A non-invasive, wearable Near Infrared Spectroscopy (NIRS) device was designed to measure in-vivo placental oxygenation. The device was used in a preliminary study in 12 healthy, singleton, pregnant volunteers at week 33.3±3.6 pregnancy. At postpartum, the placentas from 10 patients were then sent to a pathology lab, where five of them were found to have lesions. Placentas with lesions have significantly lower oxygenation levels (68.7% ± 5.6%) than the ones without lesions (74.2% ± 5.8%). This wearable NIRS device can be a potential point-of-care device to non-invasively check the lesion status of a placenta antepartum.
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