Since NASA shifted its focus to long-duration space missions, many astronauts have returned home from missions with visual changes thought to be related to increased intracranial pressure (ICP) associated with spaceflight. There is interest in better understanding the nature of this increased ICP, but there are certain obstacles that stand in the way of conducting the necessary research which must first be overcome. For example, the space environment has certain risks that make performing lumbar punctures infeasible. Similarly, in other clinical settings such as emergency centers, there may be a hesitation to use an invasive lumbar puncture to establish raised ICP in patients who may have only mild symptoms, such as headaches. Even in settings such as the intensive care unit, where invasive monitoring of ICP is used routinely, there is always a risk that hospital-acquired complications will arise from such a procedure. Thus, finding a fast, non-invasive way to measure ICP in lieu of a lumbar puncture would be helpful to better characterize and determine the magnitude of these problems.
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