I-Corps: An Innovative Technology for Environmental Exposure and Respiratory Response Assessment

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of compact, wearable, and user-friendly lung health monitoring device that can keep patients out of emergency rooms and hospital beds and in the comfort of their homes. The first commercial applications will focus on chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma, and respiratory-compromised patients whose symptoms are not well controlled and have severe breakthrough attacks requiring medical attention.

These patients are most likely to be motivated to use wearable device for monitoring. This market may be expanded to patients with other respiratory diseases and potentially to COVID-19 and long-COVID. The device has the potential to empower patients to better monitor their respiratory health and change behaviors resulting in immediate health benefits.

There is also the potential for an occupational safety market to monitor ambient air quality in the workplace.

This I-Corps project is based on the development of a wearable environmental exposure and lung health monitoring device. The first prototypes have been designed and developed and are currently in an inpatient trial at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Lung Health Center. These prototype devices are collecting data and connecting COPD and asthma patients to their health care providers which will allow for a reduction of emergency room visits and hospital time.

This technology is a wearable device technology being developed to provide continuous monitoring of a patient’s ambient environment (nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3), sulphur dioxide (SO2), and particular matter (PM) along with air temperature and relative humidity), physical activity, body temperature, blood oxygen level, respiratory function, the pace of movement, and geographic location outside of the hospital system. The respiratory function data is assessed using a peak flow meter.

A built-in movement tracker allows real-time spatial-temporal resolution data to assess the level of physical activity. The collection of an individual’s global positioning system (GPS) coordinates enables location monitoring in association with activity parameters for precise sampling intervals. The data will be be displayed in a user-friendly app to the individual, to help educate them on respiratory health and identify potential triggers and to their health care provider for assessment and intervention.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.