Patent Application
20210393435
The present disclosure relates generally to patient monitoring devices and systems for monitoring a patient's physiology and health status. More specifically, the present disclosure relates to infant warming systems with wireless patient monitoring devices, systems, and methods that incorporate and/or pair with wireless physiological sensors configured for measuring physiological parameter information from an infant and wirelessly transmitting that information.
In the field of medicine, physicians often desire to monitor multiple physiological characteristics of their patients. Oftentimes, patient monitoring involves the use of several separate monitoring devices simultaneously, such as an electrocardiograph (ECG), a pulse oximeter, a respiration monitor, a temperature monitor, etc. Several separate patient monitoring devices are often connected to a patient, tethering the patient to multiple bulky bedside devices via physical wiring or cables. Multi-parameter monitors are also available where different sensor sets may be connected to a single monitor. However, such multi-parameter systems may be even more restrictive than separate monitoring devices because they require all of the sensors attached to a patient to be physically attached to a single monitor, resulting in multiple wires running across the patient's body. Thus, currently available patient monitoring devices often inhibit patient movement, requiring a patient to stay in one location or to transport a large monitor with them when they move from one place to another.
This Summary is provided to introduce a selection of concepts that are further described below in the Detailed Description. This Summary is not intended to identify key or essential features of the claimed subject matter, nor is it intended to be used as an aid in limiting the scope of the claimed subject matter.
In one embodiment, an infant warming system includes a bassinet having a platform configured to support an infant, at least one wireless physiological sensor configured to measure a physiological parameter from the infant and transmit physiological parameter data, and at least two radio frequency identification (RFID) readers on the infant warming system. The RFID readers are each configured to communicate with the at least one wireless physiological sensor to facilitate pairing therewith so as to enable receipt of the physiological parameter data from the wireless physiological sensors at the infant warmer system. The RFID readers each have a range distance that is less than a length of the platform and are positioned such that the wireless physiological sensor is in the range distance of at least one of the at least two RFID readers from any location on the platform.
A bassinet configured as part of an infant warming system includes a platform configured to support an infant, at least two RFID readers on the infant care device configured to communicate with at least one wireless physiological sensor to facilitate pairing therewith so as to enable receipt of physiological parameter data from the wireless physiological sensor. The RFID readers each have a range distance that is less than a length of the platform and are positioned such that a wireless physiological sensor on an infant supported on the platform is in the range distance of at least one of the at least two RFID readers from any location on the platform.
Various other features, objects, and advantages of the invention will be made apparent from the following description taken together with the drawings.
The present disclosure is described with reference to the following Figures.
Wearable wireless physiological sensors are becoming more prevalent in several patient care and physiological monitoring areas. The inventors have recognized that one challenge to implementing wireless sensors in the area of infant care is ensuring that patient monitoring data wirelessly transmitted is received and correctly associated with the patient. In neonatal care environments, such as neonatal care units (NICU), multiple patients are often cared for in a relatively small environment. Having multiple neonates wearing wireless physiological sensors and multiple receiving devices, e.g., multiple warming systems, in a small area increases the opportunity and likelihood of stray reads, where physiological data transmitted by a sensor on one infant is received by a receiving device associated with another infant. If warming systems are not properly paired, patient monitoring data transmitted by wireless sensors may be misassociated with the wrong neonate, which can cause confusion, delay in care, or worse.
Thus, accurate pairing between wireless sensors and patient monitoring devices is highly important. However, current pairing methods for wireless patient monitoring are cumbersome and error-prone. Typically, sensors need to be manually paired with a patient monitoring system or other receiving system via a user interface or by swiping the sensor near a wireless receiver, such as a near field communication (NFC) reader to initiate the pairing process. Labor and delivery and NICU environments present particularly challenging environments in that they are often crowded and hectic where caregivers are caring for multiple patients at any given time. Manual pairing requires the caregiver to stop patient care and pair a sensor before placing it on the infant. This is a distraction from critical care. Moreover, where multiple patients are within range of the wireless sensor and communication protocols are utilized that allow pairing from a distance, the opportunity for stray reads and improper pairing presents itself.
