Apple wants the Apple Watch to be an effective tool at measuring blood pressure. The tech giant has been granted a patent for a “Blood Pressure Monitoring System Including a Liquid Filled Sensor.”
About the patent
In the patent Apple notes that a person may monitor one or more of his/her physiological parameters by attaching a monitoring device such as a blood pressure monitor to one of their limbs. However, the accuracy of correlating changes in air pressure within the bladder to blood pressures in the arm may vary based on a variety of factors including inflation and deflation rates, the volume of the cuff, and/or the material of the cuff among others.
Apple says it would be great to reduce some of these variations and/or increase the sensitivity of the pressure measurements to help increase the accuracy or precision of measurements taken by blood pressure monitors. And the company thinks an Apple Watch with a liquid-filled sensor would be up to the job.
Summary of the patent
Here’s Apple’s abstract of the patent: “Embodiments are directed to a blood pressure measurement device that includes a strap configured to couple the blood pressure measurement device to a user, an air pump coupled to the strap and having a housing defining a surface facing the user, and an inflatable chamber positioned on the surface of the air pump and fluidly coupled to the air pump. The inflatable chamber can be positioned between the air pump and the user when the blood pressure measurement device is worn by the user and expand towards the user when inflated.
“The blood pressure measurement device can also include a pressure sensing chamber coupled to the inflatable chamber and positioned between the inflatable chamber and the user when the blood pressure measurement device is worn by the user. The pressure sensing chamber can include a liquid volume and a pressure sensing device configured to detect a pressure of the liquid volume.”
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