Heart disease is the leading cause of death for everyone in the United States.
Did you know, one in five heart attacks is silent? That means the damage is done, but the person is not even aware they had one. That’s why being able to predict changes in your heart, organs, and arteries are vital to preventing the worst from happening.
Now, the first-ever wearable patch may be able to predict cardiovascular problems earlier than ever before.
Every 40 seconds, someone in the United States has a heart attack. Every three and a half minutes, someone will die of a stroke. Research shows that 80% of all heart diseases can be prevented by knowing and managing risk factors. That’s why the team inside a UCSD lab is working on something new.
UCSD nanoengineer, Boyu Liu says, “We are working on soft stretchable sensors.”
“This is the ultrasonic patch we are developing,” says UCSD material sciences student, Sai Thou.
Nanoengineer at the UCSD Jacobs School of Engineering, Sheng Xu, Ph.D. explains, “This device can provide continuous long-term monitoring of what’s going on in the heart.”
This group of engineers is the first to develop a flexible, wearable, ultrasound patch.
“With ultrasound, we can penetrate the tissue and get very deep targets,” Liu says.
“For example, I can easily attach it to my clothing artery like this,” Thou demonstrates.
Embedded in a sheet of flexible polymer is an array of millimeter-sized ultrasound transducers. When worn on the neck or chest, it can penetrate the tissue, and monitor blood flow, blood pressure, and heart function, in hopes of predicting a heart attack or stroke.
Xu adds, “We can use sophisticated algorithms to predict what’s going to happen in the next minute, in the next hour, or in the next few days.”
Knowing how fast the blood flows through the vessels can help diagnose blood clots, heart valve problems, poor circulation and blockages in the arteries, and help doctors save your life.
In tests, the patch performed as well as commercial ultrasound probes, which are currently used in doctor’s offices. Although they still have more testing to do, the researchers at UCSD are hopeful that this could be made available to doctors and their patients in the next two years.