According to the results published this month in the journal PLoS One Rate can reliably measure respiratory rate by an average of 9.9 seconds. Currently, health care workers often measure respiratory rate by counting breaths of the patient for 60 seconds with a stopwatch.
"Mobile phones are changing the way we manage health care, especially in rural areas and in countries where access to medical equipment limited development," says Dr. Walter Karlen, who co-led the study, Dr. Heng Gan. "With this application, we can in the health sector with few resources provide a faster and more accurate measurements to help them make better decisions, and them. More time with their patientT's"
Dr. Karlen is a postdoctoral UBC. At the time of the study, Dr. Jan was a Fellow of clinical research. Both work with Dr. Mark Ansermino and Dr. Guy Dumont CFRI, UBC and BC Children.(BD IT TALK)
The researchers say that this simple piece, but innovative technology is an important step towards a better diagnosis of children with pneumonia and other respiratory diseases. Pneumonia is the biggest killer of children worldwide, according to the World Health Organization. With early and accurate diagnosis, children with pneumonia often by simple measures, such as antibiotics are saved. ADVERTISING
The route allows workers, respiratory rate touching the screen when the child breathes measure. In addition to the calculation of the inhalation rate for a given time, providing the application to breathe an animation of an infant, which allows the direct comparison with the patient's breathing. A free version is no study on the application available online.
"We rely on the performance of your computer, touch screen and vibration feedback to measure more confidence quickly and respiratory rate," says Dr. Karlen.
The researchers collected data from 30 subjects using the app while you videos of children breathe at different rates. With these findings, an algorithm to produce the application of precise measurements in the shortest time allowed they developed.
The next step in this research is to improve the diagnosis of pneumonia in community resources by combining this application with the Phone Oximeter. Developed by researchers at UBC and CFRI offers phone oximeter, non-invasive measurements of blood oxygen levels with a light sensor and a mobile phone.
