HP Skin Patch May Replace Needles

Iddo Genuth writes "HP and Crospon have developed a skin patch employing microneedles that barely penetrate the skin. The microneedles can replace conventional injections and deliver drugs through the skin without causing any pain. The skin patch technology also enables delivery of several drugs by one patch and the control of dosage and of administration time for each drug. It has the potential to be safer and more efficient than injections."

Well...

[F-3582 (996772)]

I'd like to see someone draw blood through one of those... Should get you the clearest serum ever.

In speculative fiction for a while

[by Anonymous Coward]

Micro-needles have been part of science fiction for at least 15 years. In Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash [amazon.com] , one character has a sedative-filled needle implanted on her cervix in order to incapcitate a rapist.

Re:In speculative fiction for a while

[ozmanjusri (601766)]

one character has a sedative-filled needle implanted on her cervix in order to incapcitate a rapist.

Wouldn't a cheese-grater be quicker?

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[DigiShaman (671371)]

To slow. Should go for the bear trap instead.

Re:

[Kimos (859729)]

The you're describing an anti-rape female condom [wikipedia.org], frequently called a Dentata [wikipedia.org].

Re:In speculative fiction for a while

[garbletext (669861)]

Ah, yes. The Vagina Dentata. Making scary Freudian dreams come to life for over 15 years!

For example: http://pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF051-Zarflax.jpg [pbfcomics.com]

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[somersault (912633)]

http://www.rapestop.net/ [rapestop.net] got to wonder the type of person that would leave one of those in all the time

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[garbletext (669861)]

I know several police, and they're all terrified to be without a firearm, even off-duty or on furlough, sometimes going so far as to plan their vacations around which states have police gun treaties that will allow them to carry. Some people are just paranoid, I guess.

Although I don't see how this thing will help, it seems like a bleeding dick would not incapacitate the attacker enough to prevent him from beating the shit out of his victim instead of raping her.

Re:In speculative fiction for a while

[jotok (728554)]

It takes some people a while to separate "risk management" and "fault" or "blame." I can't pin down why, though I have some ideas.

I think the issue has to do with separating morally important acts with moral content from morally unimportant acts: rape has moral content, wearing this clothing or walking down that street does not.

Here's an example using street gangs: they wear different colors to identify themselves. So if you wear a red sweatshirt and the blue shirt gang shoots you, they did an immoral act, whereas your act cannot be construed as "immoral" and therefore you can't be blamed for your own shooting.

If you're going to allow such morally unimportant and therefore arbitrary factors when assigning blame, then you get a slippery slope where things that are not only unimportant but also beyond a person's control are used...such as your gender. So we find people saying, essentially, the man who raped the woman was not guilty--it was the woman's fault for A) being female and B) being around men, who cannot be expected to control themselves.

The obvious remedy is not for the law to enforce women's rights, nor for women to exercise their right as human beings to defend themselves, but rather to blame the women.

If this kind of reasoning makes sense to you, then you might be a Saudi judge.

Now, it is perfectly reasonable to advise people on risky behaviors: watch what you wear to reduce your chances of getting shot. Don't go get so drunk you can't stand up when you're all alone. Don't hold hands walking down Crime Alley in Gotham City. And so forth. But "being vulnerable" is still not an immoral act.

Some people do think it is, but they only want to justify their position of strength--alas, power doesn't justify itself, though powerful people wish it did.

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[RuBLed (995686)]

Implanting such thing into the cervix (or near its opening) is at the least very risky for the subject herself because when not sexually aroused there is almost no cavity present causing the subject to be injeected with the sedative unless she had some kind of antidote in her blood stream... oh wait.. this is /. ... no no.. forget what I said, I don't know anything about such things...

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[garbletext (669861)]

that exact thing happens in the book. YT engages in somewhat spontaneous consensual sex, then remembers the thing when the guy's passed out.

Did someone say hypospray?

[garbletext (669861)]

Finally, the most important star trek technology comes to the real world! Forget all that transporter, holodeck, or warp drive crap; we've got painless injections! woo!

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[selex (551564)]

Jet Injector. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jet_injector [wikipedia.org] Already exist. From what I heard from military people who had it used on them it f**king hurts.

Now the question is HP? Really? The people who built my printer? And laptop? I guess that development of the inkjet has other applications.

Selex

Really?

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[Muad'Dave (255648)]

<pedant>phlebotomist</pedant>

Is a flobotomist someone who uses Flowbees [flowbee.com] to cut hair?

