WO2025100666A1 - Patch-type bio-signal collection device - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a bio-signal collection device, and may comprise: a first substrate coming in contact with a human body so as to detect a plurality of bio-signals; a second substrate stacked on and coupled to the upper side of the first substrate so as to convert a bio-signal detection result into a digital signal; and a third substrate stacked on and coupled to the upper side of the second substrate so as to wirelessly transmit the digital signal of the second substrate to the outside.

Description

Patch-type biosignal collection device

The present invention relates to a patch-type biosignal collection device, and more specifically, to a patch-type biosignal collection device capable of collecting various biosignals without increasing the area.

This invention has been filed with the support of the following national research and development project.

[Task ID] 1415184141

[Task Number] 00154781 (RS-2022-00154781)

[Ministry Name] Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy

[Name of the task management (specialized) organization] Korea Institute of Industrial Technology Planning and Evaluation

[Research Project Name] Korea-led K-Sensor Technology Development (R&D) for Market Leadership

[Research Project Name] Development of Large-Area Wafer-Level Flexible Tensile Hybrid Sensor Platform Technology for Free-Form High-Integrated Convergence Sensors

[Contribution rate] 1/1

[Name of the organization performing the project] Korea Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute

[Research Period] 2022.04.01 ~ 2028.12.31

In general, technologies are being developed to accurately and efficiently measure various bio-information detected from the human body in order to accurately understand the patient's condition to provide effective treatment or to determine whether the general public has health problems to take appropriate preventive measures.

Electrocardiogram (ECG), one of the representative biometric data, is a record of the action current generated when the heart muscle contracts and expands due to the heartbeat. It measures the action current according to the contraction of the heart muscle by attaching electrodes to the skin of the body, and then depicts the measured current data in a graph.

Also, ballistocardiogram (BCG) is a measurement method that estimates the condition of the heart by measuring the reaction according to the blood flow ejection of the heart, and is detected using a sensor that measures the acceleration or pressure according to the reaction.

In addition, biosignals such as PPG (Photoplethysmogram), EMG (Electromyography), SCG (Seismocardiogram), IPG (Impedance plethysmography), and GSR (Galvanic Skin Responses) are known.

Although there are various signals that the human body generates externally, the most commonly used ones are the ECG, a heart signal, and BCG, which has been studied recently.

ECG represents electrical activity generated from the heart, and BCG represents vibrations generated when the heart muscle moves.

In the heart, periodic voltage activity is transmitted in the order of the sinoatrial node, atrial muscle, atrioventricular node, His bundle, Purkinje fibers, and ventricular muscle, and can be measured on the body surface.

The electrical signals generated by the heart muscle are classified into PQRST waves, and various heart-related diseases can be predicted through the amplitude and time interval of each waveform, so ECG measurement is important.

Additionally, BCG is classified into GHIJK waveforms, and research is being conducted to determine blood pressure, etc. by simultaneously comparing ECG and BCG.

However, in order to measure ECG and BCG, various electrodes must be connected to the human body, and a circuit is needed to amplify and filter the bio-signals collected from the electrodes. Therefore, the equipment for measuring these is generally not portable, or even if it is portable, it is large and very inconvenient to wear. In particular, in the case of diseases that require long-term measurements, the existing method requires considerable patience from the subject.

Therefore, patch-type biosignal collection devices are designed to measure a single biosignal (particularly ECG) as described in Patent Publication No. 10-2014-0088390 (published on July 10, 2014, patch-type electrode for biosignal measurement).

This is because in a patch-type structure, it is not easy to install sensors that detect multiple biosignals and a processing unit that amplifies and processes the signals detected by the sensors within the narrow patch-type structure.

The technical problem that the present invention seeks to solve in consideration of the above-mentioned conventional problems is to provide a patch-type biosignal collection device capable of simultaneously detecting heterogeneous biosignals while using a patch-type structure of the same area as a conventional device.

The patch-type bio-signal collection device of the present invention for solving the above technical problem may include a first substrate that comes into contact with a human body to detect a plurality of bio-signals, a second substrate that is laminated and bonded on top of the first substrate to convert the bio-signal detection results into digital signals, and a third substrate that is laminated and bonded on top of the second substrate to wirelessly transmit the digital signals of the second substrate to the outside.

In an embodiment of the present invention, the first substrate may include a first sensor and a second sensor that detect different biosignals, an amplifier that amplifies detection signals of the first sensor and the second sensor, and a first connector that provides the detection signal amplified by the amplifier to the second substrate.

