A new device being developed by scientists at the University of Akron will enable the early diagnosis of heart failure, the leading cause of death in the U.S.
Associate professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Akron, Kye-Shin Lee, started the project in collaboration with Masoud Nazari, a doctoral student in Akron after receiving funding from the National Institute of Health.
“One of the technologies that can prevent heart failure is this kind of long-term electrocardiogram (ECG) monitoring,” Lee said. “There is a lot of conventional monitoring devices, but since they have a large size and they have a high-power consumption, this kind of a heavy device for a long time can give discomfort to the patient.”
The Center for Disease and Control Prevention says about 6.2 million adults in the United States suffer of heart failure. And In 2018, heart failure was mentioned on 379,800 death certificates.
In Ohio, 30,658 people died of heart failure in 2021, positioning the state on the top 7 in the CDC’s Heart Disease Mortality by state.
Lee said the department has been working on different sensing applications including touch sensors, water quality sensors and biomedical sensors for ECG and electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring.
The goal is to use integrated circuits to create a device able to measure heart rates and detect any abnormality with a “desire performance” by eliminating the motion that affect the ECG waveform caused by various body movements, while maintaining low power consumption in a small device at a low cost.
“Our main research focus is on integrated circuits. So, we think that if we use the integrated circuit technology on health care devices, we think we can get a better performance and then also we can make the device low power in a small area,” Lee said.
Lee explained the advantage of integrated circuits is the option to integrate many components in a very small area, allowing it to last longer without changing batteries. This monitoring device could last up to a year, compared to other ambulatory ECG devices that can only be used for a couple of days or weeks.
However, Lee said that a requirement of ambulatory devices is to eliminate the motion detected by the device to provide an accurate measurement.
“We record the ECG while the person is doing a routine work, like using the computer…walking or running and sleeping,” Lee said. “And for most of the motions, the research was pretty good. We observe that for different motions, our circuit can properly eliminate the motion artifacts.”
Because of the size of the device, Lee believes that this will allow not only ambulatory ECG devices to implement the “motion artifacts” technology, but also the technology can be added to improve any monitoring devices, such as Apple watches or Samsung watches.
“Right now, we just have our device that is…separate,” says Lee. “But in the future, this can be included in commercial health monitoring devices — like it can be incorporated into Apple Watch or Samsung Watch or Fitbit.”
Lee said the device not only will last longer than conventional ECG devices, but the production could be low-cost. With a higher volume of production, the price of the device would go down. The estimate to make these devices, with a high production volume, would be under $100.
Currently, the device is still being researched to ensure it functions properly. However, Lee would like to extend the functionality to more than just a monitoring device.
The plan is to add a wireless communication to send the recorded data automatically. Also, Lee would like to add an ECG classifier, so the device can automatically detect abnormalities in the heart. This would allow for a prompt diagnosis in case the patient is at risk of heart failure.
“We’re just able to verify that our technology can properly work and then it has a potential for a commercial device,” Lee said. “That can be one option for us — finding an industry partner to actually commercialize this technology.”
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