Consider the potential abuses

[Bozzio (183974)]

If this patch is reusable it could become the method of choice for heroin addicts.

On the other hand, it would be much safer than using needles.
You can't really share these, I assume.

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[ResidntGeek (772730)]

Only for the advanced addicts, I'd think. This is a subcutaneous injection, if I'm not mistaken, which heroin users only turn to after they've used up their veins (slower absorption, you see - not as intense or immediate).

Re:

[ResidntGeek (772730)]

It could, certainly, but it wouldn't add anything new. The problems with heroin addiction and the defeat thereof are properties of the drug itself, and can't really be mitigated. Many drugs cause users to develop tolerance, but heroin is so much stronger that continually taking the same dose won't even bring you back to normal - you have to increase the dose just to get back to normal after cravings, never mind feeling the same effects for repeated highs. The withdrawal is severe and physically dangerous, a

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[phalse phace (454635)]

If it's anything like their inkjet cartridges, it won't be reusable (or cheap).

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[djupedal (584558)]

The patch is DNA matched and will only dispense when coupled with the prescriptionee. In addition, the patch allows for cross-marketing opportunities where the clinic/pharmacy owners can also choose to dose the recipient with a compound triggering a Starbucks or Taco Bell purchase. "Mocha grande, please."

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[Opportunist (166417)]

We're talking a printer manufacturer here. I bet those things have some kind of chip inside that makes dead sure you can't refill them.

one more brick in the wall

[User 956 (568564)]

The skin patch technology also enables delivery of several drugs by one patch and the control of dosage and of administration time for each drug.

Excellent. So when does Soma come out?

Previously on Slashdot

[Dr. Eggman (932300)]

Last we heard [slashdot.org] this was in the prototype phase. Btw, the search function is terrible.

Re:

[Smordnys s'regrepsA (1160895)]

I'm glad someone else noticed. Does anyone know if there is anything new in this post, or are we just rehashing old news?


Oh, and next time just use Google (site:SlashDot.org "YourPhraseHere"), it is a thousand times easier.

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[Dr. Eggman (932300)]

Thats actually how I ended up finding it. Didn't get it from Slashdot's search on any of the phrases: "HP", "patch", "drugs", "microneedles", "printers", etc.

Now we need sensors in those patches

[Thanshin (1188877)]

If this technology triumphs, the next addition should be sensors that control the release of chemicals taking the current situation into consideration.

For example, a patch could sense the cardiac rhythm and control it chemically. Another could control blood sugar, etc.

What I imagine is someone witnessing a car accident, taking four patches from his car's medikit putting them in different parts of the hurt person and calling an ambulance while the patches stabilize the patient.

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[devjj (956776)]

The lawyers are going to have a field day with that one.

Re:Now we need sensors in those patches

[Ihlosi (895663)]

If this technology triumphs, the next addition should be sensors that control the release of chemicals taking the current situation into consideration.

No company wants to open that bag of liability issues. If your device makes medical decisions (instead of leaving them to a physician), you make yourself a big fat blinking glowing target for all sorts of legal trouble. Current example: Infusion pumps. While studies show that feedback-controlled infusion pumps lead to better patient outcomes, no company wants to make them because they don't want to get slapped with a multi-million-dollar lawsuit for the one patient in a thousand who thinks he might have had a better outcome with a standard infusion pump.

Re:Now we need sensors in those patches

[Thanshin (1188877)]

Ok, we need sensors in the patches and a better legal system that doesn't bind the minds and souls of men with ropes of fear.

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[eth1 (94901)]

No, the patches just need to detect when they've been put on an ambulance chasing lawyer and release cyanide instead of their normal payload.

Tattoos

[Nefarious Wheel (628136)]

I could imagine instant tattoos -- patches with designs on them, subcutaneous injection of inks.

Just add alcohol.

Pain?

[PrinceAshitaka (562972)]

I just recently had my flu immunization. Those needles are small. I barely felt it. Is this really a pain reduction breakthrough?

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[garbletext (669861)]

It's a breakthrough for pussies.

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[Thanshin (1188877)]

It's a breakthrough for pussies.

No, the needles are too small to go through the fur.

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[garbletext (669861)]

No, the needles are too small to go through the fur.

actually, I prefer them shaved

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[rts008 (812749)]

You prefer shaved cats? Man, that's kinky.
How do you get the cat to hold still?