In an embodiment of the present invention, the second substrate may include a second connector directly coupled to the first connector, a signal processing unit that receives the amplified detection signal through the second connector and converts it into a digital signal, and a third connector that provides the digital signal processed in the signal processing unit to the third substrate.

In an embodiment of the present invention, the third substrate may include a fourth connector directly coupled to the third connector, and a wireless transmission module that transmits the digitally converted biosignal received through the fourth connector to the outside.

In an embodiment of the present invention, the first connector, the second connector, the third connector, and the fourth connector may include a signal pin for transmitting a signal and a power pin for transmitting power.

The patch-type bio-signal collection device of the present invention can detect ECG and BCG without increasing the area of the patch by applying a multilayer printed circuit board (PCB), thereby improving mobility and eliminating discomfort felt by the subject of measurement due to an increase in area or the number of measurement patches.

Figure 1 is a configuration diagram of a patch-type biosignal collection device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a patch-type biosignal collection device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 3 is an example of a biosignal waveform detected by the present invention.

- Explanation of symbols -

10:1st board 11:1st sensor section

12: 2nd sensor section 13: Detection section

14:1st connector 20:2nd board

21: 2nd connector 22: Signal processing unit

23: 3rd connector 30: 3rd board

31: 4th connector 32: Wireless transmission module

In order to fully understand the configuration and effect of the present invention, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. However, the present invention is not limited to the embodiments disclosed below, but can be implemented in various forms and can have various changes. However, the description of the embodiments is provided so that the disclosure of the present invention is complete, and so that a person having ordinary knowledge in the technical field to which the present invention belongs is fully informed of the scope of the invention. In the accompanying drawings, the components are illustrated with their actual sizes enlarged for convenience of explanation, and the ratio of each component may be exaggerated or reduced.

The terms "first", "second", etc. may be used to describe various components, but the components should not be limited by the terms. The terms may only be used to distinguish one component from another. For example, without departing from the scope of the present invention, the "first component" may be referred to as the "second component," and similarly, the "second component" may also be referred to as the "first component." In addition, singular expressions include plural expressions unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. The terms used in the embodiments of the present invention may be interpreted as having a meaning commonly known to a person of ordinary skill in the art, unless otherwise defined.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a patch-type biosignal collection device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram of FIG. 1.

Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, the present invention includes a first substrate (10), a second substrate (20), and a third substrate (30) that are laminated to each other.

The first substrate (10) includes a first sensor unit (11) that comes into contact with a human body to detect an electrocardiogram (ECG), a second sensor unit (12) that detects a ballistic cardiogram (BCG), an amplifier unit (13) that is electrically connected to the second substrate (20) to amplify detection signals of the first sensor unit (11) and the second sensor unit (12), and a first connector (14) that provides detection signals of the first sensor unit (11) and the second sensor unit (12) amplified by the amplifier unit (13) to the second substrate (20).

The second substrate (20) includes a second connector (21) that is electrically connected to the first connector (14) at the bottom surface to receive detection signals from the first sensor unit (11) and the second sensor unit (12), a signal processing unit (22) that converts the detection signal received through the second connector (21) into a digital signal, and a third connector (23) that provides an output signal of the signal processing unit (22) to the third substrate (30).

The third substrate (30) is connected to the third connector (23) and includes a fourth connector (31) that receives a detection signal converted into a digital signal by the signal processing unit (22), and a wireless transmission module (32) that transmits the digital signal received by the fourth connector (31) to the outside.

Hereinafter, the configuration and operation of a patch-type biosignal collection device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention configured as described above will be described in more detail.

First, the present invention enables the collection of heterogeneous biosignals without substantially increasing the area of a patch-type biosignal collection device, and the area can be minimized by stacking multiple PCB substrates.

To this end, the present invention proposes a structure in which three substrates are stacked vertically.

The first substrate (10) is located at the bottom and is a substrate that actually comes into contact with the human body.

The first substrate (10), the second substrate (20), and the third substrate (30) may each be flexible PCBs.

The first substrate (10) is a detection substrate that comes into contact with the human body and directly detects the human body's bio-signals, and includes a first sensor section (11) and a second sensor section (12), and collects different types of bio-signals.

At this time, the first sensor unit (11) may be an electrocardiogram sensor including a plurality of electrodes, and the second sensor unit (12) may be a ballistic cardiogram sensor using an acceleration sensor or a piezoelectric sensor.

