Acute Health Event Verification Between IMDs and Emergency Alerts

Resolve Bottlenecks,
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions

Solution Overview

Problem

Patients experiencing acute health events such as cardiac arrest or stroke may not be able to seek medical help due to incapacitation and lack of immediate assistance, leading to high mortality rates if not treated promptly.

Innovation Solution

Implantable medical devices (IMDs) detect acute health events and communicate with verification devices or systems, such as smartphones and IoT devices, to verify the event and send alerts to emergency services.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Loss of time

If implantable medical devices detect acute health events and immediately send alerts, then response time is improved, but false alarms may increase causing unnecessary emergency responses

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveresponse timeVSAvoidalert accuracy

Core Design Contradiction:

Loss of timeVSReliability

Solution Approach 1:

A verification device acts as an intermediary between the implantable medical device and emergency services. When the IMD detects an acute health event, it sends an indication to the verification device, which then verifies the event before sending an alert to emergency services. This intermediary step reduces false alarms while maintaining rapid response times.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

Solution Approach 2:

The system implements a feedback mechanism where the verification device receives indications from the IMD, verifies the acute health event, and then determines whether to send an alert. This feedback loop ensures that only verified events trigger emergency responses, improving alert accuracy while maintaining quick response through automated verification processes.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #23Feedback

2Reliability

If verification processes are implemented to confirm acute health events, then alert accuracy is improved, but response time may be delayed

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvealert accuracyVSAvoidresponse time

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The verification device is pre-configured with verification protocols and criteria for acute health events. When an indication is received from the IMD, the verification process immediately begins using pre-established parameters, reducing the time required for verification while maintaining high alert accuracy.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The verification device autonomously verifies acute health events using automated algorithms and pre-configured criteria without requiring manual intervention. This self-service verification process maintains high alert accuracy while minimizing response time delays through rapid automated decision-making.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #25Self-service

Data Source

PatentUS12558036B2Acute health event monitoring and verification

Publication Date: 2026.02.24 MEDTRONIC INC

AI summary

Devices, systems, and techniques are disclosed for verifying the occurrence of an acute health event. An example device includes communication circuitry configured to receive a communication indicative of an acute health event of a patient and memory communicatively coupled to the communication circuitry and being configured to store the indication of the acute health event. The device includes processing circuitry communicatively coupled to the communication circuitry and the memory. The processing circuitry is configured to, in response to the communication, verify the acute health event and based on the verification of the acute health event, send an alert regarding the acute health event.