Heart failure is a cardiovascular disease that affects more than 64 million people worldwide

A study led by researchers from the University of Glasgow has revealed that a brand-new heart failure monitoring device could be used to monitor patients and help prevent hospital admissions.

Published in the European Journal of Heart Failure and presented at the European Society of Cardiology’s Heart Failure Congress, the CONGEST-HF study trialled Analog Devices Inc’s (ADI) Sensinel Cardiopulmonary Management (CPM) System in 66 patients with the cardiovascular condition.

Affecting more than 64 million people worldwide, heart failure occurs when the heart cannot pump enough blood around the body.

Most patients with heart failure are admitted to the hospital multiple times for treatment with intravenous diuretics and current methods rely on expensive, invasive monitoring such as specially designed pacemakers or sensors implanted directly into the lung.

Applied to the skin of the patient’s chest, the Sensinel CPM device measures physiological parameters and cardiopulmonary indicators, including heart sounds, heart rate, temperature and respiratory rate via Bluetooth to measure heart, lung and other functions.

After trialling the non-invasive device, researchers found that it was able to detect changes in the fluid of patients with heart failure who had been admitted to the hospital to receive fluid removal by decongestion therapy or haemodialysis.

Results showed that the device successfully performed and was also able to detect changes in fluid as well as weight in patients as they had their fluid removed.

If worn for less than five minutes per day, researchers believe the device could offer an alternative method for monitoring patients with heart failure and detecting fluid overload, ultimately reducing costly hospital admissions.

Pardeep Jhund, professor of cardiology and epidemiology, University of Glasgow, commented: “This innovative system captures numerous vital patient measurements, aligning closely with the metrics we rely on in clinical practice to identify fluid overload.”

Researchers aim to conduct a larger study to determine whether the device can detect fluid accumulation in patients at home and provide sufficient warning to reduce hospitalisations.