Evaluating alternating pressure air mattress effectiveness through the measurement of skin redness and blood perfusion

Abstract

This study presents a unique method to evaluate the effectiveness of Alternating Pressure Air Mattresses (APAMs) in preventing Pressure Injuries (PIs). We employed a Laser Speckle Blood Flow and Tissue Oxygenation Imager with color image gathering capabilities by Moor Instruments to quantify skin redness and blood perfusion (flux) in a research study involving 29 healthy participants across three surgical support surfaces: foam, gel, and APAM. The methodology combined multimodal imaging with image segmentation and thresholding techniques to correlate visible skin redness with the underlying microcirculatory changes in perfusion (flux). The results showed that APAMs exhibited the most significant initial increase in redness compared to baseline but also demonstrated the faster dissipation of concentrated redness and recovery of blood perfusion (flux) after offloading. A strong correlation (r = 0.63, P < 0.001) was observed between concentrated redness and blood flux for APAMs. This approach goes beyond traditional incidence-based evaluations, providing insights into the dynamic tissue responses to different support surfaces. Our findings suggest that quantifying redness could be a practical and effective way to monitor individual patient responses to support surfaces, potentially leading to more personalized and effective PI prevention strategies.

Keywords: Alternating pressure air mattress (APAM); Erythema assessment; Multimodal imaging; Pressure injury prevention; Surgical support surfaces; Tissue recovery assessment.