Project

Electrical BioImpedance (EBI) technology is a potential diagnostic and monitoring tool for trauma victim assessment. It is non‐invasive, harmless, non‐expensive, rapid, portable and easy to use- making it ideal for ambulance use. Another great advantage is that thoracic EBI measurements allow heart and respiration rates detection, as well as estimation of haemodynamic parameters. All these measurements are essential in the prehospital monitoring setting. The most common injury as a consequence of a traffic accident is chest blunt trauma. Because blunt trauma might be occult, the final purpose is to develop a tool that non-invasively detect and monitor occult trauma. In order to do that, the first step is the objective of the present study. The objective is to assess the relationship between chest trauma and bioimpedance. Being bioimpedance defined as the opposition of biological tissue to the flow of electric current. The project is a pilot study aiming to measure thoracic bioimpedance in chest trauma patients at Sahlgrenska University Hospital. This is made possible thanks to Hans Granhed and Eva-Corina Caragounis who helped to set a collaboration with the trauma ward. The data recorded in this project will be very valuable as it belong to real patients. Moreover, most of them will have tissue damage what is needed to evaluate the value of bioimpedance phase angle for detection and monitoring of trauma, which has not been done before.