Telemedical Heart Rate Measurements for Lifestyle Counselling

In this paper we analyse a low-cost commercial chest belt to be integrated into a lifestyle counselling system as a source of heart rate data. We compared data from a Schiller ECG Holter device, which serves as a reference to a CardioSport device. Due to missing data in the CardioSport device caused by loss of contact with the body, the creation of special algorithms was necessary for synchronization and data validation. The results show that when using our synchronization algorithms the average absolute percentage error between the two signals was 2% with correlation of more than 99%. Using a data validation algorithm, we were able to get on average more than 70% of the signal with an absolute percentage error of 3% and a high average correlation of 99%. The mean RR interval values and standard deviation of RR intervals are very close to those of the reference device using both the synchronization and data validation algorithms. When using the data validation algorithm, the reference measurements produced only slightly better results with regard to false detections of atrial defibrillation than the CardioSport device. In conclusion, we found that with a simple preprocessing algorithm, CardioSport as a low-cost device can be safely integrated into a lifestyle support system as a telemedical solution.