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[by Anonymous Coward]

It is estimated that about 10% of people (including me) have a phobia of needles (trypanophobia). For many people, this phobia is associated with a sudden drop in blood pressure, causing fainting and such, at the time of injection. I know that I am perfectly capable of being fairly calm before getting a shot, and generally don't feel terribly afraid, but will still end up nauseous and probably faint afterwards. So I'm interested in this not so much for the pain reduction, but because this probably wouldn't

Stinging nettle

[lmpeters (892805)]

This actually sounds kind of like how stinging nettle works. I recently touched some by accident, and I can assure you, the needles on the surface of that leaf are so small that I couldn't feel them at all.

The cocktail of formic acid and histamines contained within the needles, on the other hand, were quite noticeable (ouch!). Of course, I'm assuming that HP is not planning to use this invention to deliver anything that's painful by design.

Something similiar.

[dunezone (899268)]

Back in 1998 I had surgery on one of my kidneys. Because theres usually a wait and you have to be at the hospital several hours before the surgery they tried this method of numbing my skin so it wouldn't hurt when they put the needles in. Basically all they did was put cream down and put a clear patch on top of it, needless to say it still hurt and was useless.

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[Palpitations (1092597)]

Chances are that was EMLA [rxmed.com]cream (Eutectic Mixture of Local Anesthetics). Basically a lido/prilocaine topical. According to the linked article, it numbs around 3-5mm deep after being in place for 60-120 minutes. Less for thicker skin, or anything deeper then the dermis. I'm guessing they slapped it on there, had you wait a few minutes (far less than an hour I'm sure), and then did the draw.

Why the hell they would bother is beyond me. The only reasons I can think of would be to help someone who was ner

Beware

[OpenSourced (323149)]

The new technology is similar to the technology employed in HP's patented process for its inkjet cartridges.

I foresee scores of people walking around with the HP logo tattooed where the patch was. Later the advertising space will be sold to other companies. Attempts to sue will be stymied by the fact that the devices will come with an EULA that clearly states that your skin doesn't belong to you while using the device, and the device can leave residues there. You will be forced to accept the EULA or else die from your sickness, but HP's lawyers will insist that was you "free and informed decision".

Just wait.

Types of injection

[Wilson_6500 (896824)]

So this is great for stuff that you can put in subcutaneously. What about intravenous injections? What about intramuscular? Intraperitoneal? What about substances that are made up of large (several micron) particles, such as the sufur colloid injections used by nuclear medicine studies? Those could get stuck in superfine-gauge needles.

I think it's a little premature to say that this patch will replace conventional injections entirely. It might seem obvious that a patch couldn't really hope to deliver injections into the muscles without penetrating all the layers of skin, but I think it at least bears mentioning.

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[aadvancedGIR (959466)]

Moreover, it will probably only work for very small volumes, so don't expect that technology to totally replace the good old needle. The only goal of this is to extend the range of medecines someone can inject himself whithout needing a nurse or special training.
Classic patches, such as nicotine ones, work because the skin is porous to that chemical, so there are strong limitations to what can be done with them, but for a diabetic, it could be awesome: instead of injecting himself a large dose of insulin no

Bad headline

[quigonn (80360)]

should be "...may replace canulas" (canulae?). A needle is something you use for sewing, but you use a canula for an injection.

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[PCM2 (4486)]

Hypodermic needle. Hypo ("under") dermic ("the skin"). Pretty commonplace tool, actually. Cannulae, on the other hand, are used for IVs.

Novelty?

[$pearhead (1021201)]

How is this microneedle-thing different, from eg. this [diva-portal.org]?

Hmmmmm

[by Anonymous Coward]

Ya know, im not so sure that this is want i want. HP gets enough under my skin as it is ;)

Re:Niccotine patch did it already?

[Thanshin (1188877)]

Those work through the skin. Transdermal patch [wikipedia.org]

This ones enter through micro needles.

Re:Thank god...

[muffel (42979)]

'What a pussy!' you must be thinking

Correct.

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[Opportunist (166417)]

Tell me about it. Every time they try to draw blood from me it's like a trial drilling for oil.

It's not so much the pain, it's more that my ellbow pit looks like I'm a junkie or something for days. Now try to wear a t-shirt to work.

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[Solra Bizna (716281)]

I have unusually, inhumanly low body fat. I'm just about as underweight as it's possible to be without there being an immediate medical danger.

Last time I was immunized, they had to pinch my arm to get enough muscle to inject into. On their first four tries, the needle stabbed me in the bone.

IT HURT.

-:sigma.SB