KR101479415B1 - Thermoregulatory Sweat Tester, TST - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a nerve diagnostic system using a human sweating response. A human sweating diagnostic system includes: various heating units used to increase the temperature of a human body in a chamber or a capsule; an air conditioner to adjust humidity; sensors and cameras to measure the temperature of the human body, an internal temperature of a device, a moisture, and an airflow; a camera to detect a fever and a sweating state resulting from the increase of the temperature in a two dimension (2D) and a three dimension (3D); and a display unit to analyze variation characteristics depending on a sweat amount, a sweating time, an initial sweating characteristic, a sweating time, temperature, and moisture, to simply and accurately diagnose a focus, a pain area, and a pain degree of an examinee, and to display the information onto a human model in 2D and 3D.

Description

{Thermoregulatory Sweat Tester, TST}

The present invention relates to a nerve diagnosis device using a skin sweating reaction, and more particularly, to a nerve diagnosis device using a skin sweating reaction, and more particularly, A sensor that measures temperature, humidity, air flow rate, a measuring device that detects the state of fever and sweating due to a rise in temperature, and the amount of sweating from the measured state value, the sweating time, the initial sweating characteristic, the sweating time, Characteristics, and the like of the subject, thereby enabling a simple and accurate diagnosis of lesion, pain, and pain of the subject.

    If an abnormality occurs in the human nervous system, abnormalities such as movement, sensation, autonomic control system, Among these devices, there are Quantitative Sudomotor Axon Reflex Test (QSART), skin biopsy using a confocal microscope, measurement of implanted nerve and TST, and most of the methods except TST There has been an inconvenience that a large amount of medication must be administered to a testee for testing. In addition, the infrared thermography system (DITI), which is currently widely used, senses the skin temperature of the human body as a thermal image and measures the degree of body temperature distribution to output a diagnosis of pain, a lesion site and a normal region through a thermal image. However, There is a disadvantage in that accuracy and reproducibility of repetition are inferior depending on the change (environment, meal, drug, etc.). EMG is widely used because of its high reproducibility. However, it is often difficult to diagnose autonomic nervous system because it is possible to test only the proximal nerve which is more than a certain thickness, it is inconvenient to test, and it is unstable in autonomic nervous system diagnosis.

 Therefore, the TST method is widely used to solve the whole neural condition with the recognition of the whole body swing pattern in a short time. However, the existing TST method is difficult to popularize because the system is not systemized by manually installing the apparatus in a certain space in the hospital, which causes high cost and other inconvenience. In addition, although the existing TST apparatus has many advantages, there are many limitations to detect the sweating amount and the sweating change according to the time except for the pattern.

In the conventional TST method, a sweating pattern as shown on the right is obtained based on an image obtained by applying a coloring reagent and sweating as shown in the upper left photograph, and based on this pattern, the subject is diagnosed as "peripheral neuropathy" However, there is a possibility that the coloring reagent responding to sweating may flow or diffuse, and the diagnosis is made using only a rough pattern on the whole image. Therefore, there is a certain restriction on the diagnosis of microparticulate disease. When sweating occurs early, In addition, after the diagnosis of sweating, there is a disadvantage that additional post-treatment operations such as cleaning the inside of the diagnosis unit by wiping the coloring reagent on the skin after sweating diagnosis are troublesome.

However, as will be described later in the present invention, when the degree of sweating is calculated with time without use of a coloring reagent, comprehensive information on total sweating amount, sweating time, initial sweating condition of each site, And it is possible to do many analyzes that were difficult to find out only by the conventional pattern inspection.

According to the present invention, it is possible to constitute a system composed of a heating means, a sensor, a measuring instrument, and an analyzing computer, etc., and telemedicine through communication or the like is also possible, and a relatively inexpensive and highly convenient apparatus configuration can be realized. In addition, according to the present invention, a systematic technique for detecting a state of fever and sweating and analyzing sweating amount, sweating time, initial sweating characteristic, temporal change characteristic of sweating, temperature, Site, and pain level can be diagnosed easily, accurately and with high repetitive reproducibility, thereby enhancing the user's convenience and efficiency. According to the present invention, it is possible to observe the autonomic nervous function stably, and it is possible to observe continuous change, test of the non-genital nerve of small thickness, test of the disabled person and damage of the peripheral nervous system.

In addition, since the conventional TST is diagnosed only on the basis of the fixed camera pattern image, it is difficult to accurately capture the foot on the side or the slope of the body. However, the present invention controls the position / Dimensional image can be obtained and analyzed, or an image can be obtained for an accurate two-dimensional surface area, and it is possible to correct the relative value of the unit surface area relative to the unit surface area.

