Background and Motivation
Diabetes is a common disease with multiple complications, which is why it has become an important challenge for world health. According to the World Health Organization (2013), there are around 347 million people around the world with diabetes. On this note, the countries with the greater incidence of diabetes are China, India, United States, Brazil, Russia and Mexico. Since there are no apparent symptoms during the initial states of the disease, early detection and treatment are of great importance to prevent serious complications like heart attack, blindness, kidney failure, lower limb amputation and even death.
In Mexico, in particular, the incidence of diabetes has increased quite notably over the years. This situation has multiple implications for society and for the health system in the country given the negative effects on the quality of life of the patients and their families, as well as the need for a very large economical investment for their proper treatment.
Currently, the glucometer is a widely used device to measure the levels of glucose in the blood of patients with diabetes. However, there are no practical ways of diagnosing other complications that may derive from diabetes. This means that further laboratory testing is needed to verify the presence of said complications after the patient shows symptoms, which takes more time, is more expensive and could result in a late diagnosis with irreversible consequences. This way, our proposal is centered on developing an aptamer-based biosensor that allows the practical and timely diagnosis of one of the irreversible complications that result from diabetes: the extensive damage to the retina known as retinopathy.