A Resource-Efficient Planning for Pressure Ulcer Prevention

作者：Ostadabbas Sarah^*; Yousefi Rasoul; Nourani Mehrdad; Faezipour Miad; Tamil Lakshman; Pompeo Matthew Q

来源：IEEE Transactions on Information Technology in Biomedicine, 2012, 16(6): 1265-1273.

DOI：10.1109/TITB.2012.2214443

• Constrained shortest path (CSP)
• posture scheduling
• pressure ulcer prevention
• resource optimization
• tissue stress evaluation

Pressure ulcer is a critical problem for bed-ridden and wheelchair-bound patients, diabetics, and the elderly. Patients need to be regularly repositioned to prevent excessive pressure on a single area of body, which can lead to ulcers. Pressure ulcers are extremely costly to treat and may lead to several other health problems, including death. The current standard for prevention is to reposition at-risk patients every 2 h. Even if it is done properly, a fixed schedule is not sufficient to prevent all ulcers. Moreover, it may result in nurses being overworked by turning some patients too frequently. In this paper, we present an algorithm for finding a nurse-effort optimal repositioning schedule that prevents pressure ulcer formation for a finite planning horizon. Our proposed algorithm uses data from a commercial pressure mat assembled on the bed%26apos;s surface and provides a sequence of next positions and the time of repositioning for each patient.

• 出版日期2012-11