Medical Design and Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Supplies and Components Index
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • MedTech Resources
    • Medtech Events in 2025
    • The 2024 Medtech Big 100
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Subscribe to Print Magazine
    • DeviceTalks
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Voices
    • Video
  • 2025 Leadership
    • 2024 Winners
    • 2023 Winners
    • 2022 Winners
    • 2021 Winners
  • Women in Medtech
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe

4 ways to make sensors work for mobile health

February 12, 2018 By Chris Newmarker

mobile health sensors TE Connectivity

This altimeter sensor is 3-by-3-by-1 mm, and could go into a pendant for a fall alert device. [Photo by managing editor Chris Newmarker]

Healthcare systems in the U.S. and around the world are increasingly turning to mobile health – keeping people out of expensive hospitals and instead treat people’s health problems from their homes. Sensors have a major role to play in enabling the shift.

Sensor technology can help make up for the fact that the home, unlike a healthcare setting, doesn’t have well-trained staff available to operate equipment, said Pete Smith, TE Connectivity‘s senior manager of product knowledge and training for sensor solutions, during a Medical Design & Outsourcing interview last week.

“They have to redevelop the machines so they can take them home and they’re safe and effective and do what the patient needs,” said Smith, who was at MD&M West in Anaheim, Calif.

There are two main things that sensors can achieve in mobile health devices, according to Smith. Sensors can measure an array of vital signs including blood pressure, temperature, pulse oximetry and more. And just as important, they monitor the machine itself to make sure it is working properly.

“Say someone in the home knocks it down. When they pick it up, is it still working properly? … If there’s something wrong with the machine, it will report back on its own,” Smith said.

Here are four ways TE Connectivity (Schaffhausen, Switzerland) has sought to ensure that its sensors meet today’s mobile health challenges:

1. Sensors for harsh environments

TE has years of experience making sensors for applications such as oil and gas or marine environments that require the equipment to be rugged and tough. The company’s engineers, for example, know how to apply coatings to a sensor or package it in a waterproof enclosure, achieving IP ratings as high as 68 or 69, according to Smith.

Smith noted that the Brooklyn Bridge’s creators – John Augustus and Washington Augustus Roebling – engineered the bridge to be six times stronger than it needed to be. Thanks to the added safety margin, the Brooklyn Bridge is one of the few major 19th century bridges still standing today.

TE Connectivity incorporates the same type of safety margins into its sensors. If a sensor needs to be plus or minus 1% for a reading, for example, TE will make it plus or minus 0.5%. “That’s the thinking we do to make it happen,” Smith said.

2. Miniaturization

About 20 years ago, an insulin pump weighed 10 pounds and hung on a pole at the hospital. Now the pumps are about the size of smartphones.  “Everything in the pump has to shrink, including the sensors,” Smith said. “There’s a huge effort toward miniaturization.”

Smith showed off an altimeter sensor that was 3-by-3-by-1 mm, and could go into a pendant for a fall alert device. TE is creating sensors that are as small as 2.5 mm across, Smith noted.

3. Power budget

Batteries, not sensors, are actually the major hurdle when it comes to miniaturizing mobile health devices, Smith said.

One thing TE Connectivity is able to do to help is to engineer sleep modes into its sensors. A pressure sensor, for example, might only sip 0.5 microamps while in sleep mode, cycling on 5 times a second to do a 10 microamp reading. The result is that other parts of the device such as the display or communications might use up power, but not the sensor. “We’re not part of the problem, which is a nice place to be.”

4. Multisensor modules

TE Connectivity has also been creating multisensor modules. For example, an altimeter, temperature sensor and humidity sensor might be packaged into one. Said Smith: “The advantage it provides is that instead of three packages on the circuit board, you have one.”

Medical customers, in fact, are paying a lot of attention to sensors – regularly inquiring about whether TE has a sensor that can fit a specific need, Smith said. “We’ll go back and ask, ‘Can we do that? Can we take some of our current technologies and morph them into something that they need?'”

About The Author

Chris Newmarker

Chris Newmarker is the executive editor of WTWH Media life science's news websites and publications including MassDevice, Medical Design & Outsourcing and more. A professional journalist of 18 years, he is a veteran of UBM (now Informa) and The Associated Press whose career has taken him from Ohio to Virginia, New Jersey and, most recently, Minnesota. He’s covered a wide variety of subjects, but his focus over the past decade has been business and technology. He holds bachelor’s degrees in journalism and political science from Ohio State University. Connect with him on LinkedIn or email at cnewmarker@wtwhmedia.com.

Related Articles Read More >

A photo of Capstan Medical's mitral valve implant, which uses nitinol.
Capstan Medical’s R&D head discusses the heart valve and robotics startup’s tech, engineering challenges and solutions, advice for others in medtech and how to join his team
Quasar Medical to buy Nordson Medical Design and Development business in Galway and Tecate
This is the logo of Superior Sensor Technology.
Superior Sensor Technology expands CP series with advanced dual pressure sensors
A photo of an Insulet Omnipod 5 automated insulin delivery patch worn on the back of a woman's arm.
Diabetes device developers turn their sights to type 2
“mdo
EXPAND YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND STAY CONNECTED
Get the latest medical device business news, application and technology trends.

DeviceTalks Weekly

See More >

MDO Digital Edition

Digital Edition

Subscribe to Medical Design & Outsourcing. Bookmark, share and interact with the leading medical design engineering magazine today.

MEDTECH 100 INDEX

Medtech 100 logo
Market Summary > Current Price
The MedTech 100 is a financial index calculated using the BIG100 companies covered in Medical Design and Outsourcing.
DeviceTalks

DeviceTalks is a conversation among medical technology leaders. It's events, podcasts, webinars and one-on-one exchanges of ideas & insights.

DeviceTalks

New MedTech Resource

Medical Tubing

MassDevice

Mass Device

The Medical Device Business Journal. MassDevice is the leading medical device news business journal telling the stories of the devices that save lives.

Visit Website
MDO ad
Medical Design and Outsourcing
  • MassDevice
  • DeviceTalks
  • MedTech100 Index
  • Medical Tubing + Extrusion
  • Medical Design Sourcing
  • Drug Delivery Business News
  • Drug Discovery & Development
  • Pharmaceutical Processing World
  • R&D World
  • About Us/Contact
  • Advertise With Us
  • Subscribe to Print Magazine
  • Subscribe to our E-Newsletter
  • Listen to our Weekly Podcasts
  • Join our DeviceTalks Tuesdays Discussion

Copyright © 2025 WTWH Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of WTWH Media LLC. Site Map | Privacy Policy | RSS

Search Medical Design & Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Supplies and Components Index
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • MedTech Resources
    • Medtech Events in 2025
    • The 2024 Medtech Big 100
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Subscribe to Print Magazine
    • DeviceTalks
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Voices
    • Video
  • 2025 Leadership
    • 2024 Winners
    • 2023 Winners
    • 2022 Winners
    • 2021 Winners
  • Women in Medtech
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe