WIN Monitors Health

The WIN Human Recorder Co Ltd, was unveiled as a way for companies to monitor their employees’ health from their home. This MacGyver / Swiss Army of health monitors has so many features including…take a big breath: EKG, brain waves, tri-axial accelerometer, galvanic skin response (GSR), skin temperature, and it can even start your coffee for you in the morning…..ok maybe not the last one.  It is a multi-assessment tool (like the BodyMedia Armband / Body Bugg / Ki ) and will go on sale in Japan first at the odd price point of $331 but will also have a $110 monitoring service contract.  Definitely not for the budget minded calorie / activity counter but does advance the field of health monitoring and data acquisition. I do have one concern in that the units require those small CR2032 pill batteries.  Why not use a typical battery or have a self-charging base like the Fitbit – featured in a previous post?

I think it would also be very appropriate for doctor’s and health care teams to use as a way to monitor home health without necessarily making a home visit. I know rural health initiatives in the past have included blood pressure / heart rate monitoring units that used phone / fax lines to report back to the health care teams.  Of course with the iPhone and newer technologies have made monitoring so much more immediate and easier to access.  At the 2009 World Wide Developers Conference, Airstrip was launched to much applause as it allows doctors to monitor their patients from their iPhones (now other devices are supported)

The newly released device, which goes by the name of 'HRS-I' is designed to measure and record a person's electro-cardiographic signals, body surface temperature and overall body movements. The tiny unit can easily be worn under your shirt as you attend to your daily business.

The device communicates wirelessly with a remote base and can last on a single charge for up to three days. Targeted toward companies working to monitor employee health, the HRS-I can be purchased for $331 and the monitoring service costs $110 per month.

In the service, health-related information is collected and analyzed by a small sensor attached to a human body, and it is viewed and managed on a mobile phone or a PC. The company commercialized the health monitoring system, which is called "human recorder system," based on the research results of the Advanced Institute of Wearable Information Networks (WIN), a nonprofit organization established by researchers at the University of Tokyo. WIN is a group led by Kiyoshi Itao, professor emeritus at the university, Tech-On states.

The sensor

The sensor is used to measure electro-cardiographic signals, heart rate, brain waves, accelerated velocity, body temperature, respiration, and pulse wave. WIN helped develop, for example, a program to analyze each data and determine health condition.

The dimensions and weight of the sensor module are approximately 30 (L) x 30 (W) x 5mm (D) and 7g, respectively. Because of the small size and the light weight, the module does not give uncomfortable feeling when attached to a human body, the company said.

The sensor module has a 2.4GHz wireless communication function and can be continuously operated for three to four days with a CR2032 button battery. Because the obtained data can be wirelessly transmitted to a PC or a mobile phone, it is possible to monitor the health condition of an elderly person who lives alone in a remote place via the Internet.

Be sure to also check these other Medical apps:

Airstrip – real-time EKG, vitals to iPhones, BlackBerrys and Windows Mobile smart phones.

Lifescan – J & J’s glucose monitoring system  for the iPhone

1. GI Monitor - Log your Crohn's or Ulcerative Colitis symptoms - iPhone

 

 

  [Via Tech On and Ubergizmo]