups, each recruited to fill out short, daily surveys about their medical status over three months. The surveys will ask about things like sleep patterns and signs of illnesses or injuries, and the app will monitor movement, phone usage and voice tone. Researchers say the data collected is stored anonymously and encrypted.

UW Medicine hopes the app could help identify potential infections sooner and prevent people from returning to work or school too quickly after an illness.

"This is a huge opportunity for us to get a sense as to whether or not phones could basically become a personal screener for illness, without having to go to a drive-in screening clinic or to a hospital to figure out if a pandemic is blooming," Areàn said.

According to the project website, those who are accepted into the program will get $90 for participating and earn Amazon gift codes as they fill out surveys. All adults aged 19 or older, with an Android or Apple smartphone, are eligible. Right now, the app is only available in English.

Learn more about the project, or sign up to participate in the study here.