Development and testing of a wearable Integrated Thermometer sensor for skin contact thermography

The need of wearable devices for the thermal monitoring is rising. These devices could be used during medical continuous monitoring, for instance in breast cancer investigation, or for the monitoring of vascular, dermatological and rheumatic disorders, in viability studies, and during physical exercises. We had designed and constructed a wearable device for skin-contact thermography that uses integrated silicon sensors. The bench test validation was performed by means of a commercial oven for the static bench test and a properly designed phantom for the dynamic bench test. The thermal resolution was better than 0.03 °C and the spatial resolution equal to 1.6 × 10−5 m2. We then investigated its performance in a medical application, suited for clinical testing, in which volunteers were subject to a maximal rate of thermal skin variation equal to 3.1 °C/0.25 h. We also compared the results with those obtained by means of an Infrared-Digital-Video-Camera. Results of the comparison showed a maximal error always lower than 0.14 °C.