Detection and differentiation of sleep disordered breathing

• US 9,675,268 B2
• Filed: 11/05/2010
• Issued: 06/13/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 11/05/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Inovise Medical, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Inovise Medical, Inc.
• Inventors: Bauer, Peter T., Arand, Patricia A., Wheeler, Timothy K., Gasperina, Marco Dalla
• Primary Examiner(s): Kahelin, Michael
• Assistant Examiner(s): TRAN, THO Q
• Application Number:
  US12/940,293
• Publication Number:
  US 20110105915A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,412 Days
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2562/0219 Inertial sensors, e.g. accelerometers, gyroscopes, tilt switches
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1116 Determining posture transitions
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1118 Determining activity level
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1135 by monitoring thoracic expansion
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/352 Detecting R peaks, e.g. for synchronising diagnostic apparatus; Estimating R-R interval
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4806 Sleep evaluation A61B5/4821 takes precedence; devices for inducing sleep A61M21/02
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4809 Sleep detection, i.e. determining whether a subject is asleep or not
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4818 Sleep apnoea
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 7/003 Detecting lung or respiration noise

Abstract

A vector method for monitoring a subject'"'"'s sleep-disordered breathing utilizing a single, anatomy-attached (anatomically outside or implanted inside), three-orthogonal-axis accelerometer(s), including the steps of (1) collecting from a sleeping subject three-orthogonal-axis data relating to at least one of sound data, subject posture, subject activity, snoring, and respiration, and (2) following such collecting, processing and analyzing collected data to detect associated, disordered breathing including assessing the presence of at least one of (a) sleep-disordered breathing generally, (b) sleep apnea specifically, and (c) differentiation between central and obstructive sleep apnea. Further involved is the acquiring of ECG data, and that the mentioned processing and analyzing include recognition of such acquired ECG data.

Claims

1. An external-only method for detecting and differentiating a sleeping subject'"'"'s manifestations of sleep-disordered breathing comprising

attaching a single, three-axis accelerometer to a subject'"'"'s chest,

acquiring data from the three axis accelerometer during a subject-recording period,

identifying, based on accelerometer data, sleep times during the subject-recording period when the subject is asleep, and generating, based on accelerometer data, a wake summary,

during the identified sleep times, utilizing solely the attached accelerometer, simultaneously collecting, externally-only, sleeping-subject-specific, three-axis, vector-mechanical accelerometer data,

filtering the accelerometer data through five independent facet-specific signal filters outside the subject to generate components specific to (a) heart sounds, (b) body position, (c) body activity, (d) snoring, and (e) chest-movement-based respiration,

collecting sleeping-subject-specific ECG data outside the subject, and

generating a sleep summary based on the wake summary including processing and analyzing the components of the accelerometer data and the ECG data outside the subject, to detect and differentiate the presences of (a) sleep-disordered breathing generally, (b) sleep apnea generally, (c) differentiated central and obstructive sleep apnea specifically, and (d) hypopnea specifically.

2. The external-only method of claim 1, wherein attaching a single, three-axis accelerometer to a subject'"'"'s chest is adjacent a V4, precordial ECG site.