Sleep Scratching: A New Way to Track Itchiness

Have you ever noticed that your itch gets worse at night? For people with skin conditions like atopic dermatitis, this is a common problem. Scratching in your sleep can make your skin worse, disrupt your sleep, and lower your quality of life. But how do you measure that? Scientists have been trying to find a way to track overnight scratching without using wearable sensors. They developed a new algorithm using a sheet-shaped body vibrometer, which is like a smart sheet placed under your mattress. It can detect when you're scratching. To test this, they observed 7 people with atopic dermatitis and 3 healthy individuals while they slept. They used an infrared camera and the smart sheet to measure their sleep. The time spent scratching was used as a standard, which was determined by watching the infrared videos. The new method was compared to the old way of measuring activity. The new method had a better correlation (0. 89) than the old one (0. 72). It also avoided overestimating scratching time by ignoring other activities like turning over. So, this new way of tracking scratching might help doctors understand and treat itchy skin diseases better.