Radial Electrical Impedance: A Potential Indicator for Noninvasive Cuffless Blood Pressure Measurement

Noninvasive, cuffless, and continuous blood pressure (BP) monitoring is essential to prevent and control hypertension. A well-known existing method for this measurement is pulse transit time (PTT), which has been investigated by many researchers as a promising approach. However, the fundamental principle of the PTT method is based on the time interval taken by a pulse wave to propagate between the proximal and distal arterial sites. Consequently, this method needs an independent system with two devices placed at two different sites, which is a problem. Even though some studies attempted to synchronize the system, it is bulky and inconvenient by contemporary standards. To find a more sensitive method to be used in a BP measurement device, this study used radial electrical bioimpedance (REB) as a potential indicator for BP determination. Only one impedance plethysmography channel at the wrist is performed for demonstrating a ubiquitous BP wearable device. The experiment was evaluated on eight healthy subjects with the ambulatory BP monitor on the upper arm as a reference. The results demonstrated the potential of the proposed method by the correlation of estimated systolic (SBP) and diastolic (DBP) BP against the reference at $0.84{\pm}0.05$ and $0.83{\pm}0.05$, respectively. REB also tracked the DBP well with a root-mean-squared-error of $7.5{\pm}1.35mmHg$.