Goal: Urinary incontinence (UI) affects a significant proportion of the population and is associated with negative physical and psychological side-effects. Microwave-based technologies may have the potential to monitor bladder volume, providing a proactive, low-cost and non-invasive tool to support individuals with UI. Methods: Studies to date on microwave bladder monitoring have been limited to highly simplified computational and experimental scenarios. In this work, we study the most realistic models to date (both male and female), which incorporate dielectrically and anatomically representative tissues of the pelvic region. Results: We examine the ability of detecting bladder fullness through both reflection and transmission-based parameters and, for the first time, study the effect of urine permittivity. As a proof-of-concept of bladder state detection, we further investigate reconstructing differential radar images of the bladder with two different volumes of urine. Conclusions: The results indicate that there is strong potential for monitoring and detecting the bladder state using microwave measurements.

中文翻译：

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使用真实骨盆模型进行基于微波的膀胱状态检测的概念验证

目标：尿失禁 (UI) 影响很大一部分人口，并与身体和心理方面的负面影响相关。基于微波的技术可能具有监测膀胱容量的潜力，为患有 UI 的个人提供主动、低成本和非侵入性的工具。方法：迄今为止，微波膀胱监测的研究仅限于高度简化的计算和实验场景。在这项工作中，我们研究了迄今为止最真实的模型（男性和女性），其中包含骨盆区域的介电和解剖学代表性组织。结果：我们检查了通过基于反射和透射的参数检测膀胱充盈度的能力，并首次研究了尿液介电常数的影响。作为膀胱状态检测的概念验证，我们进一步研究了用两种不同体积的尿液重建膀胱的差分雷达图像。结论：结果表明，使用微波测量来监测和检测膀胱状态具有很强的潜力。