Abstract
The conventional urodynamic monitoring is fulfilled by artificially filling a bladder with saline. Generally. it is difficult to evaluate the physiological functions of the storage and voiding of a bladder. With this aim, we constructed an ambulatory urodynamic monitoring (AUM) system and proposed a novel method estimating abdominal pressure by measuring bio-impedance variations. Our system was clinically evaluated for 10 patients. It turned out to be that as the intensity of the abdomen contraction increased, the amplitude of bio-impedance signal and the RMS value of EMG increased more as compared to those who observed during the rest mode. Also, we determined the optimum electrode pair for estimating the abdominal pressure using bio-impedance method and consequently compared with the conventional methods. Because impedance changes differ from a weight, a height, contractile force, volume of muscle and blood other or whatever of individuals, it was quantified in terms of impedance change, correlation coefficient and SNR Our results showed the optimum electrode pair (1,9) which could detect impedance changes due to the increase of the intensity in the abdominal pressure. The correlation coefficient and quadratic function between the RMS values of EMG and the impedance changes were 0.87 and $y=0.0014x^2+0.0620x+0.6958$, respectively. Thus, our system demonstrated that the abdominal pressure could be measured noninvasively and conveniently by simply estimating bio-impedance values. We propose that this optimum electrode configuration would be useful for the future studies involving the handy measurements of abdominal pressure with our suggested ambulatory urodynamics monitoring system.
