Small electronic medical devices, while already quite advanced and compact, can benefit significantly from further reduction in size. Hearing aids in particular can become nearly invisible if made small enough to fit inside the ear. Engineers at Fraunhofer Institute of Reliability and Microintegration in Berlin, Germany have been working to incorporate multiple electronic components into a tiny module that can perform a variety of tasks.
The Wiser-BAN device is a square of 4 mm on a side and 1 mm thick. It includes 19 different components including a radio transmitter, antenna, filters, and other parts that are commonly found inside body-worn medical device. By integrating the miniaturized device with sensors that can detect health parameters like heart rate, temperature, and blood oxygenation, the team working on the new technology may herald the age of wearatronics that we here at Medgadget are particularly excited about.