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. 2022 Feb 8;10(2):318.
doi: 10.3390/healthcare10020318.

Home Respiratory Care: Design of a Prototype for Continuous Measurement at the Nasal Septum

Roshini Narayanan  1 , Evan Bender  1 , Raphael Chernoff  1 , Luis Mendoza  1 , Samuel Bernstein  1 , Emma Turner  1 , Stephen Mathai  2 , Constanza Miranda  1
Affiliations

Home Respiratory Care: Design of a Prototype for Continuous Measurement at the Nasal Septum

Roshini Narayanan et al. Healthcare (Basel). .

Abstract

Chronic respiratory diseases have been on the rise, especially due to COVID-19, extreme air pollution, and other external circumstances. Millions of people around the world suffer from progressive lung diseases and require supplemental oxygen therapy to maintain blood oxygen (SpO2) levels above 90% to prevent hypoxic episodes that can lead to further organ damage. Today, these chronic episodes are more prevalent in aging populations suffering from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorder (COPD). Existing SpO2 measurement equipment, designed to assist with treating COPD at home, are suboptimal as they cannot measure SpO2 levels continuously, meaning supplemental oxygen devices are unable to adjust oxygen flow rates to the patient's needs. These discrepancies can result in hypoxic episodes of blood oxygen levels below 90%. Following this need, our team demonstrates preliminary results of the novel placement of a SpO2 sensor in the nasal septum to allow for comfortable and sustained SpO2 measurement. This will improve the experience of home-respiratory care with continuously obtained data from a novel location.

Keywords: aging; chronic pulmonary disease; home care; oxygen therapy; pulse oximetry; quality of life; self-management; sensors; supplemental oxygen.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
(a). This figure shows the nasal SpO2 sensor CAD rendering. The upturned edges indicate where the LEDs and IR light emitters will be placed, and the curved center will follow the curve of the nasal septum. (b) shows the physical concept with the protective Ecoflex polymer binding juxtaposed against the working sensor prototype in (c). This (c) prototype is optimized for comfort and durability, and it achieved the SpO2 readings mentioned in the Results section.
Figure 2
Figure 2
This figure shows the placement of the nasal septum sensor in an imaged nose, indicating the positioning of the device within the nasal cannula. This placement was modeled on a team member.
Figure 3
Figure 3
This figure shows the results of the SpO2 sensor testing at the nasal septum. The graph shown in blue refers to the NIR spectrum, and the graph shown in red refers to the red spectrum.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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