At the end of 2014, the number of Japanese dialysis patients was approximately 320,000, which is increasing every year. Chronic renal failure patients require hemodialysis because the workings of the kidney can't fall and take any more out a toxin in extracorporeal. During hemodialysis, vascular access is needed to secure enough blood. However, vascular access encounters the problem of hemadostenosis. Early detection of stenosis may facilitate long-term use of hemodialysis shunts. The stethoscope auscultation of vascular murmurs can be useful in the assessment of access patency; however, the sensitivity of this diagnostic approach is skill dependent. This study proposes a diagnosis system for assessing the progress of hemodialysis shunt stenosis to detect stenosis at its early stage by using vascular murmurs. The system is based on dynamic time warping (DTW), a self-organizing map (SOM), and a short-time maximum entropy method (STMEM) for data analysis. The SOM based on the spectrum of the blood flow sound obtained by STMEM qualitatively judges whether the blood vessel access of the dialysis patient is normal or abnormal. Moreover, by calculating the dissimilarity of spectrum using DTW, the narrowing of the blood vessel due to the time course of the dialysis patient is analyzed quantitatively. As a result, the degree of change in stenosis due to time course of dialysis patients could be confirmed from the qualitative aspect and the quantitative aspect. At the same time, it turned out that the blood vessel was stenotic even in a serious patient even immediately after surgery.
This paper proposes a new food-evaluation technique based on biological information of the human body. Innovating a new food evaluation technique based on biological information can allow us to develop high-valued food products on the occasion of food design. We particularly focus on a small intestine and assume that the digestive activity varies depending on an individual constitution, health condition and compatibility between an individual and a food. This method can track digests in a small intestine and determine their status by using an ultrasound B-mode movie. We acquire peristaltic activity of a small intestine using frame subtraction method and determine their status using optical flow.This allows quantifying peristaltic activity of a small intestine based on tracking of digests in an abdominal B-mode movie.
Thickening agents are commonly used to prevent aspiration, a condition that can prove fatal in the elderly. However, no established indicators exist that show the extent to which sticky food reduces the risk of aspiration. VideoEndoscopy (VE) and VideoFluorography (VF) are the classic inspection methods used for evaluating the function of swallowing, but they are both have limited utility in that they are invasive. In this study, we propose a non-invasive method that exploits esophagus ultrasound videos to estimate the internal flow characteristics of foods, and facilitates quantitative evaluation of the swallowing function. The method combines optical flow with Maximally Stable Extremal Regions (MSER) to extract the movement velocity and position of the esophagus and bolus. The results suggest that movement velocity could be used as an indicator to quantify the internal flow characteristics of foods. The displacement of the esophagus indicates the esophageal opening and could be used as an indicator to evaluate swallowing.
In this study, we develop a plastic optical fiber (POF) sensor with a double-layer structure cladding consisting of a swelling polymer lower layer and a dye-doped swelling polymer upper layer. Both cladding layers swell and decrease their refractive indices when exposed to alkane vapor. Then, the structure of the POF sensor changes from leaky to waveguide mode. Therefore, the intensity of transmitted light changes remarkably, depending on the presence of alkane. The absorption of light due to the dye in the upper cladding layer increases the change in transmitted light intensity. In this study, we fabricated a POF sensor by using the electrospray deposition method and examined its response to alkane vapor. The results indicate an improvement in the sensitivity of the POF alkane sensor due to the effect of the double-clad layer.
Access to the requested content is limited to institutions that have purchased or subscribe to SPIE eBooks.
You are receiving this notice because your organization may not have SPIE eBooks access.*
*Shibboleth/Open Athens users─please
sign in
to access your institution's subscriptions.
To obtain this item, you may purchase the complete book in print or electronic format on
SPIE.org.
INSTITUTIONAL Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.
PERSONAL Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.