Wearable Ultrasound Neuromodulation With Bone-Aware Target Alignment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing neuromodulation technologies face challenges in effectively treating internal organs like the spleen or liver due to bone interference, such as ribs, which absorb ultrasound energy and hinder treatment, causing heating and potential nerve inhibition, necessitating a home-based therapy device that accounts for skeletal structure and ensures effective ultrasound delivery.
Innovation Solution
The development of a wearable ultrasound neuromodulation device that uses bone detection and alignment mechanisms, including multipurpose indicators and transducer arrays, to deliver ultrasound energy through ribs while minimizing heating, ensuring precise targeting and alignment with the spleen or liver.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If ultrasound energy is transmitted through bone (ribs) to reach internal organs, then treatment can be delivered to targets behind bone, but bone absorbs the ultrasound energy causing heating and potential nerve inhibition
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary bone detection and identification of safe transmission paths before delivering ultrasound therapy. The controller identifies bones in the treatment path and pre-calculates optimal transducer orientations that avoid bone interference, ensuring reliable treatment delivery without bone heating.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically adjusts transducer orientation and positioning based on real-time bone detection. The controller modifies treatment parameters and transducer angles during operation to maintain optimal paths that avoid bone absorption, preventing heating while ensuring treatment efficacy.
2Ease of operation
If a home-based wearable device is used for convenience, then patient convenience and accessibility improve, but precise alignment and accounting for skeletal structure become more difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The system incorporates bone detection feedback mechanisms that provide real-time information about skeletal structure. The controller uses this feedback to automatically adjust transducer positioning and orientation, enabling precise alignment without requiring manual expertise from patients operating the device at home.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs self-alignment by automatically detecting bone positions and adjusting transducer orientation without external intervention. The wearable device autonomously identifies safe transmission paths and configures itself for optimal treatment delivery, maintaining precision while ensuring ease of home use.
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
The device effectively delivers ultrasound therapy to the spleen or liver by avoiding bone interference, providing a safe and efficient home-based treatment for systemic inflammatory disorders, enhancing treatment efficacy and patient convenience.
Implementation Method 1
Medical transducers can transmit energy, such as electrical signals and/or pulses, to subdermal tissue to alter and/or modulate nerve activity via neuromodulation
Implementation Method 2
Bone, including the patient's ribs, can absorb ultrasound energy and may hinder or prevent treatment from reaching a target site within the volume of the rib cage
Data Source
AI summary
Ultrasound energy therapy devices, systems, and methods for the treatment of a condition via neuromodulation of a nerve in a tissue, such as a spleen or liver. A therapy device having a transducer array configured to transmit ultrasound energy to the spleen or liver for neuromodulation. One or more transducers configured to transmit and receive ultrasound energy to detect the presence of bone or air between the spleen or liver and the therapy device. Detection of an obstruction can be used to guide an operator to adjust the alignment of the therapy device with the skeletal structure of the patient to minimize reflection of the energy transmitted from the transducer array to the spleen or liver.