Integrated mapping of sweat glands activity via infrared thermal imaging
Mayskov D.I., Fomin A.V., Volkov I.U., Skripal A.V. and Sagaidachnyi A.A.
Saratov State University, Saratov, Russia
Abstract
Areas with active sweat glands mark the sites of the skin with intact sympathetic cholinergic innervation. If the function of small nerve fibers is impaired, for example, in the case of diabetes mellitus, sweating may decrease as a consequence of diabetic peripheral neuropathy. Therefore, monitoring of sweat gland function can be used to detect areas of impaired sympathetic innervation of the sweat glands, assess the severity of neuropathy and the success of its treatment.
In this work a deep inspiratory test is used to stimulate the activity of the sweat glands in the area of the fingers. The reaction was monitored by dynamic infrared thermography. An integrated mapping method has been developed for marking areas with active sweat glands. The essence of the method is in the accumulation of signs of activation of sweat pores over time. Thus, based on the results of processing the entire dynamic thermogram, a single map is obtained that marks the areas of intact and impaired innervation of the sweat glands. The second informative type of functional images is the imaging of the spatial distribution of the temperature dynamics correlation at different points of the thermogram. Such a correlation map characterizes the spatial distribution of points that have similar dynamics over time.
Results: The work presents integrated and correlation maps describing the activity of sweat glands in normal and in the presence of type 2 diabetes mellitus. In a group of patients, the maps show areas in which the activity of the sweat glands is completely absent. In the group of healthy subjects, the maps demonstrate a spatially uniform distribution of sweat gland activity.
Speaker
Sagaidachnyi Andrey
Saratov State University
Russia
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