Developing an Instrumentation Package to Measure Noise and Vibration in Neonatal Patient Transport

Inter-facility transport is often necessary for patients requiring specialized medical care. In the case of neonatal patients, specialized transport systems are used to ensure continuous care during transport. Concerns relating to physical stressors to which the patients are exposed during transport has motivated our ongoing study on evaluating and mitigating vibration and acoustic noise in these systems. Regardless of the various testing configurations, whether they be full-scale vehicle tests or laboratory shaker tests, reliable and consistent data collection practices are desired. An instrumentation package, designed to measure noise and vibration of the transport system, is currently in development to ultimately improve the safety of patients during transport. This system is intended to promote standard data collection practices and ultimately the aggregation of findings from independent studies into a single database. Requirements for the system have been defined, and early stages of sensor selection and prototyping are underway. The current configuration of sensors can successfully collect acceleration, angular rate, and sound level data. Additional sensors can be integrated into the system, to allow for multiple locations of interest to be studied simultaneously. Future work will improve the efficiency of the data collection script, the automation of data processing, and the physical implementation of the system.