The object of the present invention is to measure the response of the sweating caused by the sympathetic nerve reaction by receiving a proper stimulus such as fever in a comfortable state, and to analyze the autonomic nervous system through the qualitative and quantitative analysis, (TST) system that can be used without any additional reaction coloring reagent in diagnosing peripheral neuropathy and autonomic dysopathy by examining functional nerve fibers and autonomic nervous disorders.

In order to solve the above-described problems, the present invention provides a method for controlling a temperature of a human body in a chamber or a capsule, comprising: a plurality of heating means for raising the temperature of a human body; a coil heater; a hot water pipe of the concept of a hot water boiler; an infrared ray; a near- Air humidification device, heating humidification device, dehumidifying device, etc.) and an air conditioner for controlling the air volume and the air speed, and the like, , The air condition of the chamber or capsule, and the state of the testee are monitored through sensors, infrared cameras, temperature distribution measuring cameras, and the like, which measure the central temperature and skin surface temperature of the human body and the degree of air conditioning such as temperature, . An optical system capable of detecting two-dimensional images and three-dimensional images by detecting a state of fever and sweating due to a rise in temperature, and a driving device for changing positions and angles of the plurality of measurement cameras and cameras. It is possible to analyze the diagnostic features by extracting characteristic features such as sweating pattern, sweating amount, sweating time, initial sweating characteristic, sweating time, temperature and humidity, Or three-dimensionally, and provides means of solving the problem through a sweating diagnostic device having software that can easily and accurately diagnose and express the subject's lesion, pain area, and pain level.

According to the present invention, the subject can quickly and accurately diagnose sweating in a relaxed state such as a normal environment, diagnose through sweating characteristics analysis, and display method displayed on the human body pile to determine the lesion, pain, and pain level of the testee. It is possible to simultaneously pursue convenience and efficiency.

Fig. 1 is a general appearance and installation structural view of a top-and-bottom detachable diagnostic device capable of receiving a sweating characteristic examination while a subject to be examined is lying down.
2 is a functional block conceptual diagram of a diagnostic device used in the present invention.
3 is a conceptual diagram of signals between functional blocks of the diagnostic device used in the present invention.
4 is a flowchart of the diagnostic processing software used in the present invention.
5 is a conceptual diagram of a camera, an optical system, and a camera driving device used in the present invention.
6 is a diagram illustrating an example of a method of displaying the sweating characteristic used in the present invention.

The contents of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. (1) First, FIG. 1 is an overall appearance and installation structural view of a chamber or a capsule (hereinafter referred to as a box) capable of receiving a sweating characteristic examination when a subject to be examined, which is a subject of the present invention, is lying down. Each box is composed of a collar and a fastening part so that the test subject can easily enter and exit, and is constructed in a structure that ensures safety. It is also possible with a sliding door structure. The upper and lower boxes have a camera, a light source, an optical system and a driving unit, and a transparent window or a translucent window, so that the inside of the diagnostic self-diagnosis device can be visually confirmed.

Except for a part of the window, the box has a heat insulating structure with a heating part. The heating part is composed of a plurality of heating means for raising the temperature of the human body. Typically, a coil heater, a hot water flow pipe with the concept of hot water boiler, , A far-infrared light emitting device, a hot air generating device such as a PTC, and the like. A humidifying device, an air humidifying device, a humidifying device, a dehumidifying device, and the like), and an air conditioner for controlling the air volume and the air velocity inside the box.

The air condition of the chamber or capsules and the state of the testee are monitored and controlled under optimum conditions through the sensors of the central temperature and the surface temperature of the human body, the temperature, humidity and air flow inside the apparatus, the infrared camera and the temperature distribution measuring camera . A driving unit for moving the positions / angles of the cameras, lights, optical systems, and cameras is provided to enable two-dimensional and three-dimensional measurements in the swing state, and data for judging the sweating state is secured.

(2) FIG. 2 is a conceptual diagram of a block for each diagnostic function. The center temperature and the surface temperature of the human body are measured by contact or non-contact type on the forehead, armpits, mouth, ears, etc. through the electronic thermometer and infrared thermometer, and the value is provided to the computer software through the communication unit. And so on. It is also possible to measure the temperature through the camera. In order to acquire data in a swallow state through a plurality of measurement cameras, an optical system or a driving device is used to form a database into a two-dimensional image and a three-dimensional image. That is, each optical system is constituted in order to secure a suitable image such as a measurement image of a sweating state through an interference fringe of a moire interference pattern or a sweat position, a video image for measuring a pattern of sweating and sweating, and an image for obtaining optical three- The position and angle of multiple cameras are controlled. The 3D image is extracted based on the acquired image, and the sweating state of the two - dimensional surface area with respect to the three - dimensional surface shape is extracted by software and stored in a database. Control of camera position / angle The drive system is also essential for accurately imaging and diagnosing sweating on the side or incline of the human body.

