Method and Apparatus for High Reliability Wireless Communications

• US 20160021219A1
• Filed: 07/16/2015
• Published: 01/21/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 07/16/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NeoCoil, LLC.
• Original Assignee: NeoCoil, LLC.
• Inventors: Brown, Brian, Wolff, Steven, Geisler, Mark S., Shaw, Andrew
• Granted Patent: US 9,713,453 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0022 Monitoring a patient using a global network, e.g. telephone networks, internet
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0205 Simultaneously evaluating both cardiovascular conditions and different types of body conditions, e.g. heart and respiratory condition
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/024 Detecting, measuring or recording pulse rate or heart rate A61B5/0205, A61B5/021 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/055 involving electronic [EMR] or nuclear [NMR] magnetic resonance, e.g. magnetic resonance imaging
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0816 Measuring devices for examining respiratory frequency measuring frequency of electric signals G01R23/00
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/318 Heart-related electrical modalities, e.g. electrocardiography [ECG]
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/33 specially adapted for cooperation with other devices
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7285 for synchronising or triggering a physiological measurement or image acquisition with a physiological event or waveform, e.g. an ECG signal A61B6/5205, A61B6/541, A61B8/5207, A61B8/543 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 6/03 Computed tomography [CT] echo-tomography A61B8/14
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 6/032 Transmission computed tomography [CT]
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 6/503 for diagnosis of the heart
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 6/541 involving acquisition triggered by a physiological signal
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 6/566 involving communication between diagnostic systems
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/3692 involving signal transmission without using electrically conductive connections, e.g. wireless communication or optical communication of the MR signal or an auxiliary signal other than the MR signal
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/5673 Gating or triggering based on a physiological signal other than an MR signal, e.g. ECG gating or motion monitoring using optical systems for monitoring the motion of a fiducial marker
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/63 for local operation
• CPC Class Codes: G16Z 99/00 Subject matter not provided for in other main groups of this subclass
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/201 Frame classification, e.g. bad, good or erased frame indication per se H04L1/0082
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/125 involving control of end-device applications over a network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/02 : Protocol performance
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/14 : Multichannel or multilink protocols

Abstract

A physiologic transmitter manages multiple communications between physiologic data acquisition devices attached to the patient and a receiver attached to an MRI or CT scanner. The transmitter'"'"'s processor is able to generate waveform data and trigger data based upon the acquired physiologic data and transmit the data to a physiologic receiver attached to the host scanner. The receiver then is able to deliver a trigger signal to the host scanner for imaging the patient during a selected time frame based upon cardiac and/or respiratory cycles of the patient.

Claims

1. A wireless communication system, comprising:

a transmitter including;

a control circuit operable to prepare a data packet for transmission,

a transmit circuit in communication with the control circuit and operable to convert each data packet to a radio frequency (RF) signal for transmission, and

an antenna in communication with the transmit circuit and operable to transmit the RF signal; and

a receiver including;

at least one antenna operable to receive the RF signal;

at least one receive circuit, each receive circuit in communication with the at least one antenna and operable to convert the RF signal to a data packet, and

a control circuit in communication with each receive circuit and operable to extract data from the data packet, wherein;

the control circuit in the transmitter prepares the data packet for transmission at a periodic interval,

the transmit circuit converts the data packet to a plurality of RF signals, each RF signal having a different frequency,

the transmit circuit transmits each RF signal within the periodic interval, and

the receiver receives the RF signals at each of the frequencies, converts each RF signal back to the data packet, and verifies that the data packet was transmitted successfully.

2. The wireless communication system of claim 1 wherein the receiver includes an antenna and a receive circuit tuned to each of the frequencies at which the RF signals are transmitted and the antenna and the receive circuit are operable together to receive the RF signal at the corresponding frequency.

3. The wireless communication system of claim 1 wherein:

the receiver includes one antenna;

the receiver includes a plurality of receive circuits, each receive circuit tuned for one of the frequencies at which the transmitter transmits RF signals;

the wireless communication system further includes a splitter in communication with the antenna and each receive circuit;

the splitter identifies the frequency of each RF signal received by the antenna; and

the splitter routes the RF signal to the corresponding receive circuit tuned for the frequency of the RF signal.

4. The wireless communication system of claim 1 the receiver verifies that the data packet was transmitted successfully by comparing the data packets received at each of the frequencies and when a majority of the data packets are the same, the receiver uses one of the majority of identical data packets.

5. The wireless communication system of claim 1 wherein:

the transmitter includes a checksum in the data packet; and

the receiver verifies that the data packet was transmitted successfully by determining that the checksum received corresponds to the data present in the data packet for at least one of the frequencies at which the data packet was transmitted.

6. The wireless communication system of claim 1, wherein:

the transmitter further includes memory operable to store a plurality of values of data to be included in the data packet on a first-in-first-out basis; and

the control circuit of the transmitter includes the plurality of values in the data packet.

