Overview

Patients in end stage heart failure implanted with Left Ventricle Assistant Devices (LVADs) are prone to numerous complications due to medication which can lead to stroke and possibly even death. For these patients, the task of measuring their blood pressure can be a matter of life or death. Unfortunately, the current process of using a manual cuff and a handheld doppler for measuring the blood pressure in LVAD patients yields inaccurate measurements with an average error of 6.4 mmHg. Inaccuracies in blood pressure can affect blood pressure medication administration which in turn has the potential to induce further medical complications, like stroke and clotting. In addition, this process requires the assistance of a trained nurse and can take 6 minutes to procure a reading, whereas automatic cuffs for pulsatile patients can achieve a reading in only 30-45 seconds. DopCuff will integrate doppler and automatic cuff technology into a single device that can detect the initiation of blood flow and associate it with a blood pressure reading. It will be a wearable device that can be placed easily by the nurse to reduce the need to find, and maintain, a constant doppler signal which effects the accuracy of the readings. The need for ultrasound gel will also be removed with the addition of a one-time use ultrasound gel-pad designed specifically for use with the DopCuff.