724 results about "Stethoscope" patented technology

A system that includes a mobile platform and a remote station. The remote station may be a personal computer coupled to the remote platform through a broadband network. A user can control movement of the mobile platform through the remote station. A medical monitoring device such as a stethoscope or EKG monitor can be coupled to the mobile platform and used to take patient data. The data can be transmitted to the remote station by the mobile platform. The medical monitoring device(s) may be wirelessly coupled to the mobile platform. The system may include a server that can provide an electronic medical record to the remote station. The remote station may have a monitor that displays the electronic medical record and an image captured by a camera of the mobile platform. The system allows a doctor at the remote station to more fully examine a patient while viewing past medical records.

A physiological sensing stethoscope suitable for use in high-noise environments is disclosed. The stethoscope is designed to be substantially matched to the mechanical impedance of monitored physiological activity and substantially mismatched to the mechanical impedance of air-coupled acoustic activity. One embodiment of the stethoscope utilizes a passive acoustic system. Another embodiment utilizes an active Doppler system. The passive and active systems can be combined in one stethoscope enabling switching from a passive mode to an active mode suitable for use in very high-noise environments. The stethoscope is suitable for use in environments having an ambient background noise of 100 dBA and higher. The passive includes a head having a housing, a flexural disc mounted with the housing, and an electromechanical stack positioned between the housing and the flexural disc in contact with the skin of a patient. The active system detects Doppler shifts using a high-frequency transmitter and receiver.

The present invention provides a multifunction health device, which comprises a meter and a platform. The meter has two electrodes arranged separately at its two sides or both arranged at its one side, and the meter has another electrode arranged in its bottom. The platform has four electrodes arranged in its top face, and a pressure sensor arranged in its inside. With or without some parts assisting, the single use of the meter can function as an ECG detector, a TENS machine, a thermometer, and a first sphygmomanometer. Connecting with the platform, the meter and the platform can function as an ECG detector, a weight scale, and a body composition estimator. Further, the meter can alternatively connect with a chassis thus functioning as a second sphygmomanometer, a stethoscope, a glucose meter, or a pulse oximeter.

A chest piece for a stethoscope has a housing with a cavity. The cavity has a cavity surface which is paraboloid in shape, having an apex, an axis, and a focal point. The cavity terminates at the apex and an opening, and the focal point resides in the cavity. A transducer is positioned at the focal point. The parabolic shape of the cavity surface acts to reflect sound waves transmitted normal to the opening to the transducer, while reflecting other sound waves. A mechanical wave guide with a series of parallel passages preferably extends across the opening. Preferably, a membrane with a convex surface covers the opening. The cavity is preferably filled with a liquid or gel having physical characteristics similar to human flesh. To reduce noise from motion of the chest piece across the skin, the stethoscope can be activated by a pressure switch responsive to fluid pressure inside the cavity.

The invention is of a stethoscope cleansing unit and of the use of the stethoscope cleansing unit as a novel business method for promoting a marketer's logo and advertisement to medical personnel and patients in the examining room or hospital. The system attaches such advertisements to a useful and conveniently used stethoscope cleansing unit that will be used by medical personnel to sterilize stethoscope diaphragms between patient assessments, thereby preventing the spread of infectious diseases. This apparatus can be utilized in a novel business method as a way for marketers to distinguish their product from the myriad of others by 1) attracting the attention of busy medical personnel during patient examinations, which is the exact time that medical product marketers would benefit most from such attention; and by 2) attracting the attention of the patient through its presence in the examining room at a time when the patient is typically waiting for attention and has time to notice such advertisements.

A transducer system is disclosed for detecting actual or simulated body sounds. An audio signal generation and detection system is disclosed for the purposes of simulating the medical examination of a patient or simulating the listening of sounds seeming to emanate from a live or inanimate body. A signal generator sets up a voltage potential at an electrode physically attached to the body, or electrically connected to a body, thereby setting up a voltage potential on a surface area of the body. An electric field potential sensor or a capacitive electrical sensor placed in proximity to the electrode or body surface then detects the voltage potential. The signals produced by the signal generator can represent heart, lung, bowel or other sounds and the electrical sensor can take the physical form of a listening device such as a stethoscope, thereby creating a simulation of listening to body sounds for medical diagnostic purposes.