In view of the foregoing challenges and problems in the relevant art, the inventors have developed the disclosed system and method which allow pairing between receiving devices and wireless sensors and allow reading of RFID tags on the wireless sensors only in a limited area encompassing the infant care device, such as the incubator or warmer, in which the infant is housed. The disclosed system and method allows the clinician to simply attach a wireless physiological sensor to an infant housed in an infant warming system, where the infant warming system is configured to automatically detect and facilitate pairing with that wireless physiological sensor. In one embodiment, the infant warming system has multiple radio frequency identification (RFID) readers in the bassinet housing the infant, where the RFID readers are positioned such that each of the at least one wireless physiological sensors is in a range distance of at least one of the RFID readers for purposes of pairing from any location on the platform. In one embodiment, the RFID readers are NFC readers and configured to exchange information to execute at least a portion of the pairing, such as to exchange encrypted pairing information, via NFC such that the system can automatically enable pairing between the wireless physiological sensor and the infant warming system. In certain embodiments, completion of the pairing process and communication of physiological information between the infant warming system and wireless physiological sensor may be executed through a different wireless communication protocol than the pairing initiation executed by the above-mentioned RFID readers on the bassinet, such as Bluetooth.
In one embodiment, a bassinet having a platform configured to support an infant includes at least two RFID readers on the infant care device on or around the platform, where the RFID readers each have a range distance for purposes of pairing that is less than a length of a platform. The at least two RFID readers are positioned such that each wireless physiological sensor on an infant in the bassinet is in a range distance of at least one of the two RFID readers from any location on the platform. For instance, the RFID readers may be high-frequency RFID (HF RFID) readers, such as NFC circuits, positioned such that each wireless physiological sensor on an infant housed in the infant warming system is within the range distance of at least one of the HF RFID reader from any location on the platform, wherein the HF RFID readers are positioned to minimize overlap of the ranges.
The sensor controller 10 is configured to receive and process the physiological information from the sensing element 4, such as to filter and digitize the information, as well as to process the digital signal to extract relevant physiological values therefrom. The sensor controller 10 may include a processor as well as signal processing elements, including filters, amplifiers, or the like as is required or appropriate for processing the type of physiological information that the sensing element 4 is configured to detect. In certain types of physiological sensors 2, the sensor controller 10 may be configured to determine a discrete value based on the physiological parameter information received from the sensing element 4, such as a heart rate, respiration rate, SpO2, temperature, etc.
A wireless transmitter 9 (which may also be a transmitter/receiver or transceiver) communicates the recorded physiological parameter values and other information to the infant warming system 20, such as a patient monitoring subsystem incorporated therein and configured to receive the physiological measurements. The transmitter 9 is configured to communicate the physiological information to the infant warming system 20 by a wireless communication means, which may include any appropriate wireless communication protocol. In one embodiment, the infant warming system 20 is also configured to communicate information to the sensor, and thus is configured with a transceiver 22 that communicates with a transceiver 9 in the physiological sensor 2. In one embodiment, the transceiver 22 is configured as a body area network with one or more transceivers 9 in one or more physiological sensors 2 on the patient. In other embodiments, the physiological sensor 2 and infant warming system 20 may communicate by other radio protocols, such as but not limited to Bluetooth, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), ANT, and Zigbee.
The sensor 2 and infant warming system 20 may be configured to utilize a different wireless protocol for pairing than for transmission of physiological data, where the pairing protocol is preferably a wireless protocol requiring close-range communication such as near field communication (NFC). Thereby, problems of mispairing based on stray reads can be mitigated or avoided entirely. Accordingly, the infant warming system may include one or more RFID readers 29 configured for RFID communication and having a close communication range distance—e.g., 10 cm where NFC is utilized or other ranges due to HF RFID configured with a short-range distance (e.g., with a maximum range distance between 5 cm and 20 cm).
Thereby, the RFID readers 29 are only capable of pairing communication with wireless physiological sensors 2 located on an infant within that infant warmer system 20 and not on an infant in another warmer system nearby. Moreover, the system may be configured to easily and automatically facilitate pairing between a wireless sensor 2 and the infant warming system 20, where the system 20 is configured to detect a new sensor on the infant 1 housed therein. Given the short detection range of the RFID readers 29, identification of the sensors only on the infant 1 housed in the system 20 can be guaranteed. This can facilitate an easy pairing operation for new sensors, where a clinician simply puts the new sensor on the infant and the system 20 is configured to automatically initiate and facilitate pairing. Similarly, the system 20 may be configured to automatically detect and pair with all sensors on an infant 1 when that infant is placed in the warming system 20.
