Apparatus for determining health of an individual

• US 20100234753A1
• Filed: 03/10/2009
• Published: 09/16/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/10/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ARI Licensing
• Original Assignee: ARI Licensing
• Inventors: Ma, Z. Ming
• Granted Patent: US 8,374,690 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/547
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0531 Measuring skin impedance
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4854 Diagnosis based on concepts of traditional oriental medicine
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6825 Hand

Abstract

A method and apparatus for obtaining data relevant to the state of health of an individual by measuring the signal spectra at various points on the individual'"'"'s body. Illustratively, the measurements are at points on the individual'"'"'s hand, implemented with a glove that includes numerous electrical point contacts.

Claims

1. Apparatus comprising:

a first contact device that includes an N plurality of substantially disjoint sensors, which device is constructed to be held in close proximity with a preselected portion of an individual'"'"'s skin, and said sensors constructed to electronically couple to specific locations on said skin when said first contract device is in said close proximity;

a second contact device that is constructed to electronically couple to a chosen location on said individual'"'"'s skin; and

a measurement device that computes frequency spectrum of measurements, relative said second contact device, obtained from each of said sensors.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 where said sensors are electrical sensors that are substantially insulated from each other.

6. The apparatus of claim 1 where said sensors are electrical contact, capacitive coupling, inductive coupling, or electromagnetic coupling sensors.

7. The apparatus of claim 1 where further comprising a computing device for constructing a set of N sets of measurement values (spectra values), each of which contains K frequency values.

8. The apparatus of claim 7 further comprising a computing device for comparing said spectra values to a corpus of M sets, each of which contains K spectra values.

9. The apparatus of claim 8 where said corpus pertains to information of a particular individual.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 where said corpus pertains to information of said particular individual when said individual was believed to be in a healthy state of being.

11. The apparatus of claim 8 pertains to information of a group of individuals.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 where said individuals in said group are believed to be in a healthy state of being.

13. The apparatus of claim 11 where said individuals in said group share one or more selected characteristics.

14. The apparatus of claim 13 where s said characteristics are from a set that comprises sex, ethnic identity, age, and a sickness.

15. The apparatus of claim 1 where the generator applies a time signal that concurrently contains said plurality of frequencies.

16. The apparatus of claim 1 where said generator applies a time signal that, at any one time is essentially of a single frequency.

17. The apparatus of claim 1 where the first contact device is a glove or a sock.

18. The apparatus of claim 1 where the generator applies signal to all of said sensors concurrently.

19. The apparatus of claim 1 where the generator applies a signal to all of said sensors in a seriatim fashion

2. Apparatus comprising:

a first unitary contact device that includes an N plurality of substantially disjoint sensors, which device is constructed to be held in close proximity with a preselected portion of an individual'"'"'s skin, and said sensors constructed to electronically couple to specific locations on said skin when said first contract device is in said close proximity; and

means for accessing signals detected by said sensors.

3. Apparatus comprising:

a first contact device that includes an N plurality of substantially separate sensors, which device is constructed to be held in close proximity with a preselected portion of an individual'"'"'s skin, and said sensors constructed to electronically couple to specific locations on said skin when said first contract device is in said close proximity;

a second contact device constructed to electronically couple to a location on said individual'"'"'s skin;

a generator for applying a signal that includes a K plurality of frequencies between each of the sensors and said electrical contact element; and

a measurement device that concurrently determines responses to said signal between each of said sensors of said second contact device.

4. An arrangement comprising:

a first contact device configured to be held in close proximity with skin of an individual'"'"'s body part taken from a set that includes a palm, a leg, a chest, a head, and a back, which device has an N plurality of substantially separate sensors that are constructed to electronically couple to specific locations on said skin of said body part when said first contract device is in said close proximity;

a second contact device that is constructed to electronically couple to a location on said individual'"'"'s skin; and

a measurement device that concurrently determines responses to said signal between each of said sensors of said second contact device.