Smart
baby pillows for flat head syndrome prevention
January 24, 2018, Ulsan National
Institute of Science and Technology
Smart Baby Pillow.
Credit: UNIST
Babies are born with
highly malleable skulls, and therefore lying on their backs to sleep may lead
to some positional flattening or molding of the head. A team of students at
UNIST has recently introduced a smart baby pillow to prevent and correct mild
cases of flat head syndrome.
Flat head syndrome occurs when a child's head is
asymmetrical and flattened on one side more than the other. Although this does
not harm brain development nor cause any lasting appearance problems, simple
practices like placing them in different positions over the course of each day
can easily prevent a baby from developing an asymmetrical skull shape.
"We came up with
the idea to help new parents who are in drastic need of sleep," the
students say. "We wanted to help them relax and rest at least when their
babies are asleep."
The new smart baby
pillow is designed to induce the correct sleeping posture, thereby
preventing babies from developing flat
head syndrome. This new device
features an embedded air volume control system, as well as the image-based soft
tactile sensor, developed by the Korea Institute of Industrial Technology
(KITECH).
"A soft tactile sensor
has been applied to monitor the position of a newborn's head in real
time," says Tae Hun Chung in the School of Materials Science and
Engineering. "We have also added a system that automatically controls the
volume of air in the pillow
for a perfectly
symmetrical skull. This saves the trouble of attempting to change a newborn's
head in different positions every one to two hours."
The team plans to
commercialize the product and later expand into the medical device market. The
engineers behind this smart baby pillow expect that their product will be in great
demand for both medical and cosmetic purposes, as it can drastically reduce the
risk of cot death, as well as unusual facial asymmetry. They plan to build a
prototype in the first half of this year.
"The device itself
would certainly be a great help for those stressed-out parents," says
HyeWon Cho in the School of Life Sciences. "By allowing mothers to have
some relaxation time, it can also help prevent or treat symtoms of postnatal
depression and anxiety."
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