Evaluation of Remote Photoplethysmography to Assist Vital Signs Measure in Pediatrics

When assessing a child's clinical condition, the vulnerability of the child means is the needs to assess quickly and simply his vital status. Although several parameters are available to evaluate a potential life-threatening condition in pediatrics, the initial measurement of vital constants provides the clinician an immediate assessment about how much the vital status of the child is good or not. More particularly, heart rate (HR), respiratory rate (RR), oxygen saturation and blood pressure are defined as objective markers of a child's circulatory and respiratory status. In practice, manual measurements such as pulse palpation or thoracic ampliation counting are obsolete. A number of methods of measure are commonly used. Electrical recording via ECG electrodes or pulse counting via an oximeter can be used to measure heart rate. Respiratory rate can be measured using chest electrodes to assess its ampliation. In any emergency room, the collection of these constants requires a variety of medical devices that are usually time-consuming and human resources to collect them exhaustively and reliably. Moreover, these measurements may not be carried out under optimal conditions with children who may not be compliant, with as a result a lack of reliability or a missing measurement.

In adults, new and innovative measurement methods have emerged that offer acceptable reliability and accuracy compared with current reference methods. These include remote photo-plethysmography (rPPG), a process that enables vital constants to be assessed using a simple camera recording of the face over a short period of time.

Photoplethysmography (PPG) detect blood volume in the micro-vessels of tissues on the skin's surface. With each heartbeat, the volume in the arteries and arterioles changes. It is this variation that is measured using a LED placed mostly on the finger, ear or forehead.

Remote photoplethysmography (rPPG) is a non-invasive optical method for detecting pulse waves generated by the heart through measurements of peripheral blood perfusion. This technology may replace standard medical devices because of its ease of use, its low cost, its safety, convenience and its ability to offer multiple physiological assessments.

The company I-Virtual has enabled the development of this technique, whose technology is based on the analysis of different skin color spectra in the face, in order to determine a signal at the origin of these constants.

The Caducy® application using the rPPG technique can be downloaded onto a wide range of media. Using this app is quick and easy and requires to take a selfie using any camera available on a smartphone, tablet or computer at a sufficient distance ( the whole face should be visible on the screen). The application then takes between 30 seconds and 1 minute to analyze the various parameters. On January 25, 2023, i-Virtual obtained CE Class IIa certification for its Caducy® medical device, which measures vital signs via webcam. It thus became the first company in the world with this type of technology to obtain CE marking.

However, it has never been studied in pediatric patients. And yet, this easy-to-use, fast, material-saving application, certified for adult patients, could alleviate the difficulties of measuring vital signs in pediatrics that's mentioned earlier. In partnership with I-Virtual, the investigator would therefore like to test the use of remote photo-plethysmography or rPPG via its Caducy® application in pediatrics. The objective of the study is to evaluate the use of remote photoplethysmography to measure heart rate and respiratory rate in pediatric patients compared to standard acquisition system