Keisuke MATSUSHITA, Kazuo AOKI¹, Naoto KAKUTA and Yukio YAMADA

Department of Mechanical Engineering & Intelligent Systems, University of Electro-Communications, 1-5-1 Chofugaoka, Chofu, Tokyo 182-8585, Japan
¹OTAX Corporation, 1215 Nippa, Kohoku, Yokohama, Kanagawa 223-8558, Japan

(Received March 3, 2003; Accepted June 24, 2003)

For the purpose of developing reflection pulse oximetry, we have analyzed the light propagation in tissue to calculate the photon-visit depth for reflected light and to estimate the measured intensities of transmitted and reflected light using the analytical solutions of the photon diffusion equation. The effects of the reflectance of the probe surface have been studied, and a low reflecting surface has been found to provide deeper photon-visit depth than a high reflecting surface for reflection pulse oximetry. Based on analytical estimation, we made reflection type probes, and conducted preliminary experiments to confirm the feasibility of this type of pulse oximetry.

Key words: reflection pulse oximetry, light propagation, photon-visit depth