Arrhythmia Detection Using Neural Network on a Smart Phone

Abstract

"It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver" Mahatma Gandhi. Arrhythmias are the disorders of the regular beating rhythm patterns of the heart in which there is an abnormal electric activity in the heart. Sudden Arrhythmia Death (SAD) syndrome, which is the sudden death due to arrhythmia, is becoming a very severe hazard in the world and is already in the US. Based on US stats there are about 20% of people who are likely to have premature ventricular beat during a day, that is within 24 hours and there are about 2.2 million people who are living with atrial brillation, types of arrhythmia. And the worst is approximately 300 000 people die because of this every year. Arrhythmia could be reversible in most of the victims if taken care on time or hospitalized within few minutes. This dissertation proposes a method, a system to identify arrhythmia and get medical assistance to the patient as soon as possible. This is done using three electrodes ECG acquiring system, a smart phone and a tool written for Symbion os which analyses ECG using a neural network. Some arrhythmias are temporary and complaisant where most of them occur as a result of skipping a heart beat or extra heart beat whereas some of the arrhythmias are life threatening. Cause of the arrhythmia would be mainly due to many types of heart diseases. Coronary disease, Atherosclerosis are the main contributors whereas other health conditions such as diabetes, hypertension could also be a cause. Habits such as smoking, alcohol, ca eine, stress and cough and cold medicines also could bring in arrhythmia condition. The system will consists of ve major phases. (1). ECG acquisition, (2). ECG transmission, (3). ECG analysis using a java application, (4). Data transmission to the caregivers, and the last phase (5). Data elaboration at the caregivers place. The rst phase, ECG acquisition will be done using a three lead ECG acquisition system which will consists of a circuitry. What happens actually inside is, it collects the voltage di erence of our body at three di erent places in which one of them is the ground lead. In the circuitry it enhances, amplify the signal it receives and send it via Bluetooth to a receiver. The gadget is a small device which can be worn comfortably in routine life and hence portable. The ECG data transmission to the smart phone, the second phase is done using Bluetooth as the communication medium because it is considered to be the reliable secure and uninterrupted channel for short range data transmission. Most importantly the third phase, the mobile phone application where ECG signals are analyzed using a neural network is the most highlighting phase since it involves with many issues and challenges. A neural network is used for ECG analysis because it is considered to be a good, reliable, e cient and e ective method of ECG analysis according to the previously written literature on the subject. A Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver also xed to the mobile phone in order to collect the position information of the patient. The outputs of the application would be alerts to the caregivers or someone who could take care of the patient as quickly as possible. The data used for training and testing is acquired from the MIT-BIH database which is the most popular common database available for arrhythmia studies. Almost all the previous literature have been using this database for evaluation purposes. Last two phases are the data transmission from the mobile phone to the caregivers place and elaboration at their place. The outputs sent are of two types, calls and messages. Calls are made to ensure that the other party receives the message and short message (SMS) is used to send information accurately. A voice message through the call is another option which is less practical. In conclusion the objective of this system is to save at least one mans life. The medical solutions available in particularly are not cheaper. But this system would be able to make available at an a ordable cost for someone who can save his/her life with the use of modern technology available.