Abstract: A system and method for monitoring the health of dialysis patients with Raman spectroscopy measurements of one or more target analytes is described. The methods include irradiating one or more fluids of interest with light to produce one or more spectrum and detecting the spectrum with a detector. The fluids of interest are preferably those related to dialysis, including hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis. In a preferred embodiment, the fluids are irradiated with monochromatic light, and one or more Raman spectra are detected as a result of the irradiation. The fluids may be irradiated within the dialysis tubing itself, or removed from the dialysis tubing and irradiated in a separate chamber. The Raman spectra of one or more target analytes of a dialysis patient may be followed over time or compared to one or more reference spectra, thereby providing information on the health of dialysis patients.

Abstract: A system and method for monitoring the health of dialysis patients with Raman spectroscopy measurements of one or more target analytes is described. The methods include irradiating one or more fluids of interest with light to produce one or more spectrum and detecting the spectrum with a detector. The fluids of interest are preferably those related to dialysis, including hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis. In a preferred embodiment, the fluids are irradiated with monochromatic light, and one or more Raman spectra are detected as a result of the irradiation. The fluids may be irradiated within the dialysis tubing itself, or removed from the dialysis tubing and irradiated in a separate chamber. The Raman spectra of one or more target analytes of a dialysis patient may be followed over time or compared to one or more reference spectra, thereby providing information on the health of dialysis patients.

Abstract: Baseline correction in Raman spectroscopy is a procedure that eliminates/reduces the background signals generated by residual Rayleigh scattering or fluorescence. Provided is a novel baseline correction procedure called the Iterative Smoothing-splines with Root Error Adjustment (ISREA) that has three distinct advantages. First, ISREA uses smoothing splines, which are more flexible than polynomials and capable of capturing complicated trends over the whole spectral domain, to estimate the baseline. Second, ISREA mimics the asymmetric square root loss and removes the need of a threshold. Finally, ISREA avoids the direct optimization of a non-convex loss function by iteratively updating prediction errors and refitting baselines. Through extensive numerical experiments on a wide variety of spectra including simulated spectra, mineral spectra, and dialysate spectra, the present inventors show that ISREA is simple, fast, and can yield consistent and accurate baselines that preserve all the meaningful Raman peaks.