It sounds quite like a spy-thriller, that we can actually swallow a tiny camera to picture inside of our intestines. A usual way to see inside of our intestines is an endoscope, a long tube passed from either of the two ends of our intestines. One passed from mouth (Upper GI endoscopy)can see its upper part, which is food pipe, stomach and duodenum. Another type passed up from anus (Colonoscopy) can see its lower part, which is rectum and colon. Both these leave out the middle 5-6 meters of small intestine. We can see inside of this part through a wireless camera, that passes through the entire part, just like food.
This piece of technology called “capsule endoscopy” was invented in the year 2000, by a collaboration between Gavriel Iddan (an optical engineer from Israel), and Paul Swain (a gastroenterologist from UK). The two started this quest, initially unknown to each other and then joined hands to create a tiny camera. This camera, once swallowed, travels about nine meters of human intestine over six to eight hours. During this journey, it takes thousands of pictures from inside of our intestine, so that doctors can identify any diseases. While this wireless camera eventually gets flushed out in the toilet, a wearable recording device has already stored all its images for a review.
Gavriel Iddan and Paul Swain have beautifully narrated their journey in a medical journal. In 1981, Iddan was on a sabbatical in Boston, when he befriended Dr Eitan Scapa, an Israeli gastroenterologist. Here he learned intricacies of intestine, and need to visualize it in its entirely. By 1990s, small video-cameras were available, which Iddan had improvised with semi-conductors so as to save energy, and get better pictures. Independently, Paul Swain was working on better endoscopes, and also toying with an idea of tiny wireless cameras. He and his team was looking at available devices, that were used as spy-cams or in cricket as stump-cameras.
Iddan’s and Swain’s groups eventually met, first in 1995 and then in 1998. They created their first prototype and after many animal experiments, a version that could be tested in humans was available. In 1999 Swain obtained permission to volunteer for testing of the first device. In October of 1999 he swallowed the first device, at the clinic of Iddan’s friend Dr Eitan Scapa in Tel Aviv. Many more devices and iterations later, they were ready for patient trials. In August 2000 the device got USFDA approval and also published in Nature – a top science journal.
