“It all began with the aim of wanting to help my uncle, who is a Parkinson’s patient for the past 9 years. I feel extremely grateful and lucky that I have been provided the platform to showcase my innovation and help people,” said Pune-based Jui Keskar, a Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar (PMRBP) 2022 winner.
Keskar has invented JTremour 3D – a wearable device designed to measure and track limb movements and tremors by sending signals to a cloud-based system, thereby guiding doctors in diagnosing and deciding the course of medication for Parkinson’s patients. Since then the 16-year-old has garnered immense recognition for her innovation. In addition to the Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar, Keskar has won the Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Ignited Mind Children Creativity and Innovation Awards in 2020 and Grand Award at IRIS National Fair 2021 (3rd place in Biomedical engineering). In January 2021 she was also awarded the IRIS Grand Award, recognised by ‘Broadcom Department of Science and Technology.’ Furthermore, she represented India and won the Science Seed award at the ‘Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) in Pittsburgh, USA.
“Parkinson’s is a medical condition that impacts the central nervous system of a patient, manifesting as severe tremors in the limbs. Till today doctors prescribe medication based on how the patient describes the intensity of their tremors. This is not an accurate and scientific way, since the medication is heavily dependent on the frequency of the said tremors. With this device I wanted to increase the efficiency of the treatment,” explains Keskar.
“I have seen my uncle suffer and I always wanted to help him in any small way that I could, thus during the lockdown began my research.” The tech genius went ahead to read various research papers and journals and also found a few existing devices to measure these tremors. However, these lacked portability and wearability, she said. “I wanted to make this device compact and affordable.”
Keskar is currently working on advancing the device and plans to work on many such tech innovations that will help the medical community. She also founded ‘Beat The Tremor Foundation’ (www.beatthetremor.org ) “While going through the comments from online community, I realised that a huge information gap exists among patients and families in towns and villages in India. ‘Beat The Tremor Foundation’ intents to bridge this gap with the mission to support the patients of Parkinson's Disease in India.