A team of researchers at the University of California San Diego has developed a new and improved wearable ultrasound patch that can be used for continuous and non-invasive blood pressure monitoring. The work marks a major milestone as the device is the first wearable ultrasound blood pressure sensor to undergo rigorous and comprehensive clinical validation on more than 100 patients.
According to the researchers, the technology has the potential to improve the quality of cardiovascular health monitoring in the clinic and at home. ‘Traditional blood pressure measurements with a cuff, which are limited to providing one-time blood pressure values, can miss critical patterns,’ said Sai Zhou, a recent PhD graduate in materials science and engineering at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering. ‘Our wearable patch offers a continuous stream of blood pressure waveform data, allowing it to reveal detailed trends in blood pressure fluctuations.’
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The patch is a soft and stretchy device, about the size of a postage stamp, that adheres to the skin. When worn on the forearm, it offers precise, real-time readings of blood pressure deep within the body. The patch is made of a silicone elastomer that houses an array of small piezoelectric transducers sandwiched between stretchable copper electrodes. The transducers transmit and receive ultrasound waves that track changes in the diameter of blood vessels, which are then converted into blood pressure values.
The wearable ultrasound patch builds upon an earlier prototype that was pioneered by the lab of Sheng Xu, a professor in the Aiiso Yufeng Li Family Department of Chemical and Nano Engineering at UC San Diego. Researchers re-engineered the patch with two key improvements to enhance its performance for continuous blood pressure monitoring. First, they packed the piezoelectric transducers closer together, enabling them to provide wider coverage so they could better target smaller arteries such as the brachial and radial arteries, which are more clinically relevant. Second, they added a backing layer to dampen redundant vibrations from the transducers, resulting in improved signal clarity and tracking accuracy of arterial walls.
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In tests, the device produced comparable results to a blood pressure cuff and another clinical device called an arterial line, which is a sensor inserted into an artery to continuously monitor blood pressure. While the arterial line is the gold standard for blood pressure measurement in intensive care units and operating rooms, it’s highly invasive, limits patient mobility and can cause pain or discomfort. The patch provides a simpler and more reliable alternative, as shown in validation tests conducted on patients undergoing arterial line procedures in cardiac catheterisation laboratories and intensive care units.
Researchers conducted extensive tests to validate the patch’s safety and accuracy. A total of 117 subjects participated in studies that evaluated blood pressure across a wide range of activities and settings. In one set of tests, seven participants wore the patch during daily activities such as cycling, raising an arm or leg, performing mental arithmetic, meditating, eating meals and consuming energy drinks. In another cohort of 85 subjects, the patch was tested during changes in posture, such as transitioning from sitting to standing. Results from the patch closely matched those from blood pressure cuffs in all tests.
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The patch’s ability to continuously monitor blood pressure was evaluated in 21 patients in a cardiac catheterisation laboratory and four patients who were admitted to the intensive care unit after surgery. Measurements from the patch agreed closely with results from the arterial line, showcasing its potential as a non-invasive alternative.
‘A big advance of this work is how thoroughly we validated this technology, thanks to the work of our medical collaborators,’ said Xu. ‘Blood pressure can be all over the place, depending on factors like white coat syndrome, masked hypertension, daily activities or use of medication, which makes it tricky to get an accurate diagnosis or manage treatment. That’s why it was so important for us to test this device in a wide variety of real-world and clinical settings. Many studies on wearable devices skip these steps during development, but we made sure to cover it all.’
The research team is preparing for large-scale clinical trials and plans to integrate machine learning to further improve the device’s capabilities. Efforts are also underway to validate a wireless, battery-powered version for long-term use and seamless integration with existing hospital systems.
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The research has been published in Nature Biomedical Engineering.