Noninvasive measurement of glucose and lactate in thermoregulatory sweat in neonates and adults.

Premature neonates are particularly vulnerable and therefore require rigorous monitoring of analytes such as glucose and lactate. Traditionally, this is achieved through invasive, intermittent blood sampling, which is painful and may cause potential complications. To address this issue, we have developed a noninvasive perfusable skin sampling patch designed to collect analytes from low-volume thermoregulatory sweat without the need for external sweat induction. This can be combined with microfluidic biosensor analysis technologies to detect skin glucose and lactate levels. We were able to demonstrate the potential of this technology for noninvasive measurement of glucose and lactate in premature neonates. Our results showed that skin glucose levels correlated well with time-matched blood glucose measurements. Lactate skin measurements did not correlate with blood measurements, indicating a more complex relationship. In addition, we successfully measured skin glucose levels in healthy adults, which correlated with blood glucose levels for each individual. In contrast with the neonate measurements, the relationship between blood and skin glucose varies between individual adults. We successfully carried out proof-of-concept experiments to detect glucose in real-time in both neonates and in healthy adults by connecting the sampling patch to a continuous analysis system. These results provide the groundwork for subsequent large-scale clinical trials intended to validate the system reliability and clinical applicability within health care contexts, particularly neonatal intensive care units.