Design and Development of IoT Enabled Multimodal Wearable System for Continuous Noninvasive Gastrointestinal Health Monitoring

Abstract

The gastrointestinal tract is fundamental in the process of nutrient absorption, metabolic regulation and immunity but the traditional diagnostic tools like endoscopy are not only invasive but also cannot be used in continuous monitoring. This paper describes a multimodal gut health monitoring system put on people that uses a MEMS microphone to sense bowel sounds, a piezoelectric sensor to measure the intestinal motility, an electromyography sensor to measure the abdominal muscle activity and an infrared temperature sensor to monitor the metabolic fluctuations. The sensors are inbuilt on a Velcro belt which is connected to ESP32 microcontroller that allows real time data capture and signal processing, as well as connection to internet of things (IoT) through wireless transmission. After estimating the effectiveness of using the serotonin reuptake inhibitor on the rate at which food passes through the gut by experimental analysis of 30 individuals with age ranges of 18-24 years, there was a dramatic improvement in all the parameters of the physiological aspects of the intestines after meals, which showed the speed of drink consumption through the gut to the small intestines. A Gut Analysis Index was elaborately designed to give a quantitative measure of the digestive activity. The accuracy of the system in distinguishing between fasting and postprandial states was 99.90% and indicates the potential of the system to non-invasively monitor the health state of the gut and early identify gastrointestinal anomalies.