A novel system to tackle hospital acquired pressure ulcers

Abstract

Hospital acquired pressure ulcers (HAPUs) is a major problem that affects around one in twenty patients who are admitted in hospital with sudden illness. These ulcers often occur when patients have limited mobility and cannot change positions in bed on their own. Traditionally, the occurrence of HAPUs has been minimized by turning the patient every 2 hours to alternating lateral and supine positions, and by using pressure redistributing mattresses. In many healthcare facilities, such a patient repositioning schedule is not always maintained owing to low caregiver compliance to turning protocols. Difficulty in monitoring patient position continuously, lack of turn reminders/alerts and suboptimal caregiver staffing ratio increases the occurrence of HAPUs. A novel method to address the need for improved pressure ulcer prevention is presented. The proposed method consists of a wearable device which continuously monitors the patient's position and communicates wirelessly with a tablet which enables alerts to be sent to the caregiver when a patient turn is due in accordance with the protocol adopted by the hospital. The patient's position is continuously monitored and the turning procedure carried out is logged and updated on the hospital's cloud system, thereby enabling centralized monitoring. Under a controlled setting, system was able to continuously monitor patient's position and can accurately detect standard patient positions.

Toward mitigating pressure injuries: Detecting patient orientation from vertical bed reaction forces

“…3,4 Pressure injuries can have a devastating impact on patients by reducing quality of life, 5 life expectancy, 6 as well as increasing morbidity and mortality. 7 These injuries also increase the burden on caregivers, 8 and are costly for the Canadian healthcare system with the average treatment cost of over $27,000 per pressure injury. 8 There are two widely used best practices for preventing and managing PIs: a.…”

“…There are a number of intelligent systems that have been developed to identify the need for patient repositioning in bed as a basis for providing prompts to caregivers. 7,[25][26][27][28][29][30] Existing commercially available systems fall into one of two categories: pressure mats and inertial sensors.…”

Effectiveness of a continuous patient position monitoring system in improving hospital turn protocol compliance in an ICU: A multiphase multisite study in India

“…The gateway device concurrently pushes the position data to the cloud and alerts the nurses visually via the screen display according to the hospital's turn protocol. 16 The gateway device is placed next to the patient's bedside adjacent to the vital signs monitor. Doctors and hospital administrators can access the data using a cloud-based web application.…”

“…To address this, several technologies are being developed to enable continuous patient position monitoring, which can alert nurses when the patient is due for a turn. Depth sensor, [13][14][15] wearable sensor, 12,16 and pressure sensing mat [17][18][19] are some of the sensing methodologies that have been evaluated for continuous monitoring of patient position. We decided to use a wearable sensor to continuously monitor patient's position and in collaboration with an academic research institution developed a continuous patient position monitoring system (PRESENSE).…”

“…PRESENSE was built as a readily deployable solution that could be used without any infrastructure upgrades. 16 The system was tested extensively before clinical immersion. 16 We also investigated the effectiveness and challenges faced in implementing such systems in regular care practices.…”