SoundTrak Data Acquisition and Analysis System for OSDB

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Snoring, a symptom of increased upper airway resistance during sleep, is extremely common in children. Such obstructive sleep disordered breathing (OSDB) is now recognized as having substantial neurocognitive, neurobehavioral, and cardiovascular consequences. One of the major limitations in diagnosing OSDB is the need for relatively complex, burdensome, and costly procedures, such as laboratory polysomnography. Barron Associates, Inc. (BAI) and the University of Virginia (UVA) propose to develop the SoundTrak data acquisition and analysis system, a low-cost sleep monitor for use in individuals' home environments to non invasively and economically acquire and analyze data pertaining to OSDB. The Phase I SoundTrak system will unobtrusively collect both low- and high-frequency sound data via a bed headboard-mounted microphone and a PC bedside data logger. Recent work by UVA physicians demonstrated that high-frequency inspiratory sounds are a marker for the occurrence of OSDB in children. Thoracic breathing movements of monitored subjects will be measured using BAI's patent-pending wireless thoracic band technology, enabling discrimination of the monitored subject's sleep sounds from other sources. The prototype SoundTrak system will be validated based on an overnight laboratory polysomnogram and a multi-night home sleep study, the latter of which is expected to provide more representative data for diagnosing OSDB.