Sensor Insertion Tool for Needle-Free Flexible Sensor Delivery
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Solution Overview
Problem
The insertion of flexible analyte sensors through the skin is often painful and uncomfortable due to the use of piercing mechanisms, discouraging long-term use and affecting user compliance with continuous blood analyte monitoring.
Innovation Solution
A sensor insertion tool (SIT) provides motive force for inserting flexible analyte sensors into the skin without needles, using a mechanism that includes a cocking member to load energy into springs or other means like chemical reactions, allowing the sensor to be driven through the skin via a channel guide assembly.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If flexible sensors are used to improve comfort during long-term use, then user comfort is improved, but the ability to directly penetrate unbroken skin diminishes
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a delivery device as an intermediary mechanism that enables flexible sensors to penetrate skin without requiring the sensor itself to be rigid or sharp. The delivery device contains the flexible sensor and provides the necessary force and guidance to push the soft sensor through the skin barrier, resolving the contradiction between sensor flexibility and skin penetration capability.
2Object-generated harmful factors
If piercing mechanisms are used to enable sensor insertion through skin, then skin penetration capability is improved, but user discomfort and pain increase
Solution Approach 1:
The delivery device serves as a mediator that performs the skin penetration function without requiring traditional piercing mechanisms like needles. The device mechanically pushes the flexible sensor through the skin using controlled force, eliminating the need for sharp or traumatic insertion methods while maintaining effective skin penetration.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces traditional mechanical piercing systems (needles, sharp points) with a controlled mechanical pushing system. The delivery device uses a combination of mechanical force application and guidance structures to gently advance the flexible sensor through the skin, substituting harsh piercing mechanics with a more controlled and comfortable insertion process.
3Object-generated harmful factors
If rigid hollow mechanisms like needles or cannulas are used for sensor insertion, then skin penetration is achieved, but device complexity and user reluctance increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the skin penetration function from complex traditional piercing devices like needles and cannulas. The delivery device isolates and simplifies this function by using a straightforward mechanical pushing mechanism that advances the sensor through the skin without requiring the complexity of hollow structures or sharp geometric forms.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the key parameters of the insertion mechanism from rigid, sharp, hollow structures to a flexible, solid, controlled-force system. By altering the mechanical properties of the insertion approach (from piercing to pushing, from rigid to flexible), the device achieves skin penetration with reduced complexity and improved user acceptance.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This method reduces user discomfort and increases compliance with continuous monitoring by enabling painless and efficient insertion of flexible sensors, improving user experience and medical outcomes.
Implementation Method 1
a sensor hammer positioned within the sensor insertion tool and configured to be struck by a release mechanism, causing the sensor hammer to strike the sensor subassembly with sufficient force to drive the sensor through a channel in the sensor assembly and into skin without the use of means for piercing the skin prior to insertion
Data Source
AI summary
Embodiments provide a sensor insertion tool (SIT) that provides a motive force for insertion of an analyte sensor into/through skin. A SIT may be releasably locked to one or more components of a sensor insertion system, such that components of the sensor insertion system remain securely coupled during sensor insertion. A SIT may include a release member that unlocks or uncouples the SIT and the other components after sensor insertion. In various embodiments, a SIT may be a component of a sensor insertion system configured for assembly by an end user, a health care professional, and/or a caretaker prior to sensor insertion, and may act in cooperation with other sensor insertion system components. Additional components and methods of assembly and use are also provided herein.