Raynaud's Disease - hand & foot-warmers

The direction is irrelevant. DVT compression pumps work by pumping the blood vessels near the surface and well below the surface of the skin. They are not intended to work on arteries. They increase blood flow, in one means, by decreasing back flow. That allows easier work from your arteries and heart and then increasing the blood flow.

Think of it as increasing the diameter of your exhaust pipe. Or adding a pump on your constricted exhaust to remove it quicker.

NASA’s work (and others) on spacesuit gloves might be a place to look for inspiration. NASA Tech Briefs is always a good place to look.

I was talking about a different kind of pump, but the topic of compression is probably a more productive one since you don’t necessarily need DVT level compression to achieve it. Perhaps gloves made of a compression fabric (as used for sports recovery by 2XU, etc) would increase the blood flow enough to stop the symptoms.

(I see the Hammacher Schlemmer gloves above… just need someone to test them. :slight_smile:

I understand you were talking about peristalic pumps. A compression pump works in the same manner, positive displacement to move fluid, just on a broader scale instead of working on an individual line like the peristalic.

You are correct that an arm sleeve for a DVT pump is complete over kill. I’d like to see a slim version on the forearm. But I’m not the prtoject manager. :wink:

that photo reminds me of Randy from A Christmas Story. hehe.

@iab - Thanks for the suggestion! I ordered a similar pair to those you posted and they do have an effect. It is not the largest change but I can tell that blood is flowing a little better in my fingertips (I’m using one on a single hand right now in a chilly room and it really does not get in the way too much, at least with typing, and I can feel that the fingertips on the wearing hand are warmer). I’m not sure if they would prevent a Raynaud’s attack outright on their own if I was having one, but they are at least an incremental help and the system would not be too hard to add to a direct warmer. Going to try exploring a forearm sleeve like you mentioned–my teacher also suggested a similar idea about integrating clothing with the technology so as to avoid having the solution being a completely separate device. A hand covering/wrist band would also be able to add some circulation and support for the warmer parts like the battery. Some directions to explore … and I will have to research more into pumping devices that you mention.

@jcharlesoo - It’s getting to that time of year for the annual Christmas Story showing :wink:

I’ve gotten some good findings from speaking with people who have it (not as many as I’d like, unfortunately), but also supplemented by a lot of posts online by people who struggle with Raynaud’s in an indoor setting:
http://s3images.coroflot.com/user_files/individual_files/original_365272_X2HcMgiPhthmM8pDQwzJmRyug.jpg

I’ve done a little testing on which parts of the hand to warm up, but would like to do more. My classmate suggested that I explore heating the palm and wrist directly, rather than the fingers, but it did not seem to work for me, probably because of the deep location of the arteries vs. returning blood vessels as mentioned.

Below are some of the earlier sketches, I’ll be posting some newer ones tomorrow. I can already feel some of these being a little too techie-looking for who I’m aiming at (now if I was trying to help Star Trek’s Borg…).

Some model-making:

Above: An idea for a folding warmer that can heat the entire length of the hand to fingertip, but folds to be out-of-the-way if needed (could stay folded with snaps, magnets, etc.), while still being able to warm the fingers if you make a fist. The green stuff is thermal silicone, doesn’t heat quickly enough to be the heating channel itself, but could work well with imbedded heated elements.


Ideas for a solid warmer that fits like a ring so that you can retain finger use. This is a foam model, and most people who wore it (myself included) felt that the solid ring part was constricting. Next step is a solid warmer with a flexible ring attachment.

Variations on the idea


Wrist and palm attachment

Do you have access to a university or teaching hospital?

You can actually measure changes in bloodflow with doppler ultrasound. A very expensive piece of equipment run by an expensive tech. I used such a device when working on a DVT pump.

But if you are a student and have access to a teaching hospital, you have excellent odds of having them help you (for free) with your project. When I was in school I was absolutely surprised at the level of support hospitals and healthcare professionals gave me. I saw dozens of surgeries, went on flight for life runs and had access to many other areas as well.

I called on the cardio-lab to get access to the doppler ultrasound, but different hospitals will place it is different departments, ymmv.

That is a great idea … did you visit the hospital in the later stages of your project (when you had a working prototype to test)? We have Brown University’s Alpert Medical School and Hasbro Children’s Hospital nearby.

Great sketches and process work!

Have you looked at passive cooling such as Phase Change Materials? I have a sample of a really neat mesh from Schoeller that has some nano particles of some sort of magic wax on it and its cool to the touch. I think it also works in reverse. Will try to dig a link up. The materials are generally called PCMs.

