A team of researchers and doctor from IIT Kharagpur has devised an automatic oxygen therapy system as home solution for the patients with respiratory dysfunction including Covid infected patients.
Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur has developed an Android application based a new medical device named “Senflex: Oxigenio”, for providing supplemental oxygen therapy to the COVID-19 patients at home.
The system comprises of an electronic flow controller, a pulse oximeter and an Android app. The device would also be suitable for the patients with any other respiratory dysfunction, requiring long term oxygen therapy (LTOT), such as patients diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary disease (COPD), Asthma etc.
The use of supplemental oxygen is an essential requirement to the patients affected in COVID-19 as the disease predominantly affects the pulmonary system leading to hypoxemia for most of the patients. Although oxygen therapy is lifesaving, it may be associated with deleterious effects when administered for prolonged periods at high concentrations.
“It has become necessary to maintain the prescribed oxygen flow rate per minute as per the physicians’ advice. This essentially depends upon the oxygen saturation levels and other physical conditions of the patient. Keeping this in mind, we have developed an automatic oxygen therapy device that controls the oxygen flow rate automatically as per the oxygen saturation level (SPO2) of the patient in a specific time”, said Prof Dipak Kumar Goswami, the lead researcher and the Professor of the Department of Physics at IIT Kharagpur.
At Organic Electronics Laboratory (ORELA), Department of Physics, IIT Kharagpur, along with Prof. Goswami and his research team (SenFlex), Tanmay Ghoshal from the Department of Electronics and Electrical Communication Engineering, Pranab Lodh and Suman Mitra, both from the School of Nanoscience and Technology as well as Dr Mousam Manna from B C Roy Technology Hospital, developed an algorithm to decide the oxygen flow rate, based on the data collected from the history of oxygen use by the COVID-19 patients, who were under oxygen support during their treatment.
“The system has the flexibility for the physicians to decide the initial parameters as per the current patient conditions including any co-morbidity if any, or patients with COPD or Asthma to start the automatic flow of oxygen”, added Dr Mousam Manna.
The flow controller is connected wirelessly to an android app through a Bluetooth connection for remote monitoring and control. The system can be switched to manual operation at any point of time from automatic mode, where the flow rate can be altered manually. The researchers have filled a patent for the innovation.
Media contact: Prof. Dipak Kumar Goswami, Professor, Department of Physics, IIT Kharagpur
Email: dipak@phy.iitkgp.ac.in, Ph no.: +91-3222-283818
Contact: Paramita Dey, Junior Assistant
Email: media@iitkgp.ac.in, Ph. No.: +91-3222-282004
SenFlex.T smart mask contains a highly sensitive, flexible temperature sensor along with a Bluetooth based measuring electronics. The sensor system can continuously monitor the temperature changes of inhaled and exhaled air during breathing and record the breathing pattern. The temperature sensor has a resolution of 4.3 mK and about 25 ms response time. Further, a commercially available pulse oximeter has been integrated with the sensor system to monitor the oxygen saturation level during breathing. 
The patient data is uploaded automatically to the cloud server through the mobile app (SenFlex), where it is processed by means of AIML, and reports made available on the app and for doctors’ consultation.