Seeing Red

In 2004 the Swedish county hospital of Halmstad had witnessed venous needle dislodgement on a number of occasions. A few key people from the hemodialysis department discovered that these incidents were by no means unique, and that existing alarm systems were renowned for not working. They got in touch with Daniel Engvall, a consultant specialised in realizing medical innovations. In the years that have followed a collaboration has been developed with the local university, and Daniel Engvall is now Chief Technology Officer for Redsense Medical.


Thinking outside of the dialysis equipment

While the problem of needle dislodgement was not new, Engvall's team was able to look at it from an independent viewpoint. Instead of trying to measure what was going on inside the body or the dialysis equipment, the new device was designed to keep an eye on the access point monitoring for the first sign of blood loss. Using fibre optic technology designed for this exact purpose, the blood loss detection device proved to be highly effective and user friendly, with no more than an on/off switch.


Patented technology

The concept of using an optical sensor to detect bleeding is one with many applications. For this reason, Redsense is patented as a method of detecting blood loss from the human body not just for hemodialysis. It's part of a patent portfolio which is already in place in the US, Canada, Europe, Asia and Asia Pacific. Redsense is a protected trademark.