Meet EVA, the powerful pledge that could save millions of lives

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Julián Ríos, a young Mexican, is the head of Higia Technologies, a company that creates a bra that detects breast cancer

Julián Ríos is a young Mexican, who at age 17 and as a high school student invented a garment that can help save millions of lives: EVA. His product is a bra whose function is to detect any change in the breasts to alert its carrier about possible anomalies, according to Forbes magazine. Now, the Rios company, Higia Technologies, has managed to become popular in Mexico and have a presence in Colombia, Spain, Japan, and even the United States.

Leer en español: Conoce a EVA, la poderosa prenda que podría salvar millones de vidas

How does EVA work?

The Very Interesting magazine explains that EVA, as the bra was named, has 200 biosensors that monitor the surface, considering the thermal conductivity, that is, the heat in each region of the breasts. Therefore, if there is a region that has a higher temperature, there is the possibility that there is more blood flow in it, indicating the presence of some anomaly.

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But the technological development of the bra does not stop there. Higia Technologies developed algorithms considering each type of cancer and the state in which it is located, therefore in addition to the fact that EVA obtains the data it also evaluates them to give more detailed information. The company also says that using EVA to get a check once a week is better than a mammogram every year because it ensures that some tumors can develop in less than a year, so the bra would be a better option.

Forbes points out that the invention of Ríos, a student of the Technological Institute of Higher Studies Monterrey, has managed to integrate engineers, researchers, insurers and Mexican health services into his team, which will allow having a version with improved technology and having access to other markets. Although it does not have an official price, the first versions were around $ 120 dollars, hoping that in the future the price will be more accessible, according to Julián Ríos.

The incidence of breast cancer in Latin America

Although mammography was the most common way to explore and detect breast cancer, it has some economic and social problems that have prevented its coverage and effectiveness from being greater. According to information from World Life Expectancy, the incidence of breast cancer in Latin America is medium to low, with Venezuela, Cuba, Brazil, Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia having the most cases, compared to Mexico and most of them of Central America marked with low incidence.

Julián Ríos became interested in the topic because his mother suffered the loss of her two breasts due to a misdiagnosis of cancer and with EVA she seeks to face the prejudices and fears generated by the exploration, self-exploration, and mammograms, as some women they continue to feel fear or embarrassment allowing the disease to progress.

At an economic level, the problem is the number of mammography devices considering the size of the population. For example, according to the newspaper Excelsior, in Mexico, only 20% of women had a mammogram in 2018. In the Colombian case, the data are better but not sufficient, according to the viewer only 62.5% of the women go to perform the mammograms, and 23% of those who do it must leave their department to do it, making it clear that there is not a sufficient number of devices for their population.

LatinAmerican Post | Luis Angel Hernández Liborio

Translated from "Conoce a EVA, la poderosa prenda que podría salvar millones de vidas"