(3) FIG. 3 is a conceptual diagram of signals between the diagnostic function blocks used in the present invention. The center temperature, the internal temperature of the apparatus, and the surface temperature of the human body are measured by various sensors and cameras, and input to the computer through the communication unit. Accordingly, the computer controls temperature, humidity, wind, and the like through the communication unit and the control unit. The image of the camera is inputted through the communication unit, and the position / angle of the plurality of cameras is controlled through the control unit to obtain an appropriate image. The software is used to obtain the swing state for the three-dimensional surface shape and to correct it by expressing the degree of sweating with respect to the two-dimensional area, expressing the sweating state value per unit area, constructing the sweating database, Or swallowing amount and distribution degree on a three-dimensional human body model pile, and securing it by a plurality of time together with the subject's heating temperature, time, input heating temperature, and the like to grasp the fever / sweating characteristic of the testee. The detected sweating / fever characteristics enable customized measurements for each testee as a reference when retesting at a later time. It also secures comparative data according to the healing level of the testee.

(4) Figure 4 is a flowchart of the diagnostic processing software of the present invention. When the switch is turned on at the start, it asks whether to start the examination, and inputs items related to the testee. If there is existing sweating / fever characteristic data by measurement made by the examinee, the air such as heat, humidity, wind and the like is controlled and controlled according to the characteristic. If there is no personalized data of the examinee, it slowly generates heat and controls temperature, humidity and wind. Temperature, humidity, and wind data are input through the sensor and camera, and temperature, humidity, wind, and other air are controlled to reach the desired center temperature. If there is customized data of the testee, it will quickly heat up to the original sweating characteristic and control temperature, humidity and wind. Measure the center temperature and the surface temperature, and slowly control the heat, humidity, and wind from when they reach the target temperature. The sweating characteristics (position, sweating amount, distribution diagram) at the desired temperature are processed and secured through the camera, and the camera is controlled for this purpose. If there is any abnormality in the operation of the sensor, the measurement is stopped and an alarm signal is generated.

(5) FIG. 5 is a conceptual diagram of a camera, an optical system, and a driving apparatus of the diagnostic apparatus of the present invention. That is, basically, data of swallowing state is secured through a plurality of measurement cameras, and a three-dimensional image and a two-dimensional image parallel to the skin surface are used as a basic image of the database. It is possible to obtain an image of a sweating pattern obtained by applying a coloring reagent to a surface parallel to the surface of the skin through drive control of position and angle in the case of a side surface or an inclined surface. For this purpose, the position and angle of a number of cameras are controlled, and a three-dimensional image is obtained by using a stereo vision, a three-dimensional measurement image of a sweating state through a moire interference pattern or an interference pattern of sweat, It is possible to secure various images suitable for diagnosis such as stereoscopic images obtained. Based on the acquired image, the swing state is extracted by software and converted into a database. FIG. 5 shows an example of an optical system for projecting a Moiré grid pattern to an examinee and comparing the reference grid pattern with the reference grid pattern to detect the change and measuring the degree of three-dimensional sweating. In order to accurately measure the position, This is an example of a measurement camera having a drive part that can be controlled.

(6) FIG. 6 is an exemplary view of a display representation method of sweating characteristics of the present invention. We obtain the sweating state for the three-dimensional surface shape and correct it by the expression of the average sweating degree for the two-dimensional area, construct the sweating database, and place the data on the two-dimensional or three-dimensional human model pile, . That is, the sweating characteristic is expressed on a two-dimensional or three-dimensional human body model by using its position, amount, and pattern using a point, a color, and a shape, and the human body model is rotated Or enlarged.

Unsigned

Claims (5)

A heating device for raising the body temperature of the examinee; A device for controlling temperature, humidity, wind, etc. in the chamber; Sensors for measuring a human body temperature, a temperature inside the chamber, a humidity, an air flow rate, and the like; A camera and an optical device for two-dimensionally and three-dimensionally detecting a state of heat generation and perspiration of a subject according to a temperature rise; Software for analyzing data measured from the apparatuses and sensors to diagnose a lesion, pain, and pain level of the testee; A display unit for displaying diagnostic results in two or three dimensions on a human body model; And a controller for controlling the device, the sensor, the optical device, and the display unit.
Wherein the control unit controls the calorific value and the calorific temperature to minimize the measurement time of sweating using the data when the subject's past sweating reaction data exists, divides the total calorific area into a plurality of small area modules, Dimensional image through stereovision or Moiré interferogram using a camera, a camera, and an optical system,
The software obtains sweating characteristics such as sweating amount, distribution, and time of the testee for the three-dimensional surface, corrects the sweating characteristics for the two-dimensional exposed surface area, and outputs the sweating characteristic correction value per unit skin surface area as a two- Wherein the body model is rotated or enlarged by clicking or touching a part of the body, and the detailed sweating information and image of the body part are sent to the display unit. delete delete delete delete

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