Pulse Oximeter on the Earlobe (PEARL)

Every day, more than 115 people in the United States die of opioid overdose. Overall, roughly 21-29% of patients prescribed opioids for chronic pain misuse them, with approximately eight percent of patients experiencing an iatrogenic addiction. Pulse Oximeter on the Earlobe (PEARL) is a wearable pulse oximeter designed to provide continuous monitoring of oxygen levels and heart rate during the period of time that opioids are prescribed. The goal of this project is to provide a way to reduce opioid overdose mortality in patients prescribed opioids by automatically & systemically alerting emergency medical services in the case of overdose. PEARL placed in the top 15 & won the Wolfram Award at MedHacks 2017, hosted by Johns Hopkins University. In addition, PEARL won the Best Poster Award at the 2019 Johnson & Johnson Project Showcase. Team PEARL consists of 5 senior undergraduate Biomedical Engineering students at Cornell University: Crystal Lee, Joy Li, Shweta Modi, Alice Yan, & Holly Zheng, along with Crystal Zhao as an additional co-founder at MedHacks 2017.