Respiratory monitoring using an air-mattress system

Abstract

This paper describes a non-invasive respiratory monitoring system using an air mattress. The air-mattress system features multiple air compartments to monitor movements of the thorax and the abdomen separately. To evaluate the performance of the air-mattress system, four subjects were selected for the study and their separate ribcage and abdominal movements were monitored simultaneously by respiratory inductive phlethysmography belts and the air-mattress system. The sensitivity and accuracy indices of the air-mattress system for the detection of hypopnoeas scored remarkably well (above 90%). In addition, it was noted that the mean error in the measurement of the respiratory rate between the two systems was very small. This paper shows that the air-mattress system can be a reliable non-invasive respiratory monitoring system to detect simple abnormalities in breathing, such as respiration rate and hypopnoeas.

The vexatious vital: Neither clinical measurements by nurses nor an electronic monitor provides accurate measurements of respiratory rate in triage

“…Respiratory rate is out of step with the other vital signs, which are measured electronically. There is a long list of proposed alternatives: capnography by mask, nasal prongs, or mouthpiece [30][31][32] ; pneumotachography (direct flow measurement) by mask or mouthpiece 33,34 ; acoustic monitoring by nasal microphones 30,35 ; nasal thermistors (temperature) 18,34,36 ; fiberoptic nasal sensors that gauge condensation during exhalation 30,37,38 ; inductive plethysmography, which measures chest wall and abdominal movement by bands encircling the trunk (extensometry) 26,33 ; single-compartment and multicompartment air mattresses that measure and compare chest and abdominal volumes [39][40][41] ; mask-mounted pyroelectric polymer strips, which detect temperature variations 32,42 ; transdermal fiberoptic photoplethysmography 30,43,44 ; and transthoracic impedance plethysmography. 13,18,26,30,32,37,[45][46][47] All of the above-mentioned modalities have been reported to correlate well with ''criterion standard'' clinical measurement of respiratory rate.…”

Oxygen Desaturation Index Estimation through Unconstrained Cardiac Sympathetic Activity Assessment Using Three Ballistocardiographic Systems

“…Piezoelectric sensor-based BCG monitoring systems were used for the unconstrained acquisition of N-N intervals. With a growing need for long-term monitoring techniques in sleep studies, ballistocardiography has been suggested as a measure for providing information on cardiac activity without disturbing sleep in an out-of-sleep laboratory environment [13,14,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24]. Many previous studies validated the usefulness of ballistocardiography for overnight heartbeat monitoring [14,17,18,19,20,22,23]; however, no study has attempted to use ballistocardiographic recording for the unconstrained estimation of the ODI.…”

Noninvasive monitoring of respiratory mechanics during sleep

“…Finally, other semiquantitative methods are used, although less frequently, to detect respiratory movements during sleep, as follows: thoracic impedance, electromyography of the respiratory muscles or the air-mattress system [29][30][31][32][33].…”