How Lumia™ Works
SHINE A LIGHT
Meet Your External Carotid Artery
The Lumia™ ear device uses infrared light to measure a proxy of Cerebral Blood Flow by detecting blood flow changes in a shallow ear artery -- an ideal window into the heart and brain.
Unlike wrist-worn wearables that cannot even begin to guess what is happening at your head, our in-ear device aims light directly at a shallow arterial branch of the External Carotid Artery, a parallel branch of the Internal Carotid Artery which is the primary blood supply to the brain.
This enables unprecedented cardiac signal quality for a non-invasive wearable. Patents pending.
catch a wave form
Lumia Flow Index™
See an example Lumia Flow Index™ pulse waveform. Note how “normal flow” looks "full" in comparison to how a “low flow” pulse looks “spurty.”
The spurtiness occurs because the heart is not being filled with enough blood before it squeezes, most often caused by gravity pulling blood into the lower body so it can’t reach the heart. This causes the heart to have “reduced preload.”
The consequence? Less blood flow making it to your head, and a cascade of symptoms such as lightheadedness, fatigue, brain fog, headache, and more.
This change in waveform shape is a key part of how the Lumia Flow Index™ works.
Our Flow Index does not output absolute values such as mL/min or cm/s, but instead provides an index to help you understand changes in the blood flow to your head with standing or other factors.
The Lumia Flow Index™ ultimately serves as a proxy for Cerebral Blood Flow -- making new wellness insights available in the app for better self-management of your condition.
Posture matters
Gravity Stress™
Traditional wearables cannot accurately track standing because the motion and orientation of your wrist or finger do not tell you much about your body position.
However, Lumia™ is on the head, which is tightly coupled to the spine and experiences the largest vertical changes upon standing.
By using an accelerometer, pressure sensor, and machine learning, Lumia can sense when you stand, how long you remain standing, and when you sit or lie back down.
This will enable us to calculate the amount of Orthostatic Stress your body is handling -- an index we call Gravity Stress™ -- as well as more easily understand what you were doing when you had changes in Flow Index.
Through the Lumia™ iPhone app, you'll get new wellness insights into how to pace, modify and adapt your everyday activities for better self-management of your symptoms.