There are 30,000 people in the US living with cystic fibrosis (CF)—a chronic, life-long, and life-shortening disease, involving the buildup of heavy mucus within the lungs. A primary goal of treatment is to keep the airways clear to avoid serious infection.

Current CF treatment uses bulky, uncomfortable vests to pound the chest until mucus is loosened and expelled. It has been clinically proven that 40Hz soundwaves are as effective as traditional vests (see also Supporting Information). The 40Hz soundwave matches the harmonic resonance of mucus, liquifying hard mucus so it can migrate to larger airways and be coughed out. We needed to apply this proven science to an experience that kids would not only endure but would actually look forward to.

SICK BEATS by Woojer is the world’s first music-powered airway clearance vest for cystic fibrosis (CF), using the clinically proven modality of soundwave therapy to merge the music kids love with the daily treatment they need, all on the Spotify platform.

Working with Woojer, we redesigned their consumer haptic vest to meet the needs of CF treatment—adding additional transducers, optimizing lung placement, and boosting the 40Hz output. We used an AI-enabled sniffer to search 30 million songs in the Spotify library for therapeutic frequencies, identifying thousands of 40Hz songs for use with the SICK BEATS vest.

We are turning the worst part of these kids’ day into one of the coolest experiences in the world.

Working with Claire’s Place Foundation, a CF advocacy group, we interviewed 20 CF families to gain a better understanding of the current airway clearance vests and perceptions around them. This stage was critical in ensuring we understood the CF community’s needs as well as having an endorsement from the community.

Kids told us that a big reason they disliked their current vest treatment was their inability to go anywhere or do anything. They were stuck, tethered to a machine that was loud and uncomfortable. It was isolating and boredom-inducing, making them less likely to do this necessary treatment.

Also, according to Drs. Salinas and Lewinter, two respected researchers in pediatric pulmonology, it’s all about compliance with treatment, so anything that improves the experience and adherence would improve clinical outcomes.

SICK BEATS syncs with your smartphone via Bluetooth, translating the frequencies of the music you’re listening to into powerful soundwaves that penetrate the body to loosen lung mucus so patients can cough it up.

We used an AI-enabled sniffer to search 30 million songs in the Spotify library for 40Hz therapeutic frequencies, identifying thousands of songs to build a therapeutic song library. The SICK BEATS profile on the Spotify app organizes songs into easy-to-access playlists, where kids can discover new music and build their own custom treatment playlists. On SickBeatsVest.com, we utilize the Spotify API to provide a playlist generator, powered by multiple inputs such as mood, musical taste, and treatment length.

2,000+ CF families within the Claire’s Place Foundation network have access to the vest—on a rolling basis, free of charge. To date, 20 kids with CF have joined our experience trial of the prototype vest.

The experience trial demonstrated a profound difference. Abby, a participant, said “I feel like I’m inside a speaker…no, it feels like I AM the speaker!” Another participant, Drake, said “SICK BEATS works so much better than my old vest. I can cough up more mucus, but it depends on what song I use. My favorite is Imagine Dragons’ ‘Believer’.”

The vest is currently in clinical trials to determine efficacy and is intended to have long-term impact—replacing traditional airway clearance therapy. After FDA approval, the vest will be available at a much lower cost ($400 compared to over $10,000), creating more accessibility for the CF community, worldwide.

A medical device must be studied in a multicenter trial and submitted to the FDA for review and approval before it can be available for sale. Therefore, SICK BEATS is not commercially available, but is accessible, courtesy of Woojer, to the 2000+ families within the Claire’s Place Foundation network.

30,000 people in the US have cystic fibrosis—a life-long and life-shortening disease, involving the buildup of heavy mucus within the lungs. Airways must be kept clear to avoid serious infection.

Current approaches to airway clearance use bulky vests that pound the chest until the mucus is loosened and expelled.