Method And Device For Monitoring The Risks For Sudden Infant Death Syndrom And For Positional Plagiocephaly

A method for performing the monitoring of the risks of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), and positional plagiocephaly, comprising the method steps of:

• providing at least one sensor device (102) capable of converting at least one physical magnitude into at least one electrical signal associated to the typical breath and positioning patterns of an infant;
• providing a processing unit capable of acquiring from the sensor device the generated electrical signal, converting the electrical signal in numeric signal data and storing the signal data into a local memory;
• using the processing unit for processing the stored signal data and for generating different kind of alarms for the caregiver whenever a risk of SIDS or plagiocephaly above a predefined threshold is detected;
• wherein
• at least one of the sensor devices and the processing unit are disposed within a common housing forming a single wearable monitoring device, which is attached to the infant clothes or to the infant head;
• that
• an energy storage of the monitoring device is provided with energy allowing continued operation without recharge for an autonomous operation period of at least 12 hours;
• that
• numerical signal data generated during the operation period are transferred to the local memory during the operation period;
• that
• the processing unit utilizes statistical analysis and/or pattern recognition algorithms, applied in real time to the signal data, to recognize potentially dangerous situations in the short and mid term during the current operation period;
• and that
• the data stored in the local memory are downloaded on an external processing unit and a statistical analysis, clustering and/or pattern recognition algorithm is applied to the data of more than one operation period to identify the long term risk of SIDS or plagiocephaly, and/or to optimize the reliability of the monitoring device with respect to the particular environment and/or infant characteristics.