SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR A COMPACT EEG HEADSET

• US 20150112153A1
• Filed: 10/22/2014
• Published: 04/23/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 10/22/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NEBA Health, LLC
• Original Assignee: NEBA Health, LLC
• Inventors: Nahum, Altan
• Granted Patent: US 10,076,279 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/301
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/11 Measuring movement of the entire body or parts thereof, e.g. head or hand tremor, mobility of a limb for measuring pulse A61B5/02 ;A61B5/1038 takes precedence; motion detection to correct for motion artifacts in physiological signals A61B5/721
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/291 for electroencephalography [EEG]
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6803 Head-worn items, e.g. helmets, masks, headphones or goggles
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6814 Head

Abstract

An EEG headset including an amplifier assembly, a headband assembly formed of a right and a left headband arm and an amplifier platform, a right and left lateral support assembly, at least one hinge assembly connecting at least one of the right or left lateral support assemblies to at least one of the right or left curved arms, and at least one EEG electrode assembly formed of a lead and an electrode. The electrode is in electrical communication with the amplifier assembly via electrical connections within the headset assembly and one of the right and left lateral support assembly.

Claims

1. An EEG headset system, comprising:

an amplifier assembly;

a headband assembly formed of a right and a left headband arm and an amplifier platform;

a right and left lateral support assembly;

at least one hinge assembly connecting at least one of the right or left lateral support assemblies to at least one of the right or left curved arms; and

at least one EEG electrode assembly formed of a lead and an electrode;

wherein the electrode is in electrical communication with the amplifier assembly via electrical connections within the headset assembly and one of the right and left lateral support assembly.

2. A system for measuring brain electrical activity, comprising:

a headband assembly including opposing lateral supports for placement proximate a wearer'"'"'s temporal fossae, the supports sized and contoured to facilitate fitting of the supports to a range of head sizes and shapes; and

one or more connection components configured with the headband assembly, for removably coupling with a sensor for monitoring a condition of the wearer.

3. The system of claim 2, the sensor comprising an electrode and the condition of the wearer comprising a characteristic of the wearer'"'"'s brain function.

4. The system of claim 2, the sensor selected from the group of an oxygen saturation sensor, a respiratory sensor, a proximity sensor, an optical sensor, a visible light spectrum sensor, a non-visible light spectrum sensor, a chemical sensor, a resistance sensor, a temperature sensor, a heart rate sensor, an ocular sensor, a nystagmus sensor, an audio transducer, and a gaze sensor.

5. The system of claim 2, further comprising an electrical stimulator.

6. The system of claim 2, further comprising, for each connection component, an electrode releasably coupled with the connection component, the electrode selected from the group consisting of a disposable electrode, a reposable electrode, a non-disposable electrode, an electrode including a conductive medium, an electrode including an adhesive, and an electrode including an adhesive and a removable adhesive protection layer.

7. The system of claim 2, further comprising a plurality of conducting leads incorporated with the headband assembly, for connecting with the electrodes via the connection components.

8. The system of claim 2, wherein the headband is shaped to be substantially self-locating on the wearer'"'"'s head.

9. The system of claim 2, further comprising a placement template for accurately aligning and locating elements of the system with anatomical landmarks of the wearer'"'"'s head.

10. The system of claim 2, further comprising an interface for communicating signals from the electrodes to an external signal acquisition and analysis system.

11. The system of claim 10, the interface comprising a wireless transmitter.

12. The system of claim 2, further comprising a microprocessor for receiving and analyzing signals from the electrodes.

13. The system of claim 2, further comprising a liner for lining at least a portion of the headband assembly, the liner selected from the group of a conformable material lining, an elastic band, an anti-microbial lining, a textured lining, an expanding support structure, an adhesive-lined film, and a sensor-embedded lining.

14. The system of claim 2, further comprising one or more springs or spring hinges configured with the lateral supports, for exerting lateral pressure against the wearer'"'"'s head.

15. The system of claim 2, the headband assembly being length-adjustable.

16. The system of claim 2, the sensor comprising a motion or tracking sensor for measuring and tracking head, eye, or body motion;

and further comprising a microprocessor for receiving and analyzing data of the motion or tracking sensor.

17. The system of claim 16, the sensor being selected from the group of multi-axis sensor, one or more accelerometers, a gyroscope, a piezoelectric sensor and a compass sensor.

