Amauri Amorin Assef

Entende-se que recursos tecnológicos são essenciais para a agilidade e para o acesso a serviços de qualidade em sistemas de saúde contemporâneos. Todavia, propor ferramentas que supram demandas de saúde depende não apenas de materiais específicos de desenvolvimento de sistemas, mas também de instrumentos de investigação social, como questionários. Diante disso, o objetivo deste estudo foi desenvolver e validar um instrumento de percepção profissional que abrangesse demandas clínicas, desenvolvimento e uso de tecnologias na prática clínica fonoaudiológica. Foram realizadas as seguintes etapas: 1) Divisão dos grupos e discussão; 2) Elaboração e 3) Validade. A versão final do instrumento PSTF possui 26 questões divididas em múltipla escolha e discursivas. O questionário em sua versão final obteve concordância entre os juízes (93,85%), e o Alfa de Cronbach apontou que o instrumento apresenta um alto índice de validade (0.97) e, na etapa de aplicação final, a relevância do instrumento foi de 0.83. O questionário PSTF apresentou evidências satisfatórias de validade, diante disso, recomenda-se a utilização do instrumento para investigação de necessidades sociais a fim de propor novos recursos tecnológicos para a Fonoaudiologia.

The use of technologies in educational and health sciences is essential in proposing new ways of thinking about language acquisition and treatment processes, especially orality. It is understood that the need for such tools comes from the modernisation of social systems, and this process is encouraged by world organisations, public education and health policies. In this context, several challenges are encountered when proposals for technological development meet such subjective issues as those favouring oral language. Based on this, the present study aimed to perform usability tests of an application for subjects with oral language disorders.

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is the third leading cause of disability and death globally. Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) is the most commonly used imaging modality for the characterization of vulnerable plaques. The development of novel intravascular imaging and therapy devices requires dedicated open systems (e.g., for pulse sequences for imaging or thrombolysis), which are not currently available. This paper presents the development of a novel multifunctional FPGA-based pulser/receiver system for intravascular ultrasound imaging and therapy research. The open platform consists of a host PC with a Matlab-based software interface, an FPGA board, and a proprietary analog front-end board with state-of-the-art electronics for highly flexible transmission and reception schemes. The main features of the system include the capability to convert arbitrary waveforms into tristate bipolar pulses by using the PWM technique and by the direct acquisition of raw radiofrequency (RF) echo data. The results of a multicycle excitation pulse applied to a custom 550 kHz therapy transducer for acoustic characterization and a pulse-echo experiment conducted with a high-voltage, short-pulse excitation for a 19.48 MHz transducer are reported. Testing results show that the proposed system can be easily controlled to match the frequency and bandwidth required for different IVUS transducers across a broad class of applications.

Medical ultrasound imaging using coherent plane-wave compounding (CPWC) for higher frame-rate applications has generated considerable interest in the research community. The adaptive Eigenspace Beamformer technique combined with a Generalized Sidelobe Canceler (GSC) provides noise and interference reduction in images, improving resolution and contrast compared to basic methods: Delay and Sum (DAS) and Minimum Variance (MV). Different filtering approaches are applied in ultrasound image processing to reduce speckle signals. This work introduces the combination of beamformer Eigenspace Based on Minimum Variance (ESBMV) associated with GSC (EGSC) and the Kuan (EGSCK), Lee (EGSCL), and Wiener (EGSCW) filters and their enhanced versions to obtain better quality of plane-wave ultrasound images. The EGSCK technique did not present significant improvements compared to other methods. However, the EGSC with enhanced Kuan (EGSCKe) showed a remarkable reduction in geometric distortion, i.e., 0.13 mm (35%) and 0.49 mm (67%) compared to the EGSC and DAS techniques, respectively. The EGSC with Enhanced Wiener (EGSCWe) showed the best improvements in contrast radio (CR) aspects, i.e., 74% compared to the DAS technique and 60% to the EGSC technique. Furthermore, our proposed method reduces geometric distortion, making it a good option for plane-wave ultrasound imaging.

This paper presents a high-gain three-phase interleaved rectifier operating in DCM, with dual input, for application in small wind generators. The two input diode bridges promote the sharing of the current, resulting in a significant reduction of the converter's current stresses when compared to previous topologies. A theoretical analysis of the proposed converter was performed, followed by a simulation study, and experimental tests with a physical prototype. The simulations compared the proposed three-phase rectifier with three other three-phase topologies, demonstrating its operation with significantly reduced current stresses and smaller input inductors. The experiments compared the operation of the converter when working with a three-phase power supply, and a wind turbine in association with an MPPT method using the Perturb and Observe P&O technique. For an output power of 1 kW, on a 400 V DC bus and an input RMS line voltage of 114 V, the structure's obtained efficiency was higher than 95%. Furthermore, the experimental results confirmed that the rectifier operates with sinusoidal input currents, low current ripple, and high power factor for all the tested scenarios.

Ultrasound (US) images are one of the safest ex-amination resources for medical diagnoses. Many noticeable innovations have arisen recently, particularly the Coherent Plane Waves Compounding (CPWC) and the Wavelet Transform (WT) based analysis. CPWC solves the problem of fast frame rate, achieving thousands of frames per second. However, improving image quality and suppressing or eliminating noises remain a challenge. This work aims to investigate the CPWC and WT-generated images for future applications in Doppler images. Two experiments were carried out: 1) In silico uses stepwise customized procedures with db4 wavelet, 2) In vitro uses representatives of db, symmetry, biorthogonal, and morse wavelets families, with automatic procedures according to built-in functions of MATLAB Wavelet Toolbox. In Experiment 1, the wavelet processing (db4) eliminates some artifacts. It showed qualitatively a gain of contrast and attenuation in other regions. In Experiment 2, SNR and CNR metrics pointed out bior2.4 with the higher values: 1.5101 and 0.7427, respectively. On the other hand, morse wavelet and customized filtering code mark the lowest CR = 0.1464. The experiments made possible some conclusions: The higher the vanishing moments, the better the results. The better results come from stepwise controlling the signal processing; this last approach is convenient for testing novel Doppler techniques, like speckle tracking and Vector Flow image applications.

A tecnociência, conceito utilizado para estudar as ações da tecnologia sobre a produção do conhecimento científico, tornou-se um dos temas mais discutidos nos últimos anos. Na literatura, vários autores discorrem sobre o uso destes recursos para suprir demandas cotidianas, propor respostas e aprimorar o trabalho do homem sobre situações problemas de difícil resolução. Todavia, observar-se que na Ciências da Saúde, quando o tópico é a tecnologia, existe uma evasão de pesquisas. Julga-se esta ação justificável, dado ao fato que, a produção de materiais acerca do uso de tecnologias ocupa um lugar de pouco destaque nesta ciência, diferentemente do que ocorre nos setores das Engenharias e Ciências da Informação, em que este assunto ­está em acelerada discussão. Embora, espera-se que os profissionais da área da saúde sejam fortemente capacitados para produzir e utilizar os materiais tecnológicos dispostos, a escassez de mão-de-obra especializada, principalmente pesquisadores, geram problemas em relação à produção científica da tecnologia e o impacto destas nos contextos sociais. Dentro desta premissa, observa-se que, por mais que existam barreiras e desafios, há um movimento para superá-los, e com base nisso, considera-se importante propor novas estratégias e ambientes de discussões sobre estes recursos nas diversas áreas da saúde, dentre elas a Fonoaudiologia.