Modern Sweat-based Biosensors for Non-invasive Continuous Monitoring of Biomarkers and their Future Prospects : Systematic Literature Review

Interest in health monitoring with blood tests and wearable devices has grown in recent years. The purpose of this systematic review was to determine what modern wearable non-invasive sweat sensors can measure in humans and what their future prospects are. The theoretical part of the work discussed the key concepts, the measurement of biomarkers in blood, the physiology of sweat and sweating and presented three general sweat-based monitoring methods. The purpose of the theoretical background is to provide the reader with basic knowledge and understanding of non-invasive biosensor technology and the physiological background of measurement. The methodology of this systematic review was based largely on the principles of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) checklist and the data was presented using the PRISMA flowchart. The selection of databases, the formation of search terms, inclusion criteria and data searches were carried out transparently and reproducibly. The study evaluations were performed using the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) evaluation tools for a total of five different study types. Only studies conducted on humans were included in the work. This systematic review included a total of 69 studies, with most of them being case series and case report type. The average score of JBI evaluations was 60.5% and 62.3% were published in 2024. The sensors discussed in the included studies differed a lot from each other and a total of 34 different measurable biomarkers were found, of which 17 appeared individually. The most typical measurement points for a modern sensor were the arm (n = 40), head (n = 8) and back (n = 7).The intended use was most often defined as personal health monitoring with 24.6% of the included studies. From included studies glucose (n = 28), pH (n = 20), sodium (n = 16), potassium (n = 16) and lactate (n = 14) sensors were the most common and the results indicate the growing popularity of glucose sensors, especially related to diabetes treatment with 58.8% of the statements. Results also indicate increase in the amount of research on modern biosensors in the period under review, with 95.4% growth from 2023 to 2024 in the context of this systematic review. Of particular interest was the broad distribution of biomarkers, as well as the changes and manifestations of the prescribed use of biosensors, associated diseases, usage environment and target group.