A stethoscope front-end recorder device (also referred to as Sleeve) for the chest piece of a stethoscope, which is easily installed and removed. The Sleeve covers the circumference of the chest piece of a stethoscope. The Sleeve contains sensors for acquiring biosensor parameters such as electrocardiogram, body temperature, heartbeat, heart rhythm, heart rate variability, heart rate turbulence, heart sounds, respiration, cardiac index and blood flow. The Sleeve has Bluetooth interface communicating with a mobile device with software component, interfacing with a back-end server with the capability to capture, analyze and save patient information.

The invention disclosed herein simplifies application of physiological sensors to the body. In the preferred embodiment the plurality of physiological sensors are physically attached to the back of a personal digital assistant (PDA). An operator presses the PDA single-handedly against patient's chest in such a manner that sensors are in contact with patient's skin and the PDA display faces the operator. Physiological signals are then visualized on the PDA screen. The sensors include EKG electrodes and acoustic sensors. The “EKG Stethoscope” is used to simultaneously record the audio signal from an acoustic sensor and the corresponding electrical EKG signal from EKG electrodes. The PDA analyzes EKG and acoustic signals. Further, sound from one acoustic sensor is amplified and transmitted to operator's headphones for simultaneous auscultation. Concurrent audio and visual experience greatly enhances the operator's ability to diagnose lung and heart disease. A plurality of acoustic sensors is used to localize intrathoracic sound origin. The operator looks at the PDA display for cues on abnormal sound location and sound characteristics.

A simple always-portable stethoscope for enabling accurate diagnosis. A radiation/light-receiving fiber (11) serving as a probe part for noninvasively irradiating a diseased part with near-infrared light is applied to the diseased part so as to measure, e.g., a change of the cerebral circulation blood flow. The change is hard as sound pulse modulation to examine the change of the cerebral function. For example, a light beam of three wavelengths λ=760, 800, 830 nm from a semiconductor laser light source (22) is applied to the diseased part, the reflection data from the diseased part is processed by a control device (21), and the doctor can make a diagnosis with the doctor's ears by hearing with a receiver (32) the change as the change of the frequency of the sound the pitch and volume of which are constant.

The auscultation training device enables a trainee to experience and learn various case studies without feeling the difference from the actual auscultatory action using the actual stethoscope in order to obtain the auscultatory technique. The auscultation training device 1 mainly comprises the model human body 4, which is an imitation of a human body upper torso; the stethoscope simulator 2 that the trainee 5 uses to perform the simulation of the auscultatory action on the model human body 4; an auscultatory sensor 8 which detects the auscultatory action by the trainee 5 with the stethoscope simulator 2; and the controller 3 which is connected to the stethoscope simulator 2 and the auscultatory sensor 8 respectively, whereby the controller receives the detected signals 9 of the auscultatory action transmitted from the auscultatory sensor 8, and then controls and processes signals for reproduction of vital sounds including those such as cardiac sounds and breathing sounds of the human body by a vital sound player 11 installed in ear piece 10 of the stethoscope simulator 2.

A device for converting acoustic data collected by a stethoscope into digital data for transmission to a processor for storage and/or comparison with data stored in a database, and to optionally provide computer generated suggestions for diagnosis, is provided in the form of an in-line device interposable between a head of the stethoscope and an acoustic transmission portion of the stethoscope, or is integral with the head, and advantageously has the appearance of an icon of pleasing appearance, for example, a butterfly, in which are incorporated the structural requisites of a functioning stethoscope and/or capabilities for receiving and transmitting to a diagnostician, audio signals gathered from patient examination, and optionally also other data collected at examination and/or following the examination. The butterfly-shaped device, includes a central body advantageously serving as a conduit for transmitting sound received from the patient to the physician or a remote system for analysis and diagnosis.

In the case of disease in the respiratory organs of creatures, which especially inhabit in terms of overcrowding, the danger of spreading a disease throughout the entire breeding farm is perfectly evident. The use of traditional methods, such as the stethoscope, for examining the respiratory organs of each creature, in the mode of their direct contact listening, is impossible in most due to the specific spatial arrangement of creatures in breeding farms and/or infectious danger to a veterinary. Moreover, the acoustic signs of the said illness at its early stage cannot be heard audibly with use of traditional methods. The present invention provides a novel method of ultrasound non-contact early detection of respiratory diseases in fowl and mammals, and other breathing creatures of animate nature, wherein innovative technology is applied for revealing the suspected minimal unit group with sick creature(s); wherein the said technology includes at least the following interrelated techniques: I-Stationary 3-D Surveying Technique that enables to identify vectored direction(s) to suspected sections in total creatures' inhabiting area by electronically scanning the said total area with 3-D array of ultrasonic transducers. II-Portable 2-D Inspection Technique that permits to verify disposition of perfect suspected sectional area by locating around each suspected inhabiting section with portable and hand-held ultrasonic detecting devices. III-Local 1-D Pinpointing Technique that provides for pinpointing a distinct suspected unit group, being inside an infected inhabiting sector, by a hand-held ultrasound pick-up device, equipped with extending acoustic probes for veterinary safety. Portable and Local Techniques optionally provides for use of wireless processing with Data Processing System. Spatio-Temporal compliance in applying the said techniques is being considered by operational algorithm of Data Processing System.

