SBIR Phase I: Pressure Map Analytics for Ulcer Prevention

小企业创新研究第一阶段项目旨在建立一个系统，以加强对患者S身体压力特征的了解，从而为医院工作人员提供预防压疮的辅助/认知支持。该项目的智力优势是一项使能技术，它将分析集成到一个软件平台中，用于监测、预防和管理压疮。研究工作将集中于实施全身压力分布数据收集、姿势分类、肢体跟踪、风险评估、转弯时间表利用和患者状态报告的模块。这个项目的预期结果是一个软件平台，可以作为护理人员更有效地监测高危患者的辅助技术工具。该平台将与市场上的压力垫系统很好地合作，具有以下能力：(I)在符合HIPPA的服务器中接收客户(例如医院)从压力垫收集的数据(原始压力图像)；(Ii)对上传的数据应用图像处理/增强技术，以便分析能够以合理的精度运行；以及(Iii)提供关键分析数据，以改善护理者对患者状况的认知，并帮助他们为风险评估和溃疡预防做出信息决策。该项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力将是创建一个商业可行的软件包，用于监测、预防和管理最昂贵的急性健康状况之一--压疮--或压疮。不幸的是，由于过度劳累的护理人员经常错过转诊病人，特殊床垫和压力图系统的稀缺性和高昂的成本，以及更重要的是护士/医生难以解释压力图像，传统技术并不是非常成功。统计数据显示，美国医院和疗养院(300万-600万)的患者中有11%-23%患有压疮，每年给我们的医疗系统造成的损失超过12亿美元。总的来说，压疮对我们的医疗保健系统来说是一个巨大的负担，尤其是对医疗保健提供者(例如医院和辅助生活之家)来说是一个巨大的问题。这项SBIR提案通过向医疗保健社区提供一项重要技术，有可能产生重大影响。潜在的社会和商业影响包括：(A)有效的溃疡预防，这将显著提高生活质量，减少患者的痛苦和不适；以及(B)与压疮相关的不断上升的医疗成本显著降低。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project aims to build a system that enhances understanding of the patient?s body pressure characteristics, such that it can provide assistive/cognitive support to hospital staff to prevent pressure ulcer. The intellectual merit of this project is an enabling technology that integrates analytics within a software platform for monitoring, prevention and management of pressure ulcers. Research efforts will focus on implementation of modules for whole-body pressure distribution data collection, posture classification, limb tracking, risk assessment, turning schedule utilization and patient status reporting. The anticipated result of this project is a software platform that can be employed as an assistive technology tool by caregivers for monitoring at-risk patients more effectively. This platform will work well with the pressure mat systems in the market, with the following abilities: (i) to receive data (raw pressure images) collected from pressure mats by customers (e.g. hospitals) in a HIPPA-compliant server; (ii) to apply image processing/enhancement techniques on uploaded data so that the analytics can run with a reasonable accuracy; and (iii) to provide key analysis data that improves caregiver cognition of the status of patient and assist them in making informative decisions for risk assessment and ulcer prevention.The broader impact/commercial potential of this project will be to create a commercially viable software package for monitoring, prevention and management of one of the most costly, acute health conditions, pressure ulcers - or bed sores. Unfortunately, conventional techniques have not been very successful due to overworked nursing staff who frequently miss turning patients, scarcity and high cost of special mattresses and pressure map systems and more importantly difficulty of interpreting pressure images by nurses/doctors. Statistics show that 11-23% of the patients in hospitals and nursing homes (3-6 million) in the United States develop pressure ulcers that cost our healthcare system more than $1.2 billion annually. Pressure ulcers represent an enormous burden on our healthcare system, in general, and an enormous problem for healthcare providers (e.g. hospitals and assisted-living homes) in particular. This SBIR proposal has the potential to have a significant impact by offering an important technology to the healthcare community. The potential societal and commercial impact includes: (a) effective ulcer prevention that will dramatically enhance quality of life and reduce patient suffering and discomfort; and (b) significant decrease in ever-escalating healthcare cost related to pressure ulcers.