Continuous, noninvasive blood pressure monitoring using sound

Researchers from Cornell University in the United States have developed a wearable device using sound for continuous, noninvasive blood pressure monitoring.

From PNAS Nexus/California Institute of Technology 02/08/24

Illustration by Superinnovators x AI.

A wearable blood pressure monitor uses sound to capture a continuous record of vital sign data.

Continuous, noninvasive blood pressure monitoring has been a longtime goal of medicine, given blood pressure’s utility as a metric for clinicians.

For decades, the options have been limited to internally placed arterial catheters or inflatable pressure cuffs.

Newer proposed methods need frequent calibration with an inflatable cuff.

Raymond Jimenez and colleagues propose a method based on resonance sonomanometry, in which the artery is stimulated by an acoustic transducer and its resonant response and dimensions are measured using ultrasound.

Acoustic stimulation paired with ultrasound imaging reveals resonance properties of an artery. (A) Device placement to measure blood pressure in the carotid artery. (B) Illustration of device operation: Ultrasound transducer (gray probe) is used to generate images of the artery (at bottom). (C) Illustration of resonance sonomanometry. CREDIT Jimenez et al

Just as a guitar string changes tone as its tension is manipulated, so does the circumferential tension of the arterial wall change its resonant frequency through the continuous phases of the cardiac cycle.

The method was tested on humans on the carotid artery in the neck as well as the axillary, brachial, and femoral arteries.

Measurements were compared with those from a blood pressure cuff.

All four sites produced measurements in a single subject that were broadly in line with those obtained from a cuff.

Additional testing on the carotid arteries of six volunteers showed promising results, albeit with lower systolic values, although this would be predicted given the carotid being closer to the heart than the brachial artery measured by the cuff.

According to the authors, their proposed device could be worn over any ultrasound-accessible artery, even including the radial, where the device could be worn like a watch.