Pneumatic sensor for cardiorespiratory monitoring during sleep

We show that a non-intrusive pneumatic sensor can be used to measure respiratory rate, heart rate, and their variability during sleep. The pneumatic sensor was included in a polysomnography (PSG) study involving 42 participants in a sleep laboratory. The agreement between the pneumatic sensor and the PSG for respiratory rate, heart rate, and their variability was quantified by Bland-Altman analysis. The respiratory rate has a mean value of 15.4 breaths per minute for a bias of -0.06 and 95% limits of agreement (LOA) of [-0.6; 0.5] breath per minute. The respiratory rate variability root mean square of successive differences (RMSSD) has a mean value of 459.51 ms, a bias of 9.2 and a 95% LOA of [-43.5; 61.9] ms. The heart rate has a mean value of 60.6 beats per minute for a bias of -0.8 and a 95% LOA of [-4.3; 2.7] beat per minute. The heart rate variability RMSSD has a mean value of 44.1 ms, a bias of 14.7 and a 95% LOA of [-19; 48.4] ms. These results show that a non-intrusive pneumatic sensor can accurately estimate cardiorespiratory metrics overnight.