MATERIALS | MEDICAL
AMLALTOEWRIA RLESM Partners have developed innovative smart health patch that
OTE MEDICAL MONITORING
Together with six medical
and technology companies
Henkel has developed
an innovative smart
health patch that allows continuous,
remote and wireless monitoring of
the respiration, heart rate and soon
also temperature of patients. The
product – initially set up to monitor
the vital functions of patients with
heart failure and epilepsy – will soon
be tested for the use of monitoring
coronavirus patients in a Belgian
hospital. The partners aim to further
roll-out the technology over the next
month to respond to a potential new
coronavirus surge in autumn.
The new ‘COVID-19 smart
patch’ is the result of a collaboration
between the Belgian companies
Byte ies, Melexis, Quad Industries,
Televic and Z-Plus and the Belgian
departments of multinationals
Henkel and Nitto. All partners
provided expertise and technology
components for the 15 cm long
adhesive patch, which can easily
applied to the left side of the chest.
It has been developed especially
for skin-friendly, medical use and
contains high-tech electrodes and
conductive inks to register vital signs.
A ‘sensor dot’ located in the centre
of the patch collects the patient’s vital
signs and sends all the data to the
cloud wirelessly. A mini temperature
sensor will also be integrated soon.
The healthcare centre’s nurses and
the patient’s general practitioner or
specialist can then access this cloud
data on a user-friendly platform.
is currently tested for medical use for COVID-19 patients.
Thus, the innovative patch can
improve the patient follow-up at
home and reduces time and effort for
medical stuff in data management.
Henkel as a leading global
adhesive provider has developed
the electrodes and conductive inks.
Thanks to the innovative materials,
the patch can be used for ve days
rather than just one day. “The
innovative smart patch demonstrates
the huge potentials of printed
electronics applications and the
power of collaborative approaches
in the market”, says Stijn Gillissen,
Global Head of Printed Electronics at
Henkel. “At the moment most COVID-
19 patients’ vital signs are recorded
manually. The staff in hospitals and
care homes need to take these vital
signs several times a day and then
process the data manually. Our
system has the potential to save them
a lot of time and reduce the amount
of times they are exposed to possible
infection.”
In addition, the system also offers
great advantages to patients in
home quarantine or in care homes
as it enables to take and send
measurements automatically. They
can be certain that the measurements
are correct and they are being
monitored constantly. This means
that they can take the appropriate
action quickly and they can contact a
care provider at a healthcare centre
immediately if necessary. This can
offer great reassurance, particularly
to elderly people in retirement homes
and their families. The system will
also reassure general practitioners
and home nurses with regard to
their patients and ease some of the
monitoring burden.
The Oost-Limburg Hospital,
Belgium will be the rst medical
institution to start clinical trials with
the ‘COVID-19 smart patch’. The
hospital will start testing the patch
for about 20 of their patients in the
next weeks. Based on this test, the
partners aim to roll out the system
more widely in other hospitals and
care homes within the upcoming
months. !
JUNE 2020 | WWW.EUREKAMAGAZINE.CO.UK 33
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