Advances in At-Home Medical Tech Can Improve Patient Care

Medical technology that is comfortable and easy to use, as well as offers improvements in data collection and connectivity, help shift the focus to prevention and create better patient outcomes.

Going back one or two decades, at-home medical technology included some home dialysis treatment, but centered mainly on respiratory issues with portable ventilators and CPAP machines. In recent years, telehealth has grown as a means of treating patients with limited access to physicians due to distance or mobility issues. “The availability of at-home technology for monitoring basics such as pulse oximetry, blood pressure, and temperature, that can easily share that data with a provider, improves the telehealth experience for the patient and the provider,” said Travis Amrine, marketing manager at I-PEX.

Technology has advanced in the consumer space, with smart personal devices that can monitor blood pressure, pulse rate, and can even do glucose sensing and provide simple ECG (electrocardiogram) results. This technology is influencing how home medical devices are being designed and improved. “We are seeing a blurring between medical and consumer products with a greater concern for general health as well as monitoring for health and fitness,” said Michael Klitzke, senior principal system architect for TE Connectivity sensors division.

TE Connectivity micro-thermocouples (MTC) are flexible fine gauge thermocouples for use wherever fast, accurate temperature measurements are required.

One of the main drivers of future home health care advancements is improving patient compliance. “In the near future, that involves integrating existing technologies into the home setting, making them user-friendly, unintrusive, comfortable, and easy to use,” said Klitzke. If there are lots of parts to connect, or if it’s uncomfortable, the patient is less likely to use it. “In respiratory, we often saw these very big masks, and recently, they’ve gotten smaller and smaller. In fact, some of them are only what’s called a nasal cannula, just to make it more comfortable to use and facilitate the compliance.”

Taking it even further, the monitoring device would not even have to be worn. Smart beds measure patient movement and get some information on respiratory rate and heart rate. TE Connectivity has demonstrated the use of piezo film integrated into a chair. By simply sitting in it, the patient’s respiratory rate, temperature, and pulse rate, can be monitored. “In this way, it’s not really interfering with the patient’s life, it’s being incorporated into the patient’s life,” said Klitzke. “We’re seeing these improvements go further and further. You could have an IR (infrared) monitor next to your bed that looks like an alarm clock and can monitor your temperature as you sleep.”

This leads to the second driver of at-home medical technology today — how data will be collected, transmitted, analyzed, and used. In recent years, cell phone cards have been incorporated into home ventilation CPAP machines that broadcast the collected data to the cloud, and ultimately to the patient’s physician. “Not only can the physician see whether the patient is using the machine, but they can see statistics as well. If they are seeing more flow impedance, they can ask the patient to come in for an appointment. For now, and into the near future, Klitzke said, the technology for remote patient monitoring will remain largely indicative, alerting the patient or the physician that additional tests or confirmation is needed, as in the way a smart watch ECG app might indicate a problem, but doesn’t replace an actual ECG.

The next phase: connectivity

In the near future, data transmission capabilities and the quality and nature of the data being transmitted will improve. Information that is collected and transmitted automatically to the physician offers numerous benefits.

• Reporting consistency and data accuracy improve when the patient isn’t required to upload the data or even call the physician.
• The focus can shift to prevention by establishing a baseline and looking for trends (to understand what is normal and what is unusual) and by having real-time analysis and patient monitoring. As more data points are gathered over time and in various circumstances (e.g., asleep, resting, awake, and active), a more complete picture evolves making it possible to notice changes sooner.
• Data that once had to be obtained on-site in a facility, such as for sleep studies, can now be gathered at home.
• Additional sensors in the home can be used to assess the patient’s environment.

Similarly to how smart home appliances are connected to a central hub that transmits data, patient data can be centralized. “You can imagine, my chair in the living room that has a data set from me just sitting. Then I go to bed, and my bed’s collecting that information. With a central hub, those data sets can be merged, and then we have a more continuous and complete look at variations in a person’s respiration rate, pulse rate, and temperature,” said Klitzke.

MINIFLEX 3-BFN from I-PEX offers low-speed signaling in a compact space.

“Many of these devices don’t require a lot of high-speed data, but that could change for devices that use higher resolution screens,” said Amrine. Screens add convenience and accessibility, but also complexity. “Does it have to be HD? Does the device need a touchscreen? At the same time, all these devices are trending towards being small, lightweight, and as cost effective as possible. They also need to be reliable, easy for the patient to use, and proven to be safe.”

As we move further out into the future, more new technology that will initially only be available to clinicians in hospitals will migrate out into homes. For example, one of the areas in respiratory that’s getting a lot of interest is analyzing the breath. Substances called metabolites are biomarkers that can be used to diagnose infections and a variety of health conditions.

“One example is acetone. If the acetone concentration in your breath starts increasing, it’s a possible sign of the onset of diabetes,” said Klitzke. “Measuring that in the breath is a simple, painless, and non-invasive way to determine that the patient needs to see a physician to evaluate whether diabetes is setting in. Today, a breath sample is harnessed and sent to a lab, and you don’t get the result for two or three weeks. Real-time analysis and patient monitoring would be much more efficient.”

The Calibrated IntraSense series of 1-French disposable catheter tip pressure sensors from TE Connectivity is designed for minimally invasive devices. The fully encapsulated pre-calibrated assembly eliminates the need for manual calibration.

Sensor technology

Klitzke explained that one of the recent improvements to sensor technology is greater sensitivity and selectivity. The latter is the ability to distinguish between materials and effects. Some technologies can already measure parts per million and are getting to parts per billion, but eventually we will get to parts per trillion. Once you get the sensitivity to those levels, being hooked up to a ventilator or a mask may not be required to analyze breath, he said.

“Sensors really provide the connection from the physical world to the electronic to the cloud, and it’s really about having that connection, being able to connect that patient to the cloud such that we can see the benefits. Some of the benefits will be looking at data analysis across populations. Another thing you’ll hear about more and more in the medical community is patient optimized therapy, which gets back to the baselining, really knowing where the patient is and seeing changes,” Klitzke said. “We’re going to learn a lot more just about health in general, because we’re going to have more data to draw upon. In turn, that data is going to lead to new innovations in sensors and new types of sensors. And new devices, such as breath metabolite analyzers.”

Visit the Preferred Supplier page for TE Connectivity and I-PEX to learn more about the company and its products.

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