Vital signs monitoring and management using mobile devices

Constant breakthroughs in medical sensor technology and mobile devices fields, combined with growing wireless communication capabilities, have made possible the emergence of new health monitoring paradigms. The ever-increasing features of PDAs and smartphones make them a vital component in innovative health monitoring systems. In this paper, we introduce a handset mobile monitoring and management system, developed as complement to a complete vital signs monitoring project (MOHLL). The main purpose of this system is to provide physicians with real-time visualization of the patients’ vital parameters, namely the ECG trace, heart rate, and body temperature, through an Internet-connected PDA.Clinical and financial support for the case-study has been provided by Grupo AMI - Assistencia Medica Integral (Casa de Saude de Guimaraes, SA), Portugal, under the partnership established between this healthcare company and the University of Minho

Sex differences in glycosylated hemoglobin in Mauritian origin long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis)

Diabetes is a common metabolic condition that affects the body’s ability to maintain normal glycemic control. This disease process can occur in primates. Long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis) range throughout Southeast Asia and were introduced to Mauritius approximately 400 years ago. This genetically unique population has been the source of a large proportion of captive individuals used in research and macaques are the preferred animal model for diabetic research. Additionally, long-tailed macaques are successful in exploiting habitat overlapping with humans. This urbanization results in changes in the normal diet of these animals which can contribute to poor health outcomes in populations. Similar to humans, spontaneous diabetes is a condition that develops in this species which can have significant health consequences for the affected animals. HbA1C % is a bloodwork parameter that is commonly used to diagnose and monitor diabetic animals. The HbA1C % determines the level of glycosylation occurring on the hemoglobin protein found in the red blood cells. The A1C Now+ System, manufactured by PTS Diagnostics, is a commercially available, portable, point-of-care device that is used to measure HbA1C%. This device has been validated for use in this species; however, there has been very little research on the applicability of the device for use in the health monitoring of wild nonhuman primates such as, Mauritian origin long-tailed macaques. Furthermore, sex differences in the results of this test have not been reported in this species but have been in such other mammals as chimpanzees, humans, and mice. Sixty-eight long-tailed macaques were sedated for a routine physical exam and HbA1C% was measured using the A1C Now+ device. Blood was also collected for the measurement of blood glucose, hemoglobin, red blood cell count and hematocrit. In our study population, males had significantly higher glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1C) than females (p \u3c 0.0001). Additionally, we found that HbA1C is positively correlated with hemoglobin, red blood cell count, and hematocrit, but sex did not have an impact on the correlations noted between HbA1C and Hb, HCT, and RBC. These results suggest that sex should be considered when assessing the health of a long-tailed macaque using the HbA1C test; for example, what is a normal value in a healthy male (6%) may be indicative of a pre-diabetic or diabetic female. This study confirms the utility of this device for the diagnosis and management of diabetes in captive and free ranging long-tailed macaques. Due to its small size and ease of use in the field, this device can be useful in monitoring the health of free-ranging monkeys that obtain food items that are highly processed, carbohydrate based and sugary. This type of diet is often encountered by macaques living sympatrically with humans. Captive individuals used in research and in zoos may also benefit from this data as the health of these individuals depends on the care provided by the staff

Quality of Ammoniated \u3ci\u3eBrachiaria decumbens\u3c/i\u3e Hay

The experiment was conducted at UNESP-Jaboticabal to evaluate the quality of Brachiaria decumbens hays harvested after seed ripening. The hays were submitted to the following treatments: control, anhydrous ammonia (3.0% NH3 in the DM), and urea (5.0% in the DM). The chemical composition, digestibility and the performance of steers were evaluated using a complete randomized block design with three treatments and six replications. The ammoniation either with NH3 or urea increased (P\u3c 0.05) the CP content, and the IVDMD. The NH3 treatment reduced (P \u3c 0.05) the contents of NDF and ADF, and the urea application reduced (P \u3c 0.05) the contents of hemicellulose and lignin. The ammoniation did not affect (P \u3e 0.05) the neutral detergent insoluble nitrogen, and acid detergent insoluble nitrogen values. Steers receiving Brachiaria hay plus soybean meal (1.08 kg DM.day), hay treated with NH3 plus corn meal (1.14 kg DM/day ), and hay treated with urea plus corn meal (1.14 kg DM/day) showed DM intake of 1.97; 2.23; and 1.90% BW; weight gains of 0.60; 0.53; and 0.37 kg/ day, and feed conversion of 10.8; 12.8; and 16.9 kg of DM/ kg WG, respectively

Identification of harmonic current sources in single-phase power systems using feature selection techniques and artificial neural networks

Este trabalho consiste em apresentar um método para a identificação de cargas lineares e não-lineares comumente encontradas em sistemas elétricos residenciais. Desta identificação, soluções viáveis poderão ser aplicadas com o intuito de mitigar os níveis de emissão das correntes harmônicas geradas, advindas principalmente por cargas com características não-lineares. No desenvolvimento do método, utilizaram-se de técnicas para a seleção de atributos, de forma a minimizar a dificuldade em se identificar as cargas conectadas ao sistema. A etapa posterior de identificação foi realizada pela aplicação de redes neurais artificiais. Todas as situações de distorção harmônica foram geradas em laboratório por uma fonte de alimentação, onde em sua saída foram alocados analisadores de energia, responsáveis pela extração das medidas necessárias sobre as cargas residenciais em análise. Os resultados obtidos foram considerados satisfatórios, mostrando-se que a metodologia proposta pode ser também empregada pelas concessionárias de energia elétrica para que estas obtenham informações sobre o perfil das cargas instaladas em consumidores residenciais.This work presents a method to identify linear and nonlinear loads commonly encountered in residential electrical systems. From this method, feasible solutions can be applied to mitigate the high levels of harmonic currents, generated mainly by nonlinear loads. Techniques of feature selection were used to data preprocessing and to minimize the effort in identification of loads connected to the electrical system. For the next step, the load identification, artificial neural networks were applied. All harmonic distortion situations were created in laboratory from a power source, and in its outputs were inserted the loads and power quality analyzers, which perform the extraction of all measurements. The obtained results were considered satisfactory, which show that the methodology can be employed by power distribution companies in order to obtain information about the profile of loads used by residential consumers.FAPESPCNPqCoordenacao de Aperfeicoamento de Pessoal de Nivel Superior (CAPES

Electroactive polymer membranes as substrates for point-of-care devices

Point-of-care devices (POC) are becoming essential for medical assistance in emergency situations or location with difficult access to medical infrastructures. In this work, innovative microfluidic substrates based on electroactive poly(vinylidene-co-trifluorethylene)-P(VDF-TrFE) with tuned morphologies and adequate physicochemical properties were developed using electrospinning and phase inversion techniques, as alternative to commercially available two-dimensional microfluidic substrates based mainly on cellulose. Their hydrophilicity was tuned using plasma treatments and barriers were implemented using wax printing to fabricate a design able to carry out glucose assays as a proof of concept.FCT- Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia: PTDC/EMD-EMD/28159/2017; SFRH/BD/140698/2018. Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO): MAT2016-76039-C4-3-R. Basque Government Industry and Education Departments: ELKARTEK, HAZITEK and PIBA (PIBA-2018-06