Heart Rate Variability - Data Handling

One heartbeat signal from Polar Chest Strap displayed in Audacity with Beat Finder marking.




Four heartbeats captured from a Polar Chest Strap displayed in Audacity using Beat Finder



Recording the signal from a heart rate monitor like Polar or Pro-Form using the Polar Heart Rate Module - RMCM01 from Sparkfun proved less complex than other techniques. Here is one of the best:


diy-ecg-machine-on-the-cheap

Audacity Beat Finder converted the audio signal into a text file of with every R-R interval time, and that signal is as accurate as an EKG.

The breakthrough came from this article. The Kubios software installed efficiently on both Windows and Ubuntu.

The details and pictures will follow. Budget Biofeedback has a table at the Ann Arbor Maker Faire on June 6, 2010. See you there.

OMHE - Being Monitoring in Open Source

This is the future. Read more:



OMHE (Open Mobile Health Exchange): A Microsyntax for Devices, Machines, & Humans:

OMHE (Open Mobile Health Exchange), pronounced "ooommm" is an open-source microsyntax for text messaging (mobile SMS), Twitter®, medical devices, and other "short text capable" systems. It is a community work product of microsyntax.org. Its called OMHE because its the nirvana of health informatics..open, free, and simple.

OMHE follows the basic syntax:

[command]

...or...

[command]=

So the '=' sign is optional to make it easy to work on a telephone keypad when needed. For example, to report weight (either automatically reported by a scale or by human, you could say things like.

wt155

...or...

weight=100.0k#afteryoga

The examples above illustrate two ways of communicating the same piece of information, 'weight'.

Use OMHE as format for sending blood pressure, blood glucose, weight, pedometer readings, pain levels, and other common information exchanged between people, health care providers and medical devices.

OMHE is designed to be easily typed on a mobile phone, while at the same time, easy for computers to read, write, and understand (i.e. machine readable/writeable).

Latest in Medical Monitoring

The following clips are from this Slashdot item:

http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/01/29/0051203/Monitor-Your-Health-24x7-With-the-WIN-Human-Recorder?from=rss

This is the lead information:
"Japanese venture firm WIN Human Recorder Ltd is set to bring a health monitor patch to market that is capable of keeping tabs on all your vitals. The HRS-I is a small (30mm x 30mm x 5mm) lightweight (7g) device that adheres to your chest and relays the data it collects to a computer or mobile phone via wireless connection. While the HRS-I only directly monitors electrocardiograph information, body surface temperature, and movement (via accelerometers), it can connect to sensors for heart rate, brain waves, respiration and many other important health indicators. WIN is selling the HRS-I for around ¥30,000 (~$330) and providing monitoring software for around ¥10,000 (~$110)."

This is an information rich comment:
This is old news, and just a variation on a theme -

As somebody who does this sort of stuff for a living - now they need to get around the IEC-60601 compliance and the FDA before they could introduce it in the USA.

http://www.devicelink.com/mddi/archive/03/09/015.html [devicelink.com] [devicelink.com]

Something similar is in the works for hospital use:

http://www.soterawireless.com/main/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=55&Itemid=18 [soterawireless.com] [soterawireless.com]

That goes out over WiFi inside a hospital.

Also - Bluetooth LE (Low Energy) is designed for this application and there are a bunch of "health monitors either int the works, or already out there for this:

http://mobihealthnews.com/2577/continua-picks-zigbee-bluetooth-le-for-health-devices-sensors/ [mobihealthnews.com] [mobihealthnews.com]

Blood Glucose monitors using this technology have been around for a while:

http://www.dexcom.com/default.aspx [dexcom.com] [dexcom.com]

Now if you want exciting - research into electronic eyes, electronic ears and neural pacemaker for people with epilepsy are kind of interesting. Google them and you will find them.

Got your Borg Implants? :-)

Tricorder and iPhone Applications

Two articles and a presentation on TED.com contribute to wholesome image of a biofeedback future:

Tricorder is a reference to Star Trek body scanners used by the doctor. This device comes from NASA.

Featured is a $30 hardware interface for a stethoscope that displays an audiogram of a heartbeat. The image is included in the article.

The next level of intuitive interfaces are evolving in open source and wearable. Augmented reality projected during soul searching giving another sense of your being?

Background and History of Biofeedback

Chapter 10, The Birth of Biofeedback, taken by permission from Biofeedback, Mind-Body Medicine, and the Higher Limits of Human Nature by Donald Moss, Ph.D. is a very worthwhile and available at http://nealmiller.org/?p=94

Neal Miller is termed a "Founding Father of Biofeedback" and the site is packed with articles and information collected by the committee that honored his work with this site: http://nealmiller.org/

Cognitive Behaviors and SAD

The video looks at resources and techniques for managing your own SAD. Guess what helps - charting, recording, noting, responses, patterns, triggers, and feedback of all sorts.

The Field Develops in Leaps and Bounds

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, I've been busy trying to lick atrial fibrillation. While diet, exercise, monitoring, and drugs have helped, I'm going for the current cure, ablation.

Radical, to be sure, but it avoids pitfalls like continuing chemical care, an increasing inability to reset to regular heartbeat using exercise, the risks of stroke, tissue alterations with time and a really poor mental state I experience with the inevitable cardiac insufficiency.

Wii calendars now record my daily irregular heartbeat simply by putting the "foot" stamp so that it touches the date. When rhythm is normal the simple twist to indicate positive or negative feelings about Wii Fit Age are to the right of the calendar date.

The Wii Fit daily Body Test is my most regular recording tool and looking for ways to indicate a summary of other gathered information is on my mind. The amount of time consummed to post this little piece of information while getting a weight and Wii Fit Age from the Body Test is high. Now that my system has the Homebrew Channel, I hope to find faster ways of collecting data.

Browsing biofeedback http://www.mindmodulations.com/mindmods/ proved to be a rich resource that I'd like to revisit. You might too!