Wearable device for continuously monitoring respiratory rate

Abstract

A wearable device for continuously monitoring the respiratory rate of a patient, comprises three inertial sensors (10, 11, 12), the first inertial sensor (10) is positioned on the abdomen (13), the second inertial sensor (11) is positioned on the thorax (14), and the third inertial sensor (12) is positioned on a part of the body (15) not subject to respiratory movements, fixed with respect to thetorso. Each inertial sensor (10, 11, 12) comprises an accelerometer, a magnetometer, and a gyroscope. Each inertial sensor (10, 11, 12) comprises a microprocessor (21) connected to the accelerometer,magnetometer, and gyroscope. The microprocessor (21) is connected to a transmitter (22) and is configured to process the signals and supply to the transmitter (22) a signal represented by a quaternionthat describes the orientation of the three inertial sensors with respect to the Earth's reference system. A receiver (30) connected to a control centre (31) is configured to receive the abdominal quaternion of the first inertial sensor, the thoracic quaternion of the second inertial sensor, and the reference quaternion of the third inertial sensor and is configured to send them to the control centre (31). The control centre (31) is configured to process the quaternions received, so that the abdominal quaternion and the thoracic quaternion will be referenced to the reference quaternion. The control centre (31) comprises a band-pass adaptive filter (55, 56) that filters the signals represented by the abdominal quaternion and by the thoracic quaternion to eliminate the residual components linked to the movements of the patient. The control centre (31) is configured to calculate the respiratory rate from the signals represented by the filtered abdominal quaternion and the filtered thoracic quaternion.

Description

technical field [0001] The present invention relates to a wearable device for continuous monitoring of respiration rate and a corresponding method. Background technique [0002] Respiratory rate is a basic factor of prognosis which provides important information about a person's health. Many pathological conditions of the heart and lungs, especially pneumonia and asystole, affect respiratory rate and can be predicted by persistent monitoring of respiratory rate. [0003] Currently, there is a lack of suitable and accurate equipment for long-term assessment of respiratory rate during daily activities, both in the hospital setting and at home. [0004] Previous studies have demonstrated the feasibility of estimating respiration rate using a single accelerometer, as well as increasingly complex systems placed on the chest or abdomen. However, these systems have the limitation that they cannot be used under dynamic conditions (eg when the patient is walking), and therefore the...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

However, these systems have the limitation that they cannot be used under dynamic conditions (for example, when the patient is walking), and thus they cannot provide continuous respiration rate monitoring during daily activities

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