7. The wireless communication system of claim 6 wherein:

the control circuit of the receiver extracts the plurality of values from the data packet;

the receiver further includes memory operable to store the plurality of values from each of a plurality of data packets;

the control circuit in the receiver compares each value for a transmitted signal to the corresponding value from each of the plurality of data packets in which it is transmitted; and

the control circuit verifies that the value was transmitted successfully when a majority of the values from each of the plurality of data packets are the same.

8. The wireless communication system of claim 6 wherein:

the control circuit of the transmitter includes a checksum in the data packet;

the control circuit of the receiver verifies that the checksum in the data packet corresponds to the plurality of values in the data packet; and

the control circuit in the receiver verifies that each value was transmitted successfully when the checksum for at least one of the data packets in which each value is transmitted corresponds to the plurality of values in the data packet.

9. The wireless communication system of claim 6, wherein:

the receiver includes a plurality of antennas;

each antenna is spatially displaced from the other antennas; and

each antenna is in communication with one of the receive circuits.

10. The wireless communication system of claim 7, wherein latency in transmission of the data packet is less than ten milliseconds.

11. The wireless communication system of claim 8, wherein jitter between repeated transmission of the data packet is less than two milliseconds.

12. A method of wireless communication, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving a data signal at a control circuit in a transmitter;

generating a data packet which includes at least one value of the data signal in the control circuit;

converting the data packet to a plurality of RF signals, each RF signal having a different frequency;

transmitting each of the RF signals within a periodic interval;

receiving each of the RF signals at a receiver in communication with the transmitter;

extracting the data packet from each of the RF signals in a control circuit in the receiver; and

evaluating the data packets to verify that the data packet was transmitted successfully.

13. The method of wireless communication of claim 12 wherein the step of evaluating the data packets to verify that the data packet was transmitted successfully further comprises:

comparing the data packets extracted from each of the RF signals to each other; and

determining the data packet was transmitted successfully when a majority of the data packets are identical.

14. The method of wireless communication of claim 12 wherein the control circuit of the transmitter generates a checksum for the data packet and transmits the checksum along with the data packet and wherein the step of evaluating the data packets to verify that the data packet was transmitted successfully further comprises:

determining a checksum for each data packet in the control circuit of the receiver; and

determining the data packet was transmitted successfully when the checksum determined on the receiver matches the checksum transmitted from the transmitter.

15. The method of wireless communication of claim 12 further comprising the steps of:

storing a plurality of values of the data signal in a memory device in the transmitter on a first-in-first-out basis;

including each of the plurality of values in the data packet when the data packet is generated;

extracting each of the plurality of values from the data packet on the receiver; and

storing the plurality of values from a plurality of data packets in a memory device in the receiver, wherein the number of data packets is the same as the number of values.

16. The method of wireless communication of claim 15 wherein the step of evaluating the data packets to verify that the data packet was transmitted successfully further comprises:

comparing the value of the data signal in each data packet to the corresponding value in each of the other data packets in which it is transmitted; and

determining that the value of the data signal was transmitted successfully when the corresponding values of the data signal from a majority of the data packets in which the value is transmitted are identical.

17. The method of wireless communication of claim 15 wherein the control circuit of the transmitter generates a checksum for the data packet and transmits the checksum along with the data packet and wherein the step of evaluating the data packets to verify that the data packet was transmitted successfully further comprises:

determining a checksum for each data packet in the control circuit of the receiver; and

determining that each value of the data signal in one of the data packets was transmitted successfully when the checksum determined on the receiver matches the checksum transmitted from the transmitter

18. The method of wireless communication of claim 12 wherein the receiver includes a plurality of antennas, each antenna is spatially displaced from the other antenna, and wherein the step of receiving each of the RF signals at a receiver in communication with the transmitter further includes:

receiving each of the RF signals at each antenna;

transmitting each of the RF signals from each antenna to a receive circuit in communication with the antenna; and

extracting the data packet from each of the RF signals received at each antenna.

19. The method of claim 18 wherein the step of evaluating the data packets to verify that the data packet was transmitted successfully further comprises:

comparing each of the data packets transmitted at one of the frequencies and received at each of the antennas to each other;

determining the data packet at one of the frequencies was transmitted successfully when a majority of the data packets received at each antenna are identical;

comparing the successfully transmitted data packet at each frequency to the successfully transmitted data packet at each of the other frequencies; and

determining that the data packet was successfully transmitted when a majority of the successfully transmitted data packets at each frequency are identical.

20. The method of claim 12 wherein the data signal received is from a sensor generating a signal corresponding to a physiological parameter of a patient to which the sensor is connected and wherein the transmitter and receiver are utilized with a medical imaging scanner, the method further comprising the steps of:

processing the data signal in the control circuit of the transmitter to generate at least one of a filtered data signal and a trigger signal;

generating the data packet to include the trigger signal;

extracting the trigger signal from the data packet with the control circuit of the receiver; and

transmitting the trigger signal to the medical imaging scanner to initiate acquisition of an image of the patient.