In the drawing, the first sensor unit (11) is depicted and described as a single configuration, but may include a plurality of electrodes arranged spaced apart from each other.

The first sensor unit (11) and the second sensor unit (12) each generate electrical signals according to the detected electrocardiogram and ballistic cardiogram, and these electrical signals are amplified to a predetermined voltage (or current) level in the amplifier unit (13).

The present invention has a structure in which a plurality of substrates (first to third substrates) are laminated, and the first substrate (10) must be electrically connected to the second substrate (20), and the second substrate (20) must be electrically connected to the third substrate (30).

For this purpose, the first connector (14) of the first substrate (10) is connected to the second connector (21) of the second substrate (20).

The detection signal, which is an analog signal amplified in the above amplifier (13), is provided to the second substrate (20) through the connection structure of the first connector (14) and the second connector (21).

The second connector (21) is located on the bottom side of the second substrate (20) and is connected to the first connector (14) of the first substrate (10) without any other means such as a cable.

The signal processing unit (22) of the second substrate (20) converts the detection signal received through the second connector (21) into a digital signal. The signal processing unit (22) may use an analog-to-digital converter that simply converts an analog signal into a digital signal, or may be a microcontroller unit (MCU) that processes an analog signal according to a given program and converts it into a digital signal.

When using an MCU, if the sensor units and amplifier units, which are other elements for collecting biosignals, are mounted on the same substrate due to the size of the commercial MCU, the area increases, thereby increasing the area of the patch-type collection device. However, in the present invention, even if an MCU is used, the area increase can be prevented by mounting the sensor units and amplifier units on a different laminated substrate.

The detection signal converted into a digital signal in the above signal processing unit (22) is provided to the third substrate (30) through the third connector (23).

The above second substrate (20) is a substrate for signal processing.

The above third substrate (30) is a substrate for communication functions and includes a fourth connector (31) coupled with the third connector (23) to receive a detection signal converted into a digital signal.

The wireless transmission module (32) of the third substrate (30) transmits the received signal to the outside through the fourth connector (31).

The above wireless transmission module (32) is assumed to be a communication module capable of short-distance communication, such as a Bluetooth module or WiFi module.

The above wireless transmission module (32) transmits a detection signal to a paired external device, and the external device can interpret the signal and display the detected signal as a graph.

Figure 3 shows an example of the detection results of two biosignals (ECG, BCG) detected by the present invention.

In this way, the present invention can collect multiple biosignals without increasing the area of a patch-type biosignal collection device by using a laminated substrate.

The present invention includes a battery, although not shown in the drawings, and power from the battery can be provided to each functional block of the first substrate (10), the second substrate (20), and the third substrate (30) as needed through connections between the first connector (14), the second connector (21), the third connector (23), and the fourth connector (31).

It is preferable that the battery be mounted on the third substrate (30).

That is, the above connectors are structured to include a signal pin for transmitting a detection signal and a power pin for supplying battery power.

Although the embodiments according to the present invention have been described above, they are merely exemplary, and those with ordinary skill in the art will understand that various modifications and equivalent embodiments are possible from this. Accordingly, the true technical protection scope of the present invention should be determined by the following claims.

The present invention relates to a device capable of detecting heterogeneous biosignals without increasing the area of a patch by utilizing natural laws, and has industrial applicability.

Claims (5)

A first substrate that comes into contact with the human body and detects multiple biosignals; A second substrate laminated on top of the first substrate to convert the biosignal detection results into digital signals; and A patch-type biosignal collection device including a third substrate laminated on top of the second substrate and wirelessly transmitting a digital signal of the second substrate to the outside. In the first paragraph, The above first substrate, First and second sensors detecting different biosignals; An amplifier unit that amplifies the detection signals of the first and second sensors; and A patch-type biosignal collection device including a first connector that provides an amplified detection signal from the above amplifier to the second substrate. In the second paragraph, The above second substrate, A second connector directly coupled to the first connector; A signal processing unit that receives the amplified detection signal through the second connector and converts it into a digital signal; and A patch-type biosignal collection device including a third connector that provides a digital signal processed in the signal processing unit to the third substrate. In the third paragraph, The above third substrate, A fourth connector directly connected to the third connector; and A patch-type bio-signal collection device including a wireless transmission module that transmits the digitally converted bio-signal received through the fourth connector to the outside. In paragraph 4, The above first connector, second connector, third connector and fourth connector, A patch-type biosignal collection device including a signal pin for transmitting a signal and a power pin for transmitting power.

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