Olympus transducer technology is helping make people's lives healthier and safer. California-based medical equipment manufacturer Potrero Medical uses an Olympus transducer in its Accuryn® monitoring system, an automated urine output measurement device. This system helps monitor hospitalized and acutely ill patients while protecting frontline workers. It enables nurses and other hospital staff to precisely measure a patient’s urine output without having to come in direct contact with the patient, thus limiting exposure to viruses such as COVID-19.
Potrero Medical emerged from medtech incubator TheraNova in 2014. “Potrero’s mission is to help protect the kidney,” said Joe Urban, CEO of Potrero Medical in an interview with the American Society of Nephrology (ASN). “The technology created by the engineers at Potrero meets a market need of patients left vulnerable in hospitals today due to the limitations of current technology.”
What Is Acute Kidney Injury?
Many people are unaware of acute kidney injury (AKI). In simple terms, acute kidney injury is an abrupt decrease in kidney function. The condition develops rapidly, typically over a few hours or days. Known risk factors for AKI include hypertension, diabetes, and advanced age. AKI can be caused by various conditions, including sepsis, heart conditions, and major surgery.
Also called acute renal failure (ARF), AKI is a serious medical condition that requires immediate treatment. AKI is often reversible and, if diagnosed, can be treated quickly. However, in some cases, lasting kidney damage after AKI can lead to kidney failure if actions aren’t taken to prevent the damage from getting worse.
According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), postoperative AKI is associated with up to a 10x increase in hospital mortality, decreased survival for up to 15 years after surgery, and an increased risk for chronic kidney disease (a complication that costs the US healthcare system about $11 billion annually). With these challenges in mind, the clinical goal for Potrero Medical was to identify when the kidneys experience renal hypoperfusion (i.e., reduced blood flow to the kidney) as quickly as possible. The Potrero team soon noticed the limitations of the clinical tools available in the market for clinicians to detect the onset of AKI early.
Timely and accurate monitoring of vital signs can mean the difference between life and death for critically ill patients. When there is evidence of injury to the function of a kidney, there may be reduced blood filtration and thereby reduced urine output. Current techniques for gathering urine output and intra-abdominal pressure data can be complicated and inaccurate.
How the Accuryn System Measures Urine Output and Overall Patient Health
The Accuryn monitoring system is a critical care platform designed to automate vital signs to streamline the clinical workflow. The system can all-inclusively provide accurate and real-time actionable insights on kidney perfusion and patient health by measuring and monitoring urine output, intra-abdominal pressure, and core body temperature.
The Accuryn system addresses the challenge of monitoring kidney perfusion in two unique ways:
First, by providing accurate, continuous urine output. The conventional workflow for urine output measurement is to use a Foley catheter that uses gravity to drain urine into a collection bag. A nurse then empties the bag into a graduated cylinder where they annotate their best estimate of the volume of hourly urine produced by the kidney and then chart the data into the hospital electronic medical record (EMR) system. This often results in an inaccurate representation of the urine produced by the kidney as the traditional catheter is subjected to airlocks, which results in urine being trapped inside the bladder and the catheter.
Secondly, the Accuryn system gives healthcare workers the ability to see a minute-to-minute urine output resolution of what the kidney is producing, above and beyond what is in the urine drainage bag. The patented Accuryn SmartFoley™ with Active Drain Technology™ clears the catheter without creating a vacuum on the bladder, which results in every drop of urine passing through the measurement cassette. The ultrasonic transducer, manufactured by Olympus, measures the volume ~100x per second to help ensure accuracy in the volume measurement. The system performs consistently, even in the most challenging cases where matter such as blood and proteins impact the clarity of the liquid. The urine volume is then calculated and listed on the screen of the Accuryn monitor and can be populated in the hospital EMR.
The Accuryn system’s active drain line clearance maintains continuous urine output. This reduces the need for medical staff to have to physically “milk” the Foley drainage line to the urine collection bag.
Automated Urinary Output Measurement: The New Standard in Critical Care Monitoring
The Accuryn system sets a new standard for critical care monitoring. Using the Olympus transducer as a component mounted into the Accuryn monitoring system provides accurate and automated urine output measurements.
Potrero Medical tested over a dozen different ultrasonic transducers, and ultimately selected an Olympus transducer as it provided high accuracy and was tolerant to a reasonable degree of tilt. The chosen Olympus transducer had the optimal beam width, beam spread, and sensitivity for high-resolution digital urine output monitoring.
Here’s how the transducer and monitor work together to measure urine output:
A urine collection chamber is snapped into the monitor, and the monitor then keeps track of fluid in the chamber using the ultrasonic transducer. This automates an otherwise tedious and laborious task for the intensive care unit (ICU) and operating room staff and helps ensures a high degree of clinical compliance.
Better data supports better medical care. This level of technology in critical care medicine is a new frontier and provides clinicians with improved data accuracy to make more informed decisions about clinical care.
In the ASN interview, Joe discussed the positive impact of their technology on the medical and healthcare field. “We know that our technology will help millions of people in the world,” he said.
Related Content
What Are the Different Types of Ultrasonic Transducers?
