Antepartum Fetal Monitoring through a Wearable System and a Mobile Application
Name
technologies-06-00044.pdf
Size
3.55 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
c7491cf9d38063b1a1da5fbf505672ed
Author(s)
Signorini, Maria G.
Lanzola, Giordano
Torti, Emanuele
Magenes, Giovanni
Signorini, Maria
Fanelli, Andrea
Date Issued
April 2018
Journal
Technologies
Publisher
Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI)
Citation
Signorini, Maria et al. "Antepartum Fetal Monitoring through a Wearable System and a Mobile Application." Technologies 6, 2 (April 2018): 44 © 2018 The Authors
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Prenatal monitoring of Fetal Heart Rate (FHR) is crucial for the prevention of fetal pathologies and unfavorable deliveries. However, the most commonly used Cardiotocographic exam can be performed only in hospital-like structures and requires the supervision of expert personnel. For this reason, a wearable system able to continuously monitor FHR would be a noticeable step towards a personalized and remote pregnancy care. Thanks to textile electrodes, miniaturized electronics, and smart devices like smartphones and tablets, we developed a wearable integrated system for everyday fetal monitoring during the last weeks of pregnancy. Pregnant women at home can use it without the need for any external support by clinicians. The transmission of FHR to a specialized medical center allows its remote analysis, exploiting advanced algorithms running on high-performance hardware able to obtain the best classification of the fetal condition. The system has been tested on a limited set of pregnant women whose fetal electrocardiogram recordings were acquired and classified, yielding an overall score for both accuracy and sensitivity over 90%. This novel approach can open a new perspective on the continuous monitoring of fetus development by enhancing the performance of regular examinations, making treatments really personalized, and reducing hospitalization or ambulatory visits. Keywords: tele-monitoring; wearable devices; fetal heart rate; telemedicine
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Research Laboratory of Electronics
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.3390/technologies6020044
