COVID-19: Fabrication of autonomous flexible hybrid electronic devices for patient-monitoring

我们的工业合作伙伴有一个全新的监测设备的初步设计和测试原型。该监测补丁由一个完全自主的无线柔性混合电子电路组成，提供生命体征的实时测量。它可以远程提供体温、心电图和血氧仪测量，从而通过云计算人工智能算法揭示与COVID-19感染相关的发烧、心律失常、呼吸窘迫和血压的早期迹象。这种新一代先进的健康监测设备可以在当前大流行的情况下提供巨大的帮助，(1)通过检测疲劳和/或感染的最初迹象来保护医护人员，(2)通过实时监测患者的工具减轻医护人员的负担，并在他们的情况发生变化时自动警报，(3)为出现早期感染迹象的患者提供筛查解决方案。给他们贴片后，如果他们的情况发生变化，他们可以回家收到警报信息，并提供紧急电话号码，与医疗保健专业人员联系，讨论他们的健康状况变化以及去医院和/或诊所的必要性。在这个项目中，我们的长期工业合作伙伴需要我们在灵活混合电子制造和集成方面的独特专业知识，使用C2MI （Bromont， QC）的试验线设施。研究目标将是：(1)利用我们在数字印刷电子和试点准备组件组装和集成方面的独特专业知识，以便(2)在柔性基板上打印高精度温度传感设备和电路，以提供更准确的温度测量；(3)集成新的性能更强的可充电聚合物电池模块，以提高设备精度，延长使用寿命并降低成本。这些第一批设备将由工业合作伙伴发送给专家，以便迅速获得ii类认证，以帮助解决目前的情况。在大流行之后，很明显，该设备还将为许多其他患者监测或工人保护应用提供巨大帮助。

Our industrial partners have a preliminary design and beta-prototype for an entirely novel monitoring device. This monitoring patch consists of a fully-autonomous and wireless flexible hybrid electronic circuit providing real-time measurements of vital signs. It can remotely provide temperature, ECG and oximetry measurements, hence revealing early signs of fever, arrhytmia, respiratory distress and blood pressure connected with COVID-19 infection using cloud-computing AI algorithms. This next-generation of advanced health-monitoring devices could provide a tremendous help in the context of the current pandemic situation by (1) protecting healthcare workers by detecting the first signs of fatigue and/or infection, (2) alleviating the burden on the healthcare workers with a tool for real-time patient monitoring with automated alerts when their situation changes and (3) providing a screening solution for patients showing-up at the clinic with early signs of infection. Given a patch, they can go back home and receive an alert message if their situation evolves, with an emergency number to reach a healthcare professional and discuss changes to their health situation and the need to go to the hospital and/or clinic. In this project, our long-time industrial partners need our unique expertise in flexible hybrid electronic fabrication and integration using the pilot-line facilities at C2MI (Bromont, QC). The research objective will be: (1) to exploit our unique expertise in digitally-printed electronics and pilot-ready component assembly and integration, in order to (2) print a high-precision temperature-sensing device and circuitry on the flexible substrate to provide more accurate temperature measurements and (3) integrate a new more performant and rechargeable polymer-based battery module in order to increase device accuracy, increase lifetime and reduce costs. These first units will then be sent-out by the industrial partner to experts in order to rapidly obtain a Class-II certification in order to help the current situation. After the pandemic, it is clear that this device will also provide a tremendous help for many other patient monitoring or workers protection applications.