BLOOD PRESSURE MEASURING AUXILIARY DEVICE AND BLOOD PRESSURE MEASURING APPARATUS, AND DESIGN METHOD THEREFOR

Abstract

A blood pressure measuring auxiliary device, a blood pressure measuring apparatus and a design method therefor are provided. During a blood pressure measurement, the measured pressure values and beating sound are recorded, so that the recorded pressure values and sound may be played back, which improves the accuracy of the auscultatory method; and the parameters used in the oscillometric method may be adjusted, which improves the accuracy of the oscillometric method. The blood pressure measuring auxiliary device is arranged so that it can be connected with a pressuring device of a sphygmomanometer (5), and comprises a sensing module (1), a communication module, and an audio collection module (2). The sensing module (1) is used for sensing the pressure at the joint between the blood pressure measuring auxiliary device and the pressuring device and outputting a pressure signal to the communication module. The communication module is used for receiving the pressure signal to be transmitted thereby to a terminal apparatus (6). The audio collection module (2) is used for collecting the sound at a measured site and outputting an audio signal to the terminal apparatus (6).

Claims

1-37. (canceled)

38. A measuring auxiliary device for blood pressure measurement, wherein the measuring auxiliary device is arranged to be connected with a pressuring device of a sphygmomanometer, and comprises a sensing module and a communication module; the sensing module is used for sensing the pressure at the joint between the measuring auxiliary device and the pressuring device and outputting a pressure signal to the communication module; the communication module is used for receiving the pressure signal which is then transmitted to a terminal apparatus.

39. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 38, wherein the sensing module comprises a pressure sensor via which the pressure at the joint between the measuring auxiliary device and the pressuring device is sensed.

40. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 38, further comprising an operation module used for pre-processing the pressure signal and transmitting the pre-processed pressure signal to the communication module to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

41. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 40, wherein the operation module determines the blood pressure values by the oscillometric method according to the pressure signal and transmits the blood pressure values to the communication module to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

42. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 38, wherein the audio collection module is used for collecting the sound at the measured site and outputting an audio signal to the terminal equipment.

43. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 42, wherein the sensing module comprises a pressure sensor via which the pressure at the joint between the measuring auxiliary device and the pressuring device is sensed.

44. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 43, further comprising an operation module for pre-processing the pressure signal and transmitting the pre-processed pressure signal to the communication module to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

45. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 44, wherein the operation module determines the blood pressure values by the oscillometric method according to the pressure signal and transmits the blood pressure values to the communication module to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

46. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 42, wherein the audio collection module comprises a conversion module to pre-process the collected sound.

47. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 42, wherein the audio collection module transmits the audio signal to the communication module to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

48. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 44, wherein the audio collection module transmits the audio signal to the operation module to be transmitted thereby directly or after pre-processing to the communication module, then to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

49. The measuring auxiliary device according to claim 48, wherein the operation module determines the blood pressure values with the auscultatory method according to the pressure signal and the audio signal or/and with the oscillometric method according to the pressure signal, and transmits the blood pressure values determined with the auscultatory method or/and the oscillometric method to the communication module to be transmitted thereby to the terminal apparatus.

50. A blood pressure measuring apparatus, comprising a pressuring device used for pressurizing and depressurizing a measured site; a sensing module used for connecting with the pressuring device to sense the pressure at the joint and output a pressure signal; an audio collection module used for collecting the sound at the measured site and outputting an audio signal; a master unit used for connecting with the sensing module and the audio collection module to receive and process the pressure signal and the audio signal.

51. The blood pressure measuring apparatus according to claim 50, wherein the pressuring device comprises a pressure-applying component directly acting on the measured site, and the audio collection module is partially or completely disposed within or outside of the pressure-applying component.

52. The blood pressure measuring apparatus according to claim 50, wherein the sensing module comprises a pressure sensor via which the pressure at the joint between the pressure sensor and the pressuring device is sensed.

53. The blood pressure measuring apparatus according to claim 50, further comprising an image output module for numerically and/or graphically displaying the pressure signal and/or the audio signal.

54. The blood pressure measuring apparatus according to claim 53, further comprising an audio output module used for playing the audio signal and the audio formed by processing of the audio signal.

55. The blood pressure measuring apparatus according to claim 50, wherein the master unit determines the blood pressure values with the auscultatory method and/or the oscillometric method, and the blood pressure values are displayed by the image output module or/and are played by the audio output module.

