Sensorizing a Compression Sleeve for Continuous Pressure Monitoring and Lymphedema Treatment Using Pneumatic or Resistive Sensors

Abstract

Smart soft wearable devices have great potential to change how technology is integrated into daily life. A particularly impactful and growing application is continuous medical monitoring; being able to stream physiological and behavioral information creates personalized datasets that can lead to more tailored treatments, diagnoses, and research. An area that can greatly benefit from these developments is lymphedema management, which aims to prevent a potentially irreversible swelling of limbs due to causes such as breast cancer surgeries. Compression sleeves are the state of the art for treatment, but many open questions remain regarding effective pressure and usage prescriptions. To help address these, this work presents a soft pressure sensor, a way to integrate it into wearable devices, and sensorized compression sleeves that continuously monitor pressure and usage. There are significant challenges to developing sensors for high-pressure applications on the human body, including operating between soft compliant interfaces, being safe and unobtrusive, and reducing calibration for new users. This work compares two sensing approaches for wearable applications: a custom pouch-based pneumatic sensor, and a commercially available resistive sensor. Experiments systematically explore design considerations including sensitivity to ambient temperature and pressure, characterize sensor response curves, and evaluate expected accuracies and required calibrations. Sensors are then integrated into compression sleeves and worn for over 115 hours spanning 10 days.