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Demand for smaller, more portable medical devices is driving innovation in sensor

technologies

In a world that is becoming increasingly mobile, it should come as no surprise that


the medical devices traditionally used in hospitals and clinics are evolving to
become more portable, creating new possibilities for their use in the home
healthcare market.

A study by RNR Market Research estimates the homecare medical equipment


market could be worth nearly $26billion by 2022. In response, medical device
manufacturers are designing practical solutions in smaller form factors.

By the same token, smaller components such as sensors, are growing in demand for
use in more portable medical devices. However, device functionality and reliability
cannot be sacrificed for smaller form factors. And for most manufacturers, budgets
arent unlimited, meaning low-cost components are ideal. This is why new sensor
innovations reaching the market need to feature smaller form factors while
maintaining high functionality and affordability.

Sensing market trends

Embedded devices, such as pressure sensors, are advancing in many ways to better
meet the needs and challenges of designing smaller medical devices. For example,
advanced low-cost basic pressure sensors have become a valuable commodity,
specifically with engineers who need to design and create low cost, high volume
assemblies in the healthcare sector. Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are
experiencing greater demand for products and need components that meet their
strict design requirements.

In the healthcare market, for example, the focus on designing technology that is
less intrusive and more portable for home use has led to a demand for smaller
devices, such as oxygen concentrators and continuous positive airway pressure
(CPAP) machines. In addition, the growing adoption of wearable devices to track a
persons health and fitness is having an impact. A 2016 report by Gartner estimates
that more than 109million units of fitness wearables will be sold in 2017 alone.

Even as devices become smaller for increased portability, users expect these
systems will maintain functionality and accuracy. And to design small, yet accurate,
medical devices, component parts such as sensors must also offer robust features
at a low cost. However, higher degrees of accuracy usually mean higher price tags,
which isnt ideal for low-cost, high-volume applications.

For example, certain ventilators can cost tens of thousands of dollars to design and
build. At that cost, its easier to justify using a $15 sensor because it represents less
than 1% of the total cost of the unit. Its harder to justify that $15 sensor in a blood
pressure monitoring application that only costs $40 to $120 for design and build.
The extra cost for 1.5% full scale span (FSS) the difference between output signal
measured at the upper and lower limits of the operating pressure range of Total
Error Band (TEB) improvement is not as easily justifiable.

Staying within budget has to be a priority. And if lower-cost components are the only
available option to a design engineer, how does one best evaluate low-cost sensors
for use in these types of highly functional systems? Deriving value from these types
of applications requires designers to view these components not purely as
commodities, but as critical technology enablers that can offer a competitive
advantage to the systems that design engineers create.

Accuracy is king

Functionality and reliability are important qualities for all medical devices.Improving
accuracy of a component device such as a sensor can result in higher functionality
and accuracy for these systems. For a low-cost, high-volume application, innovation
in small, affordable sensing technology has helped bolster measurement accuracy
that can rival some premium solutions.

Innovations in low-cost sensor technologies have become especially important as


factors such as lower power consumption, repeatability and reliability have become
popular among design engineers looking to maintain tighter error budgets and
improve system specifications.
Lets look at an oxygen concentrator as an example. Low and ultra low pressure
silicon sensors may be used in these systems to detect when a patient begins to
inhale so that oxygen can then be delivered efficiently in order to minimise oxygen
waste when the patient isnt inhaling. This allows the oxygen concentrator to be
smaller and to operate more efficiently. And smaller equipment size also means
lower power consumption, as well as greater portability.

In order to improve accuracy in low-cost applications, it is important to retain the


benefits of easier-to-install components such as compensated or amplified
compensated pressure sensors. Less-accurate sensing technology could negate
some of the benefits achieved by using plug-and-play technology, such as the
ability to help relax specifications in other parts of the system. This benefit may be
of greater value particularly for engineers struggling to meet design requirements.
For example, being able to more-accurately measure pressure inside an oxygen
concentrator may negate the need to regulate down to the minute details, or
overcompensate elsewhere in the system.

The desire for more plug and play components explains, in part, the growing
popularity of amplified compensated rather than uncompensated pressure sensors.
Amplified compensated sensors can typically be used without the need for
additional modifications and can provide part-to-part interchangeability, calibration
and temperature compensation. A non-amplified compensated sensor may require
the use of amplification circuitry, assuming that an ASIC with a mV input A/D
converter is not being used. By contrast, uncompensated sensors provide a raw
output and usually require some form of compensation in order for them to be used
in many applications.

Using plug-and-play solutions, such as a fully amplified compensated sensor,


eliminates the need for additional circuitry and design time to develop, and
therefore provides greater value. Again, though, a plug-and-play solution that
doesnt provide accurate data defeats the overall purpose; poor performance could
potentially negate any savings gained through the easier installation.

Lets examine a scenario that can help design engineers choose the ideal sensing
solution. An uncompensated sensor that has a TEB of greater than 30% FSS costs
$9, while a compensated sensor with a TEB of about 10% FSS costs $10. A fully
amplified plug-and-play sensor with a TEB of 1.5% costs $13. Knowing that low-cost
and high accuracy is important for their system design, the best option for
designers would be to implement additional circuitry to improve the accuracy of the
less-expensive sensors if the component costs less than $4, not to mention design
and calibration time involved. In doing a similar upfront analysis, design engineers
can better understand the advantages and benefits of a component devices price
and performance value.

Evolving functionality

Portable medical devices arent new, but these devices continue to be designed to
be smaller and easier to use for patients who prefer to receive higher-quality
healthcare in their own homes. However, neither design engineer nor patient can
afford to sacrifice functionality for size and portability. Recent innovations have
helped transform low-cost components into valuable, highly functional technologies
that are often ideal for the medical devices current technology renaissance.
Advancements in smaller sized and highly accurate low-cost components will
continue to help design engineers address some of the stricter design parameters in
todays medical device industry.

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