PAINFUL blood tests could be over for many thanks to a new tool to measure haemoglobin — using a smartphone.

Instead of drawing blood, a picture of a person’s eyelids is taken with a specially adapted phone camera.

It has a hyperspectral imager to measure haemoglobin, blood’s oxygen-carrying capacity.

US tests on more than 150 volunteers showed they were comparable to traditional blood tests.

Medics hope it can help detect anaemia, acute kidney injury and haemorrhages, or assess blood disorders such as sickle cell anaemia.

Study leader Prof Young Kim, from Indiana’s Purdue University, said: "Our new mobile health approach paves the way for bedside or remote testing of blood haemoglobin levels for detecting anaemia, acute kidney injury and haemorrhages, or for assessing blood disorders such as sickle cell anaemia.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has greatly increased awareness of the need for expanded mobile health and telemedicine services."

"This new technology could be very useful for detecting anaemia, which is characterised by low levels of blood haemoglobin.

"This is a major public health problem in developing countries, but can also be caused by cancer and cancer treatments."

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