Medical Device Link.

Originally Published EMDM January/February 2005

Technology News

Nexense’s biosensor platform, which monitors vital signs, can be integrated into sensor systems.

In the healthcare industry, determining what medical needs exist is just as critical as creating technology to address those needs. Nexense (New York, NY, USA) has developed a platform that can be integrated into cost-efficient sensors and sensor-based systems to extract and report vital-signs data in real time. The recently patented technology provides precise, noncontact measurement of predetermined parameters such as temperature, pressure, and other physical qualities.

The technology is based on the internal propagation of a cyclically repeating energy wave from a primary location that is received at a secondary location. The sensor detects a preset reference point in the energy wave and continuously changes the frequency of an exciter until the number of waves equals an integer. The change in frequency enables measurement of the parameter of interest.

The technology offers high accuracy and sensitivity in a platform that is amenable to incorporation in an external sensing instrument. It includes an alert function and can be equipped with a memory chip to store readings of vital functions. A recently developed example is the PartnerCare Nexaver, which monitors a couple’s vital signs as they sleep, notifying one person when it detects abnormal signs in the other.

Executives at Nexense acknowledge that high levels of accuracy and sensitivity often correlate to escalating costs. However, they emphasize that one of the product’s advantages is its cost-effectiveness in new product development, which results from the use of a core technology platform.

“Nexense’s applications use the same core technology platform as a building block, so no development starts from scratch. We can provide simple to extremely complex solutions within a quick-to-market time frame, and this translates directly into cost savings,” says the firm’s vice president Asialee Huang. “Nexense also has the ability to provide sensorless sensing. This means that the materials we use are low cost and often the element to be sensed acts as the sensor itself.”

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