18. The system of claim 3, further comprising an isolation feature for isolating electrodes from mechanical movement.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising an electrode spring tab electrode configured to be in skin contact with the center of the wearer'"'"'s head along the median line.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein the isolation feature comprises a spring hinge connecting the lateral support assembly to the headband assembly for isolating user associated muscle movement proximate the lateral support assembly from the headband assembly such that the an electrode spring tab electrode remains in skin contact with the center of the wearer'"'"'s head along the median line.

21. The system of claim 18, wherein the connection component is an electrode lead jack and wherein the isolation feature is incorporated into the shape and material properties of an electrode lead formed as a flex circuit with at least 4 degrees of freedom and configured to support the electrode at its proximal end and an electrode lead plug releasably connect to the electrode lead jack at its distal end.

22. The system of claim 21, further comprising one or more additional electrodes, wherein the electrodes are located to increase the number of signal receiving sites.

23. The system of claim 18, wherein the isolation features are formed and configured with the EEG headset to reduce triboelectric noise.

24. A method for quickly and accurately fitting an EEG headset to a wearer'"'"'s head via a single head reference point, comprising the steps of:

aligning the sagittal plane measurement start marker located at the proximal end of a measurement strip with the wearer'"'"'s nasion;

locating where the wearer'"'"'s inion meets a measurement scale at the distal end of the measurement strip;

reading a measurement from the measurement scale corresponding to where the inion meets the measurement scale;

identifying on a locator scale at the proximal end of a headset locator a locator measurement corresponding to the read measurement;

aligning the locator measurement with the wearer'"'"'s nasion;

identifying a center point of the wearer'"'"'s head at the distal end of the headset locator for accurately fitting the EEG headset to the wearer'"'"'s head.

25. The method of claim 24, further comprising parting the wear'"'"'s hair to create a hair part along the median line of the head to facilitate (1) identifying the center point of the head and (2) contact of an electrode of the EEG headset with the wear'"'"'s skin.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein identifying the center point of the head comprises aligning the hair part with one or more alignment features on a placement area of the headset locator.

27. The method of claim 24, further comprising properly orienting the EEG headset by matching the shape of the EEG headset with a shape of a placement area of the headset locator.

28. The method of claim 24, further comprising identifying a proper angular position for electrode placement relative to the identified center point of the user'"'"'s head.

29. A system for quickly and accurately locating an EEG headset and electrodes on a wearer, comprising:

a headset locator shaped to facilitate alignment of EEG headset on a wearer'"'"'s head having a placement area, a locator scale tab, and a locator scale; and

a measurement strip having a sagittal plane measurement start marker at the proximal end and a measurement scale at the distal end.

30. The system of claim 29, wherein the measurement strip is configured to measure along the median line on the surface of the wearer'"'"'s head from an anterior location on the wearer'"'"'s the head to a posterior location of the wearer'"'"'s head.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein the anterior location is the nasion and the posterior location is the inion.

32. The system of claim 29, wherein the measurement strip further comprises a coronal plane start marker for measuring a lateral to contralateral measurement.

33. The system of claim 32, wherein the lateral to contralateral measurement is a measurement from a wearer'"'"'s left ear superior helix to the wearer'"'"'s right ear superior helix.

34. The system of claim 32, wherein the lateral to contralateral measurement determines the fit of adjustment bands of the EEG headset to a head size for fitting on a wearer.

35. The system of claim 34, further comprising an adjustment band scale formed on one or both of EEG headset adjustment bands with measurement values that correspond to the lateral to contralateral measurement.

36. The system of claim 35, wherein the measurement scale and the adjustment band scale are similarly color coded to facilitate quick and easy adjustment of the adjustment band by matching a color coded measurement from the measurement scale to a corresponding color coded measurement on the adjustment band.

37. The system of claim 32, wherein the sagittal plane measurement start marker is spaced away from the coronal plane start marker, such that the same measurement scale may be used for both sagittal and coronal measurements.

38. The system of claim 29, wherein the measurement strip further comprises a median plane window to facilitate location of a hair parting line.

39. The system of claim 29, wherein the locator scale is linearly or non-linearly related to the measurement scale.

40. The system of claim 39, wherein the relationship is a linear relationship a length of the locator scale is ½

the length of the measurement scale.