Allyx

Allyx, your personal healthcare companion

Inspiration

Mental health is one of the largest public health issues that is often overlooked. Nearly 1 in 5 of adults in the United States suffers from a mental illness, but 60% of those adults are left untreated. Mental health remains a highly stigmatized health issue, and Allyx aims to combat that by connecting with those with mental illness & empowering them.

What Allyx does

Allyx helps detect unusually high levels of stress through a Meta Health chip. The Meta Health chip contains the following sensors:

GSR (Galvanic Skin Response – skin conductance)
PPG (Optical heart-rate pulse)
BMI160 (Accelerometer & Gyroscope)
Thermostat (Temperature)

After detecting an unusual emotional and/or physical change, Allyx talks to you to see how it can help, and also contact proper authorities if the need arises.

How we built it

For the hardware, we utilized the Pebble to monitor heart rate and Amazon Echo to speak to the patient. As for the software, we used JQuery, HTML5, and CSS3 to develop the website and then API.ai to help program the AI for Echo, and finally ResponsiveVoice’s API for text-to-speech capabilities.

Challenges we ran into

Lack of hardware, namely the new Pebble 2, lack of knowledge regarding JQuery.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

In determining what we should call our innovation, we decided to combine the name from A gender neutral name for Amazon’s Alexa ( Alex ) + “ Ally ”; hence “ Allyx ”.

What we learned

The effects of mental illnesses, basics of JQuery, new terminologies such as front-end and back-end programming, capabilities of Amazon Echo and Pebble.

What's next for Allyx

Phase 2 : Increasing portability using Raspberry Pi technology; increasing customizability through a few language options (e.g. Spanish, Madarin, etc.); provide value added service by allowing family members to pay extra to record their own voices.

Phase 3 : Expand product line with two new options.

Have Allyx contained in a single wearable
Have a more interactive/more personable AI in the home (mini Baymax)

Phase 4 : Expand internationally into countries such as Japan and customize based on local customs. Mental health isn’t an isolated issue in the US. Worldwide Self harm is the 12th leading cause of death. It’s a solution that can be extended to all markets.