Proc. IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society Conference, EMBC06, In Press. Portable Gage for Pressure Ulcer Detection

Abstract — Pressure ulcers are widely considered to be a critical problem in rehabilitation since they result in severe discomfort and high healthcare cost. The prevention of pressure ulcers is a constant preoccupation for every nursing team. This paper introduces a novel handheld instrument that can detect subtle changes in the skin biomechanical properties by measuring its biomechanical response. This could be used to detect stage-I pressure ulcers and deep tissue injury. Its high bandwidth makes it possible to load the skin under wide range of conditions. The instrument is portable, inexpensive, and intrinsically precise. Several experiments were conducted to validate the function of the device. Preliminary results show that the device could effectively measure the difference in the viscoelasticity between human skin of different sites, hence paving the way for the development of clinical protocols and trials. I