Twenty‐four‐hour continuous and remote monitoring of respiratory rate using a medical radar system for the early detection of pneumonia in symptomatic elderly bedridden hospitalized patients

The use of continuous and long‐term monitoring of respiratory rate is vital for predicting pneumonia in symptomatic patients; however, it is often measured manually and discontinuously by counting of chest wall movements in routine practice.1 Hence, here we developed a point‐of‐care system for the early detection of pneumonia in symptomatic elderly bedridden hospitalized patients on the basis of 24‐hours continuous and noncontact monitoring of respiratory rate using a medical radar sensor. We focused on designing a system that would improve hospitalized patient quality of life and reduce medical staff workload. To this end, we adopted a medical radar sensor for respiration monitoring that featured an extremely low burden on the patient and enabled unobtrusive measurements without the need to attach electrodes to the patient's body.2 To reduce medical staff workload, a prediction method, that is, return map,3 was implemented into the system to analyze the time series respiratory rates, thereby extracting the risk period of pneumonia and sending out an alarm. Infection is the most common cause of hospital‐acquired pneumonia, which is associated with prolonged hospital stay and increased mortality in elderly hospitalized patients.4 In this study, we evaluated the feasibility of this system for detecting the risk period of pneumonia on the basis of continuously monitored respiratory rates in elderly bedridden hospitalized patients.