Scoping Review in Lancet Digital Health Highlights the Importance of Objective Cough Counting Data in Disease Management

Scoping Review in Lancet Digital Health Highlights the Importance of Objective Cough Counting Data in Disease Management

Review including Hyfe research evaluates continuous digital cough monitoring as a practical way to address limitations of patient-reported cough data

• Hyfe’s cough-monitoring technology was found to perform competitively as an automated cough monitoring system.
• Factors like recall bias and individual interpretation can influence patient reporting, emphasizing the role of objective cough counting. 
• A key area of opportunity is bridging the gap between academic use of cough monitoring tools with real-world patient use.

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Wilmington, Del., Jan. 13, 2025 –  A new scoping review published in The Lancet Digital Health examines the role of digital cough monitoring tools as objective, quantifiable measures of cough counts across a range of diseases. The review, which features global leader in AI cough care Hyfe, Inc., assesses the clinical practicality of continuous cough counting and its ability to address known limitations of patient-reported symptom data in real-world care settings.

The review, which pre-dates the release and adoption of Hyfe’s flagship clinical trial product CoughMonitor Suite, found that Hyfe’s cough-monitoring mobile app emphasizes the advantages of autonomous and continuous systems over contact-based ones, particularly when balancing real-world continuous monitoring with acceptable sensitivity (90 percent) and low false positives.

Led by Alexandra Zimmer, PhD, the review closely analyzed 77 studies evaluating digital cough monitoring tools, including Hyfe’s smartphone-based cough tracker app, now called CoughPro.  Researchers looked at a variety of cough-counting platforms used in conditions such as asthma, chronic obstructive lung disease (COPD), chronic cough, tuberculosis, and COVID-19. The research team synthesized the different clinical and public health applications of these cough counting tools, assessed their alignment with patient-reported outcomes, and evaluated their readiness for broader implementation.

Key takeaways from the review include:

• Objective cough data may function as a digital biomarker: Automated cough monitoring was highlighted as a promising digital biomarker for tracking disease activity and treatment response over time.
• Real-world performance matters: Many cough monitoring platforms have been validated using short, controlled audio samples. The review highlights the importance of tools like CoughPro that can operate continuously in real-world environments, where background noise and daily activity are unavoidable.
• Cough frequency and symptom perception don’t always align: The authors observed only moderate correlation between objectively measured cough frequency and patient-reported data (median correlation coefficient of 0.42, IQR 0.38 to 0.59). Factors such as anxiety, recall bias, and individual interpretation can influence subjective reporting.
• Moving beyond the "24-hour snapshot": While traditional evaluation often relies on short-term cough monitoring (i.e., 24h), the review emphasizes the necessity of longitudinal data to truly understand disease progression. The authors cite studies utilizing Hyfe’s technology to successfully track treatment response over extended periods (up to six months in tuberculosis patients) demonstrating the feasibility of the long-term monitoring required for chronic disease management.
• Shifting from hardware to accessible software: The review identifies a pivotal shift from contact-based, semi-autonomous devices (which require physical proximity) to accessible wearable and smartphone-based solutions. Tools like Hyfe’s smartphone app were highlighted for their ability to streamline community-wide deployment, leveraging the ubiquity of smartphones to monitor populations at a scale previously unreachable with specialized hardware. Hyfe has expanded with its CoughMonitor Suite to combine remote monitoring via a watch monitor with its companion app to further improve accessibility, usability, and data collection.

“Patient-reported cough measures are valuable, but they are inherently subjective,” said Dr. Zimmer. “Questions can be interpreted differently, recall varies, and for conditions that can be asymptomatic like tuberculosis, patients may not even perceive themselves as coughing at all. Objective monitoring offers a more consistent signal, which helps clinicians better understand disease activity and treatment response.”  

For Hyfe, these findings reinforce a growing consensus in respiratory medicine emphasizing objective data collection. 

“Objective, passive, and longitudinal monitoring tools are essential to complement subjective symptom reporting and help close the gap between clinical trials and everyday care,” said Peter Small, MD, CMO of Hyfe. “By combining objective data with patient experiences, we can improve therapeutic endpoint evaluation and enhance existing treatment protocols to better serve patients.”

To explore partnership opportunities or learn more about Hyfe’s digital therapeutic platform, visit hyfe.com or schedule a call here.

About Hyfe, Inc.

Hyfe, Inc. is the global leader in AI-powered cough-monitoring technology. The company’s patented machine-learning software enables passive, long-term monitoring of cough frequency, revealing novel health insights. Hyfe delivers cough-monitoring solutions that empower pharma and academic researchers to advance clinical trials, enable healthcare providers to optimize patient care, and power digital therapeutics to transform the management of respiratory illness, including chronic cough. Hyfe’s technology has been used in 50+ research studies, and its long-term partners include global pharma companies and leading academic institutions. More information is available at hyfe.com. 

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Media contact:

hyfe@ampublicrelations.com

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