When you wake up, the first place you go is the bathroom. The fact that you go there every day means you can obtain consistent data from that location. It's about reading health from the data collected by the smart toilet.
On the 13th, in a Zoom video interview, Professor Park Seung-min from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore noted this. Professor Park has already gained global recognition for his work with toilets. In 2023, he received the Ig Nobel Prize in the institutional sector of public health for his smart toilet research, published in the 'Annals of Unusual Research' by Harvard University.
The Ig Nobel Prize parodies the Nobel Prize, the highest honor in the scientific community. However, it does not select winners in a frivolous manner. While researching toilets has provided some humor, it also offers a serious opportunity to consider its role as a means for early diagnosis of diseases in daily life. Professor Park's ideas are becoming a reality.
Professor Park and his research team announced on the 11th in the international journal 'Advanced Science' that they verified the health information of actual users with a smart toilet developed in 2020. The smart toilet is a system that automatically collects users' defecation information through built-in sensors and stores and analyzes it in real-time in the cloud.
The idea for the smart toilet originated from a movie. In the 2005 film 'The Island,' the protagonist checks their health status through a urine analysis result in the morning. There is also a scene where sodium concentration in urine leads to the exclusion of salty bacon from the diet. Professor Park explained, "I wanted to realize the imagination from the movie in reality, converting daily naturally discharged waste, rather than cumbersome blood tests, into health information."
Professor Park's research group obtained various biomarkers from 11 participants who used the smart toilet for 12 days. The data included the time taken to first defecate after sitting on the toilet, the number and intervals of bowel movements, the thickness, texture, and color of the credit entry, as well as the time until the final discharge and the completion with toilet paper. The research team considered the time from the final discharge to the use of toilet paper could be related to the feeling of incomplete evacuation.
Professor Park explained, "Previously, patients had to directly write bowel logs for 2-3 weeks, or doctors had to gather information through interviews, but this research allowed us to obtain accurate real-time data in an automated manner."
The most notable indicator was the time of bowel drop. The speed of fecal fall is directly related to viscosity. The hypothesis that slower speeds indicate constipation and faster speeds indicate diarrhea was validated by actual data. Professor Park explained, "By measuring the speed of feces in time units, we were able to objectively assess the state of the intestines and this could lead to early diagnosis and prevention of conditions such as constipation, irritable bowel syndrome, and chronic diarrhea."
In fact, one participant exhibited normal values during the first week, but over time, delays in bowel movement and thickening of feces associated with constipation symptoms appeared. Although he was unaware, changes were evident in the data collected by the toilet. Professor Park explained, "This allows for early intervention to manage conditions by adjusting the diet or prescribing medication before the user even notices it."
There was also a case where two people living together displayed similar diarrhea patterns. Professor Park said, "This could be because living together leads to similar eating habits, and if diarrhea patterns recur, it may be necessary to check the intestinal environment or reactions to specific foods."
The research team plans to unveil a prototype next month and install it in two hospitals in South Korea to collect patient data, aiming for commercialization in the first half of next year. As the procedures to receive medical device approval are complex, it will initially be utilized as a health management product.
Professor Park stated, "South Korea, with its high bidet penetration rate, provides an optimal environment for testing smart toilets," indicating plans to prioritize the domestic market. Plans to expand into the markets of the United States and Europe are also underway, starting with South Korea and Singapore.
The ultimate goal of smart toilet research is to develop a system that captures signs of disease earlier than a doctor and continuously manages health status, even without user awareness. Professor Park said, "What we pursue is 'precision health' that goes beyond 'precision medicine.'"
He emphasized, "The aim is to monitor health status in real-time before it deteriorates into disease, integrating various data such as genetics and lifestyle habits for early prediction and prevention-oriented health management," adding, "That starting point might be right there, the toilet, which no one has paid attention to."
References
Advanced Science (2025), DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/advs.202503247