Initial Comparison of Vital Signs Monitoring on the Wrist With the Ankle and Bicep

Abstract

Kangaroo care is a vital component of infant care that can lead to reduced morbidity and mortality amongst infants born prematurely. While it is known that kangaroo care, or more simply, skin-to-skin contact, can lead to better health outcomes for both the infant and the mother, the correlation between duration of kangaroo care and positive health outcomes remains a mystery. Not all mothers are able to perform kangaroo mother care, or 24-hour kangaroo care, so it is important to know how much kangaroo care is necessary to achieve positive health outcomes for infants born prematurely. To determine the relationship between maternal-infant interactions, a system of health monitoring devices is presented to measure the duration and frequency of kangaroo care, along with the effects of kangaroo care before, during, and after the act. One specific parameter of interest is the heartrate of the mother and infant. The maternal heartrate can be measured with a commercially available Garmin Venu® Sq smartwatch, but it typically cannot be worn on the wrist in NICUs due to their infection control guidelines. The viability of wearing a Garmin® smartwatch to measure maternal heartrate on the ankle or bicep compared to the wrist was determined by wearing three smartwatches simultaneously on the specified locations. It was found that the smartwatch located at the ankle undercounted the heartrate by an average of 0.5 bpm and the smartwatch located at the bicep overcounted by an average of 0.05 bpm. From statistical analysis, it was determined that the smartwatch worn at the bicep would be an acceptable alternative to wearing a smartwatch on the wrist to gather maternal heartrate data for use in the complete kangaroo care monitoring system.