Non-Contact VITAL Signs Monitoring of a Patient Lying on Surgical Bed Using Beamforming FMCW Radar

Respiration and heartrates are important information for surgery. When the vital signs of the patient lying prone are monitored using radar installed on the back of the surgical bed, the surgeon’s movements reduce the accuracy of these monitored vital signs. This study proposes a method for enhancing the monitored vital sign accuracies of a patient lying on a surgical bed using a 60 GHz frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) radar system with beamforming. The vital sign accuracies were enhanced by applying a fast Fourier transform (FFT) for range and beamforming which suppress the noise generated at different ranges and angles from the patient’s position. The experiment was performed for a patient lying on a surgical bed with or without surgeon. Comparing a continuous-wave (CW) Doppler radar, the FMCW radar with beamforming improved almost 22 dB of signal-to-interference and noise ratio (SINR) for vital signals. More than 90% accuracy of monitoring respiration and heartrates was achieved even though the surgeon was located next to the patient as an interferer. It was analyzed using a proposed vital signal model included in the radar IF equation.