R

Thanks for the suggestion rkuchinsky! I see just browsing now that they are used in the reheatable gel warmers, and interestingly in the Coffee Joulies:

Definitely something to look at further

I visit the hospital in all stages of any project, I’m going to Loyola next week and a hospital in Texas later the same week, but that discussion is for another thread.

For the doppler ultrasound, we had working prototypes along with competitive pumps. That part of the project was a large PO and difficult to schedule. I needed the most efficient and effective way to gather the necessary data.

Remember, medical devices are more strict with their functionality. If you make a claim, like increased bloodflow, you must prove your claim. That is not only to satisfy the FDA, it is also to satisfy the clinician who will use or recommend the device. Otherwise you will find yourself in the hocus-pocus nonsense claims like the magnets you posted earlier.

Not to say you must have data, then its only a consumer product, and, atmo, a harder sell.

http://www.schoeller-textiles.com/en/technologies/schoeller-pcm.html

Evenly heated fabric. might be of help! :slight_smile:
http://www.diginfo.tv/v/12-0025-r-en.php

Samwl, awesome, thanks for the find! That kind of thinking might work very well for what my design might be.

Apologies for the lack of updates. I was spending a lot of time on the research but was sort of going in a loop, so I picked a direction to go with for the final critique and post it later for feedback (the project doesn’t end after the crit :wink:

Hi all,

I had an mediocre critique back in December and I am looking to strengthen this project! The two images below are my general thought path and then the final concept (as of December), but the rest of the project as it is is located [here]

The general feedback (our teacher invited some guest ID professionals, which was pretty cool) was that the form and materials of my solution (direction C in the ideation page) were probably not the most comfortable, especially for people who would be wearing this on a very regular basis. They were also worried how it might be powered – I was initially thinking of a combination of batteries and phase change materials, where the batteries would heat the PCM just enough for it to activate and provide heat, but the response was that it would be too complicated.

I am also wondering if a “ring” concept that fits in the upper palm is direct enough of a heating method – the idea is that the user would close her hand around the device as it is worn. I looked some other ideas (such as how a product might heat the fingertips directly) but these led to things like the “spidery” looking sketch and model in the upper right of the ideation page (IMO a little too techie-looking and complex), as well as just thinner versions of heated gloves.

Instead of the steel and aluminum route, I would like to play around with heated textiles and perhaps silicone (one of the thermally conductive samples I got a while ago actually works pretty well once heated up) as soft goods are a new thing for me.

I would love to hear any suggestions and ideas … thanks for the help!


how much energy is required to heat up the material? PCM/textile. I was keen to have a go at the same problem a year ago because I have mild raynaud’s and my hands are cold even when the gloves are on. I’d stay away from anything that stays on the palm or fingers, seems to me that they restrict movement quite a bit.

How far are you now?

Hi samwl, thanks for the response. I agree that something that stays in the palm / fingers does restrict – I would love to find a way to have something like a little pad on each finger or fingertip but keeping them durable and attached is one of the issues, as is heating five separate areas.

Unfortunately, the silicone I used needs a very good amount of energy to heat up. At first, I wrapped it around a hot mug and that was insufficient. With a heat gun, it stayed warm for a bit and was very evenly heated, but a heat gun is a little much!

I have taken a little time off this project to clear my head and hopefully find some inspiration … it wasn’t coming when I was hitting my head against the wall. :wink:

I took a look at the link to the video of evenly heated fabric that you posted, I am thinking of going a soft-goods approach (and people joked that the metal design above could’ve been some kind of vibrator :stuck_out_tongue: ).

This is more of a technical overkill solution, working in a fixed indoor space, probably not in the immediate realm, but imaginable. It solves the issue without touching the hands or having any interference whatsoever. It is an invisible solution, aka, least satisfying design solution. :slight_smile:

Combining a few known systems:

A thermal imaging system.
Video recognition software that recognizes hands specifically and can provide the target data of the sub temperature areas.
A set or series, of low wattage infrared lasers with scanning-positioning mirrors mounted strategically in the local environment, or in an enlightened public workplace.
Processing and software to direct the infrared lasers and apply a measured amount of energy to required areas of users hands, and measure the result in a feedback loop.

Precise, variable, non-contact, invisible infrared heating.

Other adaptations would be for individual users to be identifiable, allowing the ability to personally dial in warmer or cooler operating temperatures. This system would be ideal for a country like Japan, where the post-Fukoshima situation has required offices to dial back heat settings to save energy.

Thing is there are already tons of heated gloves out in the market. the problem is that they are chunky especially with the massive power source. I’d look into printed graphene as a power source, relative new material perhaps hard to find someone to do it. I’m not too sure…

Love the overkill idea though btw.

Thanks samwl, I will look into that! And nxakt I would love to have your solution in both my school and home desks :wink: