Abdominal hypertension can complicate critical care conditions. If untreated and sustained, abdominal hypertension can lead to the abdominal compartment syndrome with its high morbidity and mortality. Treatment of+ severe abdominal hypertension is often surgical. We designed ABDOPRE, a system to non-invasively lower abdominal pressure. A bell-shaped chamber is applied on the patient’s abdomen and by means of a vacuum pump a negative pressure is generated in the chamber outside the abdomen. ABDOPRE senses intra-abdominal pressure from an indwelling urinary bladder catheter. The desired value of abdominal pressure and the time allowed to reach this value are entered into the system which servo-controls the vacuum pump, according to treatment protocols. Pressure data of the monitoring/treatment sessions are recorded to allow review of patient response and a daily report is available for the Electronic Medical Record. Preliminary observations were made on intensive care patients.