56. A design method for blood pressure measuring apparatus, wherein a sensing module, an audio collection module, and a master unit connected with the sensing module and the audio collection module are provided; the sensing module is used for sensing the pressure at a measured site and outputting a pressure signal; the audio collection module is used for collecting the sound at the measured site and outputting an audio signal; the master unit receives and processes the pressure signal and the audio signal.

57. The design method according to claim 56, wherein the following modes are employed to determine the blood pressure values: Mode 1, the blood pressure values are determined by the master unit with the auscultatory method according to the pressure signal and the audio signal; Mode 2, the blood pressure values are determined artificially with the auscultatory method according to the image outputted by the image output module obtained based on the pressure signal and the audio signal and the sound outputted by the audio output module; Mode 3, the blood pressure values are determined by the master unit with the oscillometric method according to the pressure signal, wherein the parameters used in the oscillometric method can be adjusted.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0066] FIG. 1 is a graph of the frequency distribution of measurement deviations of a certain brand sphygmomanometer;

[0067] FIG. 2 is a graph of the curve coordinates of normalization values of the amplitude parameter method;

[0068] FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of a blood pressure measuring auxiliary device of the present invention, with the sphygmomanometer and the mobile phone that may be used with it being shown;

[0069] FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of the structure of an access component of the blood pressure measuring auxiliary device shown in FIG. 3;

[0070] FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of connections between the blood pressure measuring auxiliary device shown in FIG. 3, the sphygmomanometer and the mobile phone;

[0071] FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of a sphygmomanometer according to the present invention;

[0072] FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of a host system architecture of the sphygmomanometer shown in FIG. 6;

[0073] FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of an operator interface of the sphygmomanometer shown in FIG. 6; and

[0074] FIG. 9 is another schematic diagram of the operator interface shown in FIG. 8.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

[0075] The blood pressure measuring auxiliary device and the blood pressure measuring apparatus of the present invention is further illustrated below by the specific embodiments, in order to fully appreciate the objects, features, design methods and effects of the present invention.

Embodiment 1

[0076] This embodiment is a measuring auxiliary device for blood pressure measurement according to the present invention, which mainly solves the problem that the user cannot obtain the initial data when making the measurement using the existing sphygmomanometer products. An upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer is used as an example in this embodiment, but it is not limited to the upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer. Other sphygmomanometers with different pressuring manners and for different measured sites such as mercury sphygmomanometer and wrist electronic sphygmomanometer may also be used, as long as a pressuring device is provided in the used sphygmomanometer.

[0077] As shown in FIG. 3, within the solid box is a measuring auxiliary device according to the present invention, which is used in conjunction with an upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer 5, wherein the measuring auxiliary device includes an access component 1, a microphone 2, an air tube 3 and a stethoscope 4. The microphone 2 is connected with the stethoscope 4 through the air tube 3, the microphone 2 is provided at one end with a headset plug connected with the mobile phone 6, so as to form an audio collection module. In this embodiment, the mobile phone 6 is used as a terminal apparatus, but it is not limited to the use of the mobile phone, intelligent apparatus in our daily life such as computer and a tablet computer or new wearable apparatus such as bracelet and wrist watch also may be used.

[0078] As shown in FIG. 4, the access component 1 includes an operation module (such as a single-chip microcomputer), an air inlet and an air outlet, a communication module and a pressure sensor; the air inlet, the air outlet and the port connected with the pressure sensor in the access component 1 is a three-way structure. In this embodiment, the communication module is wirelessly connected with the mobile phone 6 to achieve data transmission. A wired connection also can be employed, and a data cable is arranged to be connected to the data port of the mobile phone 6, such as USB port.

[0079] When people need to make the blood pressure measurement, as shown in FIG. 5, the access component 1 is connected into the air tube of the upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer 5, and the headset plug at one end of the microphone 2 is inserted into the headset jack of the mobile phone 6. The upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer 5 is used in its normal use mode, the cuff is bundled at the brachial artery of upper arm, and simultaneously the stethoscope 4 needs to be placed inside the cuff close to the brachial artery. The measurement procedure of the upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer 5 is performed; the measured site is pressurized and depressurized. During this process, the pressure sensor of the access component 1 will sense the pressure in the air tube and output a pressure signal, after the pressure signal is converted, amplified and filtered via the operation module (the operation module may not be used, in this case the output signal of the pressure sensor is directly transmitted to the mobile phone 6 by the communication module), the pre-processed pressure signal is transmitted to the mobile phone 6 through the communication module, at the same time the microphone 2 collects the sound at the brachial artery that is transmitted via the stethoscope 4 and the air tube 3, and which is transmitted to the mobile phone 6 by the headset plug. Similar to the pre-processing of the pressure signal, a conversion module for pre-processing the audio signal may also be added at the output end of the microphone 2, such as performing the processing like signal amplification, noise reduction, digital-to-analogue conversion and filtering, and the output from the headset plug is the pre-processed audio signal.

