指尖式血氧仪拆解：揭示个人医疗设备未来

在 DesignMed 2011 大会上，透过拆解 Nonin Onyx II 9560 指尖式血氧仪(pulse oximeter)，工程师们可一窥未来个人医疗设备的发展风貌。 “从放置在桌上的大型系统演变至今天护士能随身携带的小型设备，Nonin 早已预见了未来人们对小型、简便的医疗设备的的需求，”前Nonin Medical工程副总裁Bill Betten说。 Onyx系统让原先专用于医疗院所中的装置变为更适合个人应用的消费性医疗设备。 “在不久的将来，我们会看到许多技术陆续问世，如可测量人体参数的耳机、可穿戴式传感器、胸带，以及其它各式各样的设备，都将出现在专业的医疗领域之中，”Betten说。Betten目前是《EE Times》母公司UBM LLCs旗下UBM TechInsights医疗部门的资深顾问。 来自快速成长的消费电子领域的先进显示屏幕、处理器和用户接口软件，目前也正开始进入医疗电子领域，过去，医疗设备一直专注于发展后缘(trailing edg)组件，而且设计和审核的周期都非常长，Betten说。这将激发出“文化上的根本冲突，”他表示。 “发展脚步太迅速了，以致你很难确实追踪，”他说。另一方面，植入式医疗设备的低功耗和微型封装技术，也很有可能回流在未来的某一天回流到消费市场，他补充道。 拆解Nonin的设备，便会发现它使用了恩智浦(NXP)的微控制器(MCU)和飞思卡尔 (Freescale)的8位MCU，UBM TechInsights的技术智财部副总裁David Carey说。 Nonin使用专有的信号处理技术，以独特的方法来放大并讯节光信号，因此，他们声称可以使用低功耗的消费级处理器，Betten说。9560这款产品将蓝牙(Bluetooth)收发器内置在系统的电池组中，以节省空间，他表示。 这次的 DesignMed大会将以‘行动’为主轴。德州仪器(TI)的工程师也将回顾个人保健设备的发展，并探讨无线技术在医疗设计中的影响程度。此外，业界专家也将展示如何获得医疗保健监管机关的核准。 DesignMed大会也邀请到麻省理工学院(MIT)教授Charles G. Sodini进行主题演讲，他针对医疗电子进行了广泛调查，包括创新的可穿戴式设备，以及通讯技术等。 编译： Joy Teng 本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载 参考英文原文： Consumer meets medical in ESC teardown，by Rick Merritt

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{pagination} Consumer meets medical in ESC teardown Rick Merritt SAN JOSE, Calif. – Engineers will get a glimpse into the future of personal health care devices at DesignMed 2011 where experts will tear down a Nonin Onyx II 9560 fingertip pulse oximeter, a system that helped pioneer the emerging field. The teardown is one of a handful of sessions at the ESC Boston event exploring the horizon in personalized medicine. "Nonin saw a need for something small and simple taking medical devices from tabletop systems to handheld units nurses can carry around with them," said Bill Betten, the former vice president of engineering at Nonin Medical who will be in the audience for the teardown. The Onyx system is a regulated device geared for use in hospitals, but helped forge the way for consumer medical devices that face less stringent regulations. "In the not-too-distant future we'll see a lot of neat technologies like headsets that measure body parameters, body-worn sensors, chest straps and a lot of things that creep up to the edge of the professional medical world," said Betten, now a senior advisor for the medical group at UBM TechInsights, part of UBM LLCs, the publisher of EE Times. The sophisticated displays, processors and user interface software of the fast-moving consumer sector are invading the medical electronics field that has been focused on trailing edge components and long design and approval cycles, Betten said. That's creating "a fundamental clash of cultures," he said. "It's all evolving so rapidly it's hard to keep track of it," he said. On the other hand, the low power and miniature packaging technology of medical implants is likely to flow back into consumer markets someday, he added. The Nonin teardown will reveal a device using tried and true components including an NXP micrcontroller and a Freescale 8-bit MCU, said David Carey, vice president of technical intelligence at UBM TechInsights who will open up the device. It is one of about 13 medical device teardowns the group has done to date. Nonin used signal processing expertise to amplify and condition light signal in unique ways so they could use low-power, consumer-grade processors, said Betten. The model 9560 builds a Bluetooth transceiver into the system's battery pack to save space, he added. Mobile will be the theme of a handful of DesignMed sessions. Texas Instruments engineers will review the landscape of personal health care devices and talk about the impact wireless is having in medical design. Separately, a consultant will show how to get regulatory approval for health care apps. The program also includes a keynote from MIT professor Charles G. Sodini who will survey the broad landscape in medical electronics, including innovations in wearable and communicating devices.