Multipoint measurement trial of skin contact pressure toward evaluation of contacting surface area in a neck cooling belt

Abstract

Persons with spinal cord injury suffer from hyperthermia due to dysfunction in thermoregulatory function. The authors have developed a neck cooling device for such persons in order to prevent increase of body temperature during exercise. This study attempts to evaluate the contacting status of the device by multipoint measurement of skin contact pressure. Test cooling belts with flow channel inserts of different length were used in order to investigate relationship between the pressure distribution and the contacting status. Coefficients of variation and maximum to standard deviation ratio of the 8-point contact pressure values around the neck increased along with the length of the flow channel inserts. These results imply that the multipoint measurement of the skin contact pressure can be used to evaluate the contacting status of the neck cooling device.