Design and Development of Smart Textile-based Wearable Shirt for Epilepsy Patients

Abstract

The modern textile industry is influenced both by consumers’ lifestyles and by new technologies. Smart textile materials and their applications have been increasing with the emergence of new innovative methods for fiber and fabric with different technologies. One application of smart textiles is conductive textiles, which has seen rapid growth and interest from researchers and industrial companies. It is used for data transfer in clothing, monitoring vital signs, germ-free garments, and brain-computer interfaces. The successful use of conductive yarns in previous research, along with their resilience against factors like washing and sweat, represents a significant achievement in the field of smart textile development and wearable technology. This discovery indicates the potential for employing these yarns in a wide range of applications, including smart clothing and health monitoring devices. This research has been extended to weave stainless steel conductive yarns into linen shirts. In this paper, we propose a smart textile-based wearable shirt for epilepsy patients. The proposed shirt is equipped with sensors that enable continuous tracking of vital functions such the heart rate. The integration of conductive threads into a shirt for epilepsy patients to measure and monitoring of heart rate changes and transmit changes in heart rate during seizures is a significant advancement in healthcare technology. It provides real-time monitoring, early intervention, and valuable data for medical professionals, ultimately improving the quality of life and safety of individuals living with epilepsy.