Hot Flash Skin Conductance Monitor

General Description

The Bahr Hot Flash Skin Conductance Monitor is a miniature device designed to collect data on skin conductance from ambulatory research subjects for up to seven days. The monitor clips directly unto the self-adhesive electrode patch eliminating the need for any cables. It is worn unobtrusively on the sternum hidden under clothing and is easy to remove and replace. The housing of the monitor is water resistant so when bathing the monitor is unclipped from the electrode, which is left in place. After bathing the electrode patch is simply patted dry and the monitor reconnected.

The self-adhesive skin conductance dual electrode patch uses a specially formulated gel to interface the metal electrode snaps with the skin of the subject wearing the patch. The gel does not change shape while worn and therefore, the baseline conductance remains constant with time. The gel is also mildly adhesive so that both the electrode and the patch stick to the skin as a single unit. As the subject sweats the electrode gel absorbs the fluid from the sweat, which is further absorbed by the cloth backing of the patch. The backing of the patch is made from materials that can breath so that sweat does not accumulate in the solid gel but rather evaporates. The accompanying JAVA© application records the monitor serial number, participant ID, and dates of monitoring, provides file labeling, downloads, saves, and displays the data, then erases the memory, and sets the clock. The JAVA© software language was chosen because it is platform independent and can be run on a PC or a MAC computer. The data are stored in a delimited text format so that they can be read by any text editor or they can be imported into software programs like EXCEL© or MATLAB©.

hotflash monitor data Click to image to enlarge.
The JAVA© graphic user interface (GUI) downloads and displays data as skin conductance waveforms that include date, time, and self-marked events.

hotflash monitor data Click to image to enlarge.
Hot flash data show baseline conductance of about 1 µS. During hot flashes, conductance rises to about 7 µS. Blue circles indicate subject marking of hot flashes.