The wireless physiological sensor 2 includes an RFID transmitter 8, which may be an RFID transceiver, configured to communicate with the one or more RFID readers 29 positioned in the warmer system 20, such as on or around the platform 112. For example, the RFID transmitter 8 may be an NFC transmitter, such as an NFC circuit. In other embodiments, the RFID transmitter 8 may be configured for communication via a different protocol, such as via HF RFID and configured for communication only over a short-range distance. The RFID transmitter 8 may be a separate device from the receiver/transmitter 9, where the RFID transmitter 8 is configured for shorter range communication and the transceiver 9 is configured for longer-range communication. In other embodiments, one radio communication system may be provided and capable of communicating via two different protocols—e.g., a shorter range protocol for pairing (or at least a portion of the pairing process) and a longer range protocol for communicating physiological parameter data etc.
In the exemplary incubator system of
In the examples, the system 20 includes a body temperature probe 2a removably fixed to the infant's torso, such as to the infant's abdomen, to measure a body temperature of the infant 1, and includes a peripheral temperature probe 2b removably fixed to the infant's extremity to measure a peripheral temperature of the infant 1. Each temperature probe 2a, 2b has a respective temperature sensing element thermally contacting and detecting a temperature at a particular location on the infant's skin. In the particular embodiment, the body temperature probe 2a comprises an adhesive connection on the bottom side 14′ of the substrate 14 adhering the wireless body temperature sensor 2a to the skin of an infant's torso, such as above the infant's liver. In the depicted embodiment, the peripheral temperature probe 2b has a fixation band fixing the peripheral temperature sensor 2b to the infant's hand.
The incubator 20′ contains one or more RFID readers 29 configured to communicate with RFID transmitters 8 in the wireless sensors (e.g., 2a and 2b) for purposes of recognizing sensors 2 and/or for pairing. For example, each RFID reader 29 may be an NFC circuit 29 that emits an NFC field. The temperature sensors 2a and 2b each incorporate an NFC circuit as the RFID transmitter 8, which each emit their own field. Thus, when one of the sensors 2a, 2b are in within range of the NFC field when the sensor 2a, 2b is in close proximity to the NFC circuit 29. Pairing between each temperature sensor 2a, 2b and the host controller 24 of the incubator 20′ is then executed. Once pairing occurs, the temperature of the microenvironment 119 maintained in the incubator 20′ can be controlled based on the infant's temperature.
The infant warming system 20 may include a host controller 24, which may be configured to process and/or display physiological data recorded by the sensors 2 (e.g. temperature sensors 2a and 2b). The infant warming system 20 may include a user interface 26, such as for displaying the physiological information recorded by the sensor 2. The user interface may include a display device and may also include one or more speakers 27 or buzzers for generating an audio alert. The user interface 26 may further be configured to facilitate pairing between the infant warming system 20 and the sensors 2. For example, the user interface 26 may be configured to collect user approval or instruction for pairing. For example, the controller 24 may operate the user interface 26 to display a list of all wireless sensors 2 within range of all of the RFID readers 29 in the infant warming device 20. The user interface 26 may be configured to receive a user selection input from a user to select one of the physiological sensors for pairing.
In one embodiment, the range distance of communication between the wireless physiological sensor 2 and infant warming system 20 for purposes of pairing is less than the length of a platform 112 in the infant warming system 20. In another embodiment, the range distance of communication between the wireless physiological sensor 2 and infant warming system 20 for purposes of pairing is less than the width of the platform 112 in the infant warming system 20.
This written description uses examples to disclose the invention, including the best mode, and also to enable any person skilled in the art to make and use the invention. Certain terms have been used for brevity, clarity and understanding. No unnecessary limitations are to be inferred therefrom beyond the requirement of the prior art because such terms are used for descriptive purposes only and are intended to be broadly construed. The patentable scope of the invention is defined by the claims, and may include other examples that occur to those skilled in the art. Such other examples are intended to be within the scope of the claims if they have features or structural elements that do not differ from the literal language of the claims, or if they include equivalent features or structural elements with insubstantial differences from the literal languages of the claims.