[0080] Thus, the collection and transmission of the pressure and audio signals at the measured site during the measurement made by the existing sphygmomanometer products are achieved with the measuring auxiliary device.

[0081] On the other hand, the components within the box of FIG. 3 may also be combined in several different ways, for example, the microphone 2 may be placed in the stethoscope 4, and then is connected to the headset plug by the conductive wire, in this case, there is no need to use the air tube 3 or other sound conducting medias. The connection between the headset plug and the mobile phone 6 may be a direct connection, or it may be an indirect connection, for example, the headset jack is arranged on the access component 1, the headset plug is inserted into the access component 1; the audio signal is transmitted via the wired or wireless connection between the access component 1 and the mobile phone 6, there are also two ways in this case: (1) the audio signal is directly transmitted to the mobile phone 6 by the communication module; (2) since the pressure signal and the audio signal can be received simultaneously by the access component 1, the pre-processing of the audio signal can be realized in the operation module (such as the conversion module described above), then the pre-processed audio signal is transmitted to the communication module which then transmits it to the mobile phone 6.

[0082] While the functions of the operation module can be extended as needed, to mitigate the data processing pressure of the terminal apparatus, even only using the terminal apparatus as the output apparatus of image and sound, the processing of data can be performed by the operation module, such as the described above pre-processing of the pressure signal and the audio signal, and the blood pressure values are also determined with the oscillometric method or the auscultatory method according to the received signals, and then transmitted to the terminal apparatus through the communication module.

[0083] Therefore, most of the functions (such as data sync storage, data processing and calculating, determination with the oscillometric method, the parameter storage and adjustment with the oscillometric method, etc.) that are realized by a specialized APP on the mobile phone 6 all can be achieved by arranging corresponding function modules in the operation module, the mobile phone 6 is responsible only for displaying and man-machine interaction.

[0084] The data therein may also be transmitted to the external apparatus via the wired or wireless connection with the mobile phone 6, for example, the stored data is uploaded to the external apparatus such as computer, server and cloud, and is shared on the external apparatus or is directly played back on the external apparatus, so that the determination of blood pressure values is no longer limited by time, the number of people and the physical distance.

Embodiment 2

[0085] This embodiment is an electronic sphygmomanometer according to the present invention, which employed pressure control, signal/data collection, signal/data processing, signal/data analysis, signal/data watching and listening to and man-machine interaction.

[0086] As shown in FIG. 6, which is an upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer 7 of this embodiment, but it is not limited to the upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer, other types of sphygmomanometers with different pressuring manners or against different measured sites are possible. The sphygmomanometer includes a host 10, an air line 8 and a cuffed air bladder 9, and the host 10 includes a button 11 and a touch display screen 12. A stethoscope (not shown) is fixed inside the cuffed air bladder 9, a microphone (not shown) is provided in the cavity of the stethoscope (it is possible to only use the microphone, and the stethoscope is not provided). The microphone is connected to the conductive wire of the host 10 and embedded in the air line 8, so that it has little difference from a common upper arm type sphygmomanometer in appearance.

[0087] As shown in FIG. 7, which is a system architecture of the host 10, where the main processor is mainly responsible for: controlling the air pump and the release valve in the pressuring device; processing the pressure signal and the audio signal transmitted by the pressure sensing module and the audio collection module respectively (such as amplification, noise reduction, analog to digital conversion and filtering) and synchronously storing to the data storage module; determining the blood pressure values with the oscillometric method and/or the auscultatory method; controlling the output of audio and image; receiving instructions from the button module to perform operations such as device control, parameter adjustment, data playback. The button input from the user (the receiving end of the button module) may be achieved by a physical button, or it may be achieved by touching the touch display screen, a combination of the two ways is used in this embodiment.

[0088] The pressure sensing module senses the pressure via the pressure sensor, which may send the pressure signal outputted by the pressure sensor directly to the main processor for processing, or an operation module as described in Embodiment 1 is arranged within the pressure sensing module for pre-processing the pressure signal.

[0089] A communication module is also included in the architecture, which is used for wired or/and wireless communication between the host 10 and the external apparatus, the communication module in this embodiment uses a wireless protocol for data transmission and sharing with the external apparatus.

