Fast Hydration Measurement
The Importance of Hydration
Up to 60% of the human adult body is water, depending on age, gender, amongst other factors. Dehydration or overhydration can lead to serious health problems and can be comorbid with several medical conditions.
It is striking that no quick and simple, non-invasive method exists to reliably measure and monitor someone’s hydration status.
Raman-based Hydration Status Analysis
RiverD is developing technology for non-invasive hydration status analysis, based on Raman spectroscopy. A proof-of-concept device has been developed and is currently being used in studies exploring a broad range of use cases in both traditional medicine and the evolving field of sports medicine.
Medical Conditions
Several medical conditions or acute events can lead to either overhydration or dehydration. Timely intervention and proper management require a reliable hydration status analysis.
Healthy ageing
In the era of “healthy ageing” and ever-increasing health care costs, dehydration leads to many hundreds of thousands of preventable hospitalizations, which in some cases are emergencies, particularly amongst the elderly each year.
Sports
In sports, many physiological parameters are monitored to optimize performance and, surprisingly, direct hydration measurement is not one of them. Overhydration occurs as often as dehydration, negatively impacting performance and regularly leading to situations requiring medical attention.