Experimentally-guided development of a sensor for pleural cavity pressure sensing.

The precise monitoring of the intrapleural pressures, necessitates the development of a specific instrumental approach to select the correct shape, dimensions and material to implement the sensing balloon which will be inserted into the pleural cavity. We demonstrate that a 10 cm diameter disk, printed with filaments of TPU (Thermoplastic polyurethane) with hardness 92A offers the best compromise in terms of static sensitivity (0.28 mV/cmHg) and dynamic frequency response (48 Hz).