title: Electrical impedance tomography system based on active electrodes.
abstract: Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) can image the distribution of ventilated lung tissue, and is thus a promising technology to help monitor patient breathing to help selection of mechanical ventilation parameters. Two key difficulties in EIT instrumentation make such monitoring difficult: (1) EIT data quality depends on good electrode contact and is sensitive to changes in contact quality, and (2) EIT electrodes are difficult and time consuming to place on patients. This paper presents the design and initial tests of an active electrode-based system to address these difficulties. Our active electrode EIT system incorporates an active electrode belt, a central voltage-driven current source, central analog to digital converters and digital to analog converters, a central FPGA-based demodulator and controller. The electrode belt is designed incorporating 32 active electrodes, each of which contains the electronic amplifiers, switches and associated logic. Tests show stable device performance with a convenient ease of use and good imaging ability in volunteer tests.
authors.affiliation: Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique S.A. (CSEM), Landquart, Switzerland. pascal@gaggero.ch
authors.forename: Pascal Olivier
authors.initials: PO
authors.lastname: Gaggero
authors.forename: Andy
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Adler
authors.forename: Josef
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Brunner
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Seitz
mesh_terms: D003196:Computer Graphics; D017097:Electric Impedance; D004566:Electrodes; D006801:Humans; D008128:Logic; D008297:Male; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D013909:Thorax; D014054:Tomography / Q000295:instrumentation*