DEVELOPMENT AND APPLICATION OF A GENERAL-PURPOSE AMBULATORY MONITOR

This paper details the development and application of a multi-channel, general purpose, lightweight, portable monitor. The monitor is constr ucted with separate analogue and digital circuitry so that a dedicated analogue board may be developed for each new application with the sam e general purpose digital board, the latter requiring only changes to the firmware. At the heart of the digital circuit is an Arizona Microc hip PIC 16C64 microcontroIler, which can communicate with a computer v ia a serial port and perform both simple and relatively complex data a nalysis prior to storing data in memory. The low-power design enables the circuit to operate for potentially longer than a week on one set o f batteries. Designed with medical applications in mind, preliminary d ata from three studies utilising the monitor are described. These incl ude measurements of bladder pressure, personal exposure to pollutant g ases and body temperature. The studies demonstrate the system's versat ility in a variety of investigations requiring different signal proces sing and sampling protocols. II is hoped that, in the future, this amb ulatory device will contribute to the diagnosis, treatment and underst anding of a wide variety of disease conditions. (C) 1998 IPEM. publish ed by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.