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For patients under Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) spontaneous respiration is constantly at risk of being impaired by anesthetic drugs or by upper airway obstruction. Therefore, continuous monitoring of the breathing activity is needed to assess adequate ventilation or to detect specific obstruction patterns. The paper describes three MRI compatible respiration sensors based on pure optical technologies developed within the EU FP6 project OFSETH. The sensors are based on fiber Bragg gratings, optical time-domain reflectometry and macrobending effects. The developed smart medical textiles can sense elongation up to 3% while maintaining the stretching properties of the textile substrates for patient's comfort. The OFSETH harness allows a continuous measurement of abdominal and thoracic respiration movement while all vitals organs are free for medical staff actions. The sensors were tested in MRI environment and on healthy adults. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Application results of a dynamic technique for simultaneous measurement of length changes and optical power changes between multiple reflection points in an optical fiber are presented. The technique is based on incoherent optical frequency domain reflectometry (I-OFDR) and allows for measuring for example length changes and optical power changes quasi-distributed at repetition rates up to 2 kHz. Precise measurement with length change resolutions in the -range can be conducted using standard single-mode or multi-mode fibers. Previous results of dynamic refractive index change measurement and the use of polymer optical fibers for high-strain measurement are concluded and possible sources of measurement inaccuracies are discussed. Field test results with sensors installed on a masonry building during a seismic shake test are presented. The versatility and simplicity of this technique makes it potentially interesting for application in the structural health monitoring sector and chemical process control. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The potential impact of optical fiber sensors embedded into medical textiles for the monitoring of respiratory movements in a magnetic resonance imaging environment is presented. We report on three different designs, all textile based: a macrobending sensor, a Bragg grating sensor, and a time reflectometry sensor. In all three cases, the sensing principle is based on the measure of the elongation of the abdominal circumference during breathing movements. We demonstrate that the three sensors can successfully sense textile elongations between 0% and 3%, while maintaining the stretching properties of the textile substrates for a good comfort of the patients. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]