Pacemakers Can Alert Doctors No Matter Where You Are

The Dutch research organization Imec has created a new way to monitor a patient's implanted sensors. Many patients have for example, a pacemaker implanted by a doctor so that it can be read by a special sensor at home or at the office. The drawback to this is that obviously you must use be at your home or wherever you happen to have the sensor. Imec has now created a little sensor that you wear around your neck that acts as a median between your phone and the sensor. The sensor will pick up the information from the implanted sensors and then in turn relay the info to your cell phone. The sensor gathers data every 100 milliseconds from the pacemaker and then sends it to the phone. From your phone it can be sent directly to your doctor. You can also set the app up to alert you or even text someone else when your heart rate and blood pressure are approaching dangerous levels.

Right now the app is only available for the Android operating system but hopefully it will be available for all operating systems. The Sensor worn around the neck uses the obscure sounding nRF24L01+ radio frequency, which was developed by Nordic Semiconductor, rather than the more common Bluetooth radio frequency. What this means to the average person is that instead of having to charge the sensor every day, which is what you would have to do if it were using Bluetooth, you only have to charge the sensor every seven days or a week.