Disclosed is an output system for displaying an auscultatory sound signal such as heartbeat or respiratory sounds generated from the interior of a body in real time. The output system includes a stethoscope and a computer. The stethoscope includes at least a) a diaphragm to he brought into contact with a specific portion of a human body so as to vibrate according to a sound generated from the body, b) a microphone for converting the vibration of the diaphragm to an electrical sound signal, c) a signal process unit adjusting an auscultatory frequency band of the electrical sound signal from the microphone and outputting an auscultatory sound signal, d) a sound output unit for outputting a sound input from the signal process unit, and c) a signal output unit for transmitting the auscultatory sound signal output from the signal process unit to the outside. The computer displays an output signal received from the stethoscope, together with a standard sound pattern a user selects from standard sound patterns stored in a database.

In accordance with the present invention, a device and method is provided for covering and sterilizing a stethoscope or other medical instrument for safer use. The device comprises a closed housing for shielding the object to be sterilized, a means for receiving the object, a power supply, an ultraviolet light source within the housing, and a switch for controlling that lamp.

An active stethoscope or other sound detection device, including a diaphragm, at least one floating mass mounted to the diaphragm (at at least one coupling point of the diaphragm), and an acoustic transducer mounted to the floating mass. Preferably, each floating mass is configured and mounted so that as each floating mass and each coupling point of the diaphragm move in sympathy with acoustic waves (to be detected) that impinge on the diaphragm, the acoustic transducer rides with and is stabilized by the floating mass to which it is mounted and the diaphragm is stabilized by each floating mass. The acoustic transducer can be of any of many different types. For example, it can be a microphone, or an optical, capacitive, or inductive transducer. The diaphragm can have an isolating portion which absorbs acoustic surface wave energy incident thereon, or otherwise prevents or reduces transmission of acoustic surface waves through the isolating portion between regions of the diaphragm.

A small, lightweight sanitizing device that is adapted for attachment to a stethoscope. When the stethoscope is not being used the device covers the diaphragm and bell portions of the stethoscope with sanitizing pads that kill germs and prevent the spread of disease between patients that are examined with the stethoscope. When the health care provider needs to use the stethoscope, the device can be slid up a length of the stethoscope to a desired location so that the diaphragm is exposed for use. The device is advantageously produced with a narrow top that frictionally engages with the tube of the stethoscope so that the sanitizing device stays at the desired location until the user pulls the device back down over the diaphragm. The present sanitizing device can be used with both adult and pediatric stethoscopes. In an alternative embodiment, the sanitizing device is designed to be held within the front pocket of a health care provider's shirt or lab coat so that sterilization of the diaphragm and bell are achieved by simply placing the head portion of the stethoscope in the front pocket.

A “relaxoscope” (100) detects the degree of arterial endothelial function. Impairment of arterial endothelial function is an early event in atherosclerosis and correlates with the major risk factors for cardiovascular disease. An artery (115), such as the brachial artery (BA) is measured for diameter before and after several minutes of either vasoconstriction or vasorelaxafion. The change in arterial diameter is a measure of flow-mediated vasomodification (FMVM). The relaxoscope induces an artificial pulse (128) at a superficial radial artery (115) via a linear actuator (120). An ultrasonic Doppler stethoscope (130) detects this pulse 10-20 cm proximal to the point of pulse induction (125). The delay between pulse application and detection provides the pulse transit time (PTT). By measuring PTT before (160) and after arterial diameter change (170), FMVM may be measured based on the changes in PTT caused by changes in vessel caliber, smooth muscle tone and wall thickness.

A method of obtaining health data of a toilet user using one or more sensors is disclosed. One or more sensors are used by a toilet user while the toilet user is using the toilet to take health measurement readings of the user. Dynamic heart stress readings may be obtained and monitored over weeks, months and years. Rolling averages of heart function and heart health may be determined and deviations from the rolling averages may trigger notifications. Other health related measurements and functions such as temperature, respirations, heart rate, electrocardiogram, echocardiogram, and stethoscope sounds are also recorded and stored for trending and data analysis.