Mapping Sound Propagation through the Human Lung for Better Diagnosis
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Mapping Sound Propagation through the Human Lung for Better Diagnosis
IRAS ID
167188
Contact name
Pasupathy Sivasothy
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and the University of Cambridge
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 6 months, days
Research summary
This study addresses the question, how does sound propagate from a source in the chest to the chest wall? Using sound recorded at the chest as a diagnostic technique has the advantage of being non-invasive and non-radioactive, but compared to other techniques it cannot currently differentiate well between different diseases. Our aim is to improve our ability to differentiate between different diseases using sound recorded at the chest by improving the fundamental understanding of the mechanisms by which sound propagates in the chest.
The methodology of the study will be to place a source at a known location in the chest and measure the acoustic response on the chest wall with a microphone array. The sound source will be created by playing sound down the working channel of a bronchoscope, and located anatomically using direct imaging. By placing a sound source inside the chest we will enable the relative importance of different propagation modes to be tested and will allow an acoustic map of the lung to be generated. This will be an advance on previous work, which placed a sound source at the mouth.
Some subjects will be selected for the study by asking patients undergoing a bronchoscopy procedure whether they would be willing to take part in the experiment in addition to their standard procedure.
Procedures will take place in the Bronchoscopy unit at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge. The Unit runs regional speciality clinics in severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, lung cancer, bronchomalacia and interstitial lung disease and has the busiest interventional bronchoscopy service in the UK.
A subsidiary part of the study will collect sound recordings from healthy volunteers and patients with common respiratory diseases using the same microphone array, in order to create a database of lung sounds.
The study will last approximately 18 months.
REC name
East Midlands - Leicester Central Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/EM/0176
Date of REC Opinion
8 May 2017
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion