Health monitoring of children. A plea for help - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: PaulW
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: March 08, 2023, 12:46:14 pm
content: Hi all,Coming to you from my blackest of days. On the 25th of February this year my 2 year old daughter and only child died of Strep A / Sepsis.I will accept any condolences but what I am really looking for is idea's. Idea's of health monitoring of children, I'm not talking about babies as products already exist for this group of children. Like the Owl bracelet.I'm talking about the 1 to 4 year old range. Kids maybe you can't strap an apple watch ontoI've talked to many parents this past week about loss. Parents who have lost due to sepsis, sids, fits and other sudden deathsI can't help but to think some of these deaths are avoidable if we had better monitoring of our children available. Especially those at risk from known health problems.I could go into a grief spiral about this or throw myself into a project and I would rather the second choice.So please give me ideas for health monitoring ,such as heart rate, temperature , blood pressure, oxygen saturation and how to practically achieve them.Thanks in advance Paul Williams

author: DC1MC
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2023, 01:14:50 pm
content: First of all my deepest condolences for your loss. Second, regarding infant monitoring solutions there are a ton of well funded startups and companies doing this: Kiddo and Owlet come to mind, and basically they have monitoring watches and socks, that are capable of monitoring and generate alerts for most important vital parameters: Pulse, temperature, oxygen saturation, even blood pressure.https://owletbaby.com/https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kiddowearable/kiddo-stay-connected-to-your-childs-wellbeingThe biggest problem is due to ENORMOUS development cost, especially regulatory certifications, these devices remain some kind of very niche, very expensive products. Another thing is as much as they try to make it easy to use and child proof, these things are in the end medical devices suitable for use by professionals, need themself constant monitoring and servicing, I have tried myself with different relatively cheap oxygen monitoring watches and devices, is extraordinarily easy to have them either not measuring anything, or giving erroneous measurements. Especially for kids that squirm and pull and bite these thing are very difficult to do properly.So this is a very tall order IMHO, AFAIK, the holly grail of patient monitoring is the multispectral camera connected to some powerful image processing and ML extravaganza, but this makes it even more expensive and unaffordable except for large well funded hospitals.But by all means, grief is a strong motivator, look into the topic and who knows where an idea may show up, good luck.DC1MC

author: tggzzz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2023, 01:48:39 pm
content: That's every parent's nightmare. I don't know how I would cope in similar circumstances.My limited understanding of sepsis is that it can be difficult to detect, can progress surprisingly rapidly, and sometimes it can't be treated. It is such an "underappreciated problem" that there have been health campaigns about it over here. If it had happened to my daughter, I probably wouldn't have reacted in time.While I haven't seen it myself, a couple of decades ago I saw my niece go through her daughter having leukaemia. In my niece's case, and I suspect some but not all others, the pain never goes away, but over time the pain becomes blunted and memories become less demanding. To that extent my niece has come through the experience.My best wishes for the future.

author: tpowell1830
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2023, 12:54:28 am
content: Quote from: PaulW on March 08, 2023, 12:46:14 pmCondolences for your loss.There is a product using cameras thta might be worth researching. I read about this five years ago and don't remember the source but a with the search phrase "camera system for monitering vital signs from a distance" I found this and other links.https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/22/11/4097Regards and hope you find what you are looking for.

author: JoeRoy
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2023, 02:07:28 am
content: I know these people, they developed a pacifier capable of doing several measures.https://transmitter.ieee.org/makerproject/view/817adhttps://www.prototypesforhumanity.com/project/bubu-digital/I also know about another project that uses radio frequency (like wifi) to capture the heartbeat up to 6 meters distant.And there is another project with a thermal camera to monitor the kid's temperature, etc.

author: Kasper
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2023, 05:13:24 am
content: Condolences for you loss. I can not imagine how hard this must be but I commend your effort to focus on finding solutions.If you want support, I recommend connecting with Patchd Medical. Cofounded by Robert who has had sepsis 18 times. I've spoken with him a couple times, he was very enthusiastic and it seemed like he'd be a great person to work with.https://www.patchdmedical.com/our-storyTheir website focusses on watches but I think they are interested in different solutions as well.Another company that might be of interest is VivaLink. They have a variety of sensors including a temperature sensor that sticks in armpit. They also seemed very friendly the couple times I spoke to them.https://www.vivalink.com/wearable-temperature-monitor