Authors:
Daniel Ferreira
1
and
Gil Gonçalves
2
Affiliations:
1
Increase Time, Portugal
;
2
Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, Portugal
Keyword(s):
Medical Applications, Mobile Monitoring, Mobile Devices, Bio Signals.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Biomedical Engineering
;
Biomedical Instruments and Devices
;
Biomedical Sensors
;
Computer-Aided Detection and Diagnosis
;
Devices
;
Electrocardiography and Heart Monitoring
;
Health Monitoring Devices
;
Human-Computer Interaction
;
Physiological Computing Systems
;
Wireless Systems
Abstract:
The aging of the population causes an increased prevalence of chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular disease
(which is the leading cause of death in developed countries) and dementia. Because of the high morbidity and
mortality rates associated with this group of diseases, it is necessary to continuously monitor the vital signs of
people at risk. Nowadays this monitoring is carried out by a Holter monitor, which acquires electrocardiogram
data for a long period of time, so that it can be analyzed later. However, this is not a real-time monitoring.
There is another type of monitor, which stores the data and communicates with a remote server, allowing realtime
continuous monitoring. The latter system requires a specific platform and, as result, the patients have to
adapt to yet another device in their daily activities.
Information and communication technologies (ICT) have had a remarkable role in the management of health
care distribution and social work, and can be applied on daily
monitoring of patients, providing a timely opportunity
for medical staff to intervene. In the ICT field we have witnessed the rise of smartphones as a gadget
with great mobility, connectivity and processing capacities. They are the ideal device to take patient monitoring
to the next level, replacing the need for specific platforms for each type of monitoring, and facilitating
the daily lives of patients. This ability of smartphones becomes more and more apparent with the increasing
number in new medical applications that profit from its characteristics.
Therefore, our goal is to create an application for smartphones which takes advantage of the portability and
processing capacities of smartphones to assess cardiac function, using bio signals captured by a device with
bluetooth interface and the sensors on the smartphone, and subsequent processing with a medical telemetry
system.
(More)