U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research, JBSA Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, TX 78234, USA.
Sensors (Basel). 2022 Feb 1;22(3):1122. doi: 10.3390/s22031122.
Uncontrolled hemorrhage remains a leading cause of death in both emergency and military medicine. Tourniquets are essential to stopping hemorrhage in these scenarios, but they suffer from subjective, inconsistent application. Here, we demonstrate how tourniquet application can be automated using sensors and computer algorithms. The auto-tourniquet self-tightens until blood pressure oscillations are no longer registered by the pressure sensor connected to the pneumatic pressure cuff. The auto-tourniquet's performance in stopping the bleed was comparable to manual tourniquet application, but the time required to fully occlude the bleed was longer. Application of the tourniquet was significantly smoother, and less variable, for the automatic tourniquet compared to manual tourniquet application. This proof-of-concept study highlights how automated tourniquets can be integrated with sensors to provide a much more consistent application and use compared to manual application, even in controlled, low stress testing conditions. Future work will investigate different sensors and tourniquets to improve the application time and repeatability.
在急诊和军事医学中，无法控制的出血仍然是主要的死亡原因。止血带在这些情况下对于止血至关重要，但它们存在主观、不一致的应用问题。在这里，我们展示了如何使用传感器和计算机算法实现止血带的自动化应用。自动止血带会自行收紧，直到与气动压力袖带相连的压力传感器不再检测到血压波动。自动止血带在止血方面的性能与手动止血带应用相当，但完全阻断出血所需的时间更长。与手动止血带应用相比，自动止血带的应用更加平稳，且变异性更小。这项概念验证研究强调了如何将自动化止血带与传感器集成，以提供比手动应用更一致的应用和使用效果，即使在受控、低压力测试条件下也是如此。未来的工作将研究不同的传感器和止血带来改善应用时间和可重复性。