[0090] The operator interface of the sphygmomanometer in this embodiment is further illustrated below, it is to be noted that the setting of the interface is not limited to the following example, numerous changes may be made on the basis of the prior art. The following example is intended to reflect the beneficial effects of the visualization of initial data on blood pressure measurement and determination.

[0091] As shown in FIG. 8, which is an operator interface of the upper arm type electronic sphygmomanometer 7, where graphs of audio amplitude, oscillation wave and pressure value over time, and blood pressure values calculated by the main processor according to the auscultatory method (the blood pressure values may also be provided directly by voice after the measurement) are shown from top to bottom, respectively. The blood pressure values determined with the oscillometric method may also be shown, or the blood pressure values determined with the auscultatory method and the oscillometric method are shown simultaneously. In each of the graphs, the leftmost vertical line A denotes the time point corresponding to the systolic pressure determined according to the auscultatory method, and the rightmost vertical line B denotes the time point corresponding to the diastolic pressure.

[0092] FIG. 9 is the state of the interface in FIG. 8 when the data is played back. As the audio is played, the vertical line C at the middle in the operator interface could move along the time axis with the playing progress, the audio amplitude curve that the vertical line C passes through may help the user to more accurately determine the sound that the ears heard. In addition, the graphicalization of the audio signal not only may be in the time domain, but also in the frequency domain or both. The graphs are also not limited to be curve graphs, or may be column graphs etc. It is also possible to suspend, continue in the playback process of sound and to arrange a loop play between two time points.

[0093] For the blood pressure values determined by the main processor with the oscillometric method, they can also be calibrated according to the blood pressure values obtained with the auscultatory method (or the blood pressure values with higher accuracy obtained by other ways), by taking the amplitude parameter method in the oscillometric method as an example, the parameters C1 and C2 vary from person to person, which can be adjusted according to personal circumstances, to improve the accuracy of measurement for individuals. The adjustment can modify the parameters used in the oscillometric method directly by the operator interface (not shown), such as the parameter C1 and C2, but this may need professional person to be implemented effectively. For general users, it may be arranged so that, for a certain measurement, the blood pressure values that are considered to be accurate after confirmation (such as the blood pressure values determined artificially with the auscultatory method) are inputted, the inputted blood pressure valves are compared with the blood pressure values determined with the oscillometric method by the specialized APP, the parameter adjustment is carried out according to the comparative result, so that the parameter adjustment may also be simply carried out without the need for professional person. The parameters used in the oscillometric method (such as C1 and C2 in the amplitude parameter method) are automatically calibrated on the basis of the blood pressure values determined with the auscultatory method, the calibration may also be arranged to be periodic, for example, it is arranged so that they are automatically calibrated after a period of time or a certain number of times.

[0094] Since the modification of parameters is the calibration that is carried out for personal circumstances, the accuracy of measurement will be generally higher than the direct reading on an ordinary electronic sphygmomanometer. And after calibration, even without using the stethoscope 4 (to determine blood pressure values without using the auscultatory method), it is also possible to obtain relatively accurate blood pressure values. The avatar icon in the lower left of the operator interface in FIGS. 6 and 7 can be used for switching users, each user has a respective parameter group, and many people use is satisfied.

[0095] The implement of the above interface functions are all within the achievable scope of prior art, and as long as there is a data source, the mode of processing and displaying data is varied, such as correlation analysis is carried out for the data, dynamic elements are added into the image, etc., further design or improvement can be done according to actual needs.

[0096] In use, as an ordinary electronic sphygmomanometer, the sphygmomanometer of this embodiment is started just by pushing a button, and the sphygmomanometer automatically inflates or deflates the cuffed air bladder, and records the measured data simultaneously. Once the measurement is complete, the blood pressure values determined with the oscillometric method and/or the auscultatory method are displayed automatically, the recorded pressure values and sound data may also be played back on the host, and the blood pressure values are determined artificially with the auscultatory method.

[0097] Finally, it should be pointed out that, in Embodiment 1, almost all functions of the sphygmomanometer in this embodiment may be achieved by programming a corresponding APP on the mobile phone (or computer, tablet computer and the like) as the terminal apparatus. In this case, the mobile phone is roughly comparable to the host 10 in this embodiment, and the difference is that the mobile phone cannot control the pressuring device.

[0098] The preferred specific embodiments of the invention have been described in detail above. It is to be understood that numerous modifications and variations can be made by those ordinary skilled in the art in accordance with the concepts of the present invention without any inventive effort. Hence, the technical solutions that may be derived by those skilled in the art according to the concepts of the present invention on the basis of the prior art through logical analysis, reasoning and limited experiments should be within the scope of protection defined by the claims.