Patent ID: 8308654

Claim:
An apparatus for use in sensing continuous pressure-related signals derivable from locations inside or outside a human or animal body or body cavity, wherein the apparatus comprises the following components: a) a pressure sensor with a pressure sensing element to receive said pressure related signals, b) a pressure transducer connected to the pressure sensor and configured to transform said pressure-related signals into digital pressure-related signals, c) a processing unit with input means for receiving said pressure-related digital signals from the pressure transducer, wherein the processing unit is configured to operate based on an operational method provided through use of a firmware therein or by use of plug-in software related memory therein, said operational method enabling the processing unit to provide at output means thereof one or more of the following time sequence parameters during selectable time sequence windows of said pressure-related signals: mean wave amplitude (TS.MeanWavedP), mean wave latency (TS.MeanWavedT), mean wave rise time coefficient (TS.MeanWaveRT), mean amplitude (TS.MeandP), mean latency (TS.MeandT), mean rise time coefficient (TS.MeanRT), mean single wave pressure (TS.Mean SW P), d) at least one of: d1) a display unit connected to said output means for selectively displaying said one or more parameters, and d2) information transfer means connected to said output means and enabling transferal of information to an external unit of at least said one or more parameters, and e) means for supplying power to power consuming parts of the device, wherein the processing unit comprises a signal sampling means connected to an output of the pressure transducer, a signal converter means communicating with the sampling means and configured to deliver digital data to identifying means, said identifying means configured to present non-excluded time sequence windows to computing means, said computing means configured to provide time sequence parameters to analyzing means, the output of the analyzing means being parameter signals to the output means of the processing unit, and wherein the identifying means is configured to i) identify all separate peaks and valleys, ii) based on general methods criteria provide non-excluded peak and valleys pairs, iii) based on single wave and delta single wave criteria provide non-excluded single pressure waves, and iv) based on time sequence and delta time sequence criteria to provide said non-excluded time sequence windows to said computing means.