On the Optical Monitoring of Anemia Severity Levels

[摘要] Anemia is a prevalent medical condition that seriously a ects millions ofpeople all over the world. In many regions, not only its initial detection, butalso its monitoring are hindered by the limited access to laboratory facilities.This situation has motivated the development of a wide range of optical de-vices and procedures to assist physicians in these tasks. Although noticeableprogress has been achieved in this area, the search for reliable, low-cost andrisk-free solutions still continues, and the strengthening of the knowledgebase about this disorder and its e ects is essential for the success of theseinitiatives. In this paper, we contribute to these e orts by closely examiningthe sensitivity of human skin hyperspectral responses (within and outside thevisible region of the light spectrum) to reduced hemoglobin concentrationsassociated with increasing anemia severity levels. This investigation, whichinvolves skin specimens with distinct biophysical and morphological charac-teristics, is supported by controlled in silico experiments performed using apredictive light transport model and measured data reported in the biomed-ical literature. We also propose a noninvasive procedure to be employed inthe monitoring of this condition at the point-of-care.

[发布机构] University of Waterloo

[关键词] Computer Science