An on-line microcomputer-based cardiac monitoring system

Heart rate is a very sensitive measure for evaluating the physiological strain in industrial muscular work. A review of the literature showed that most researchers resorted to the manual counting of heart beats. Some use analog devices such as cardiotachometers and very few use digital systems which are often expensive. Moreover, the existing cardiac monitors were developed for patient monitoring and for monitoring physical activities that do not require severe contractions of the chest muscles. They are not suitable for monitoring heavy activities because of signal interference. The main objective of the present study is to develop and test an on-line microcomputer-based cardiac monitoring system that is capable of accurately and rapidly computing the heart rate of individuals engaged in manual industrial tasks. The design, specifications and merits of the system are given. The software package developed is written in macroassembly language for the IBM AT personal computer. The experimental evaluation of the microcomputer-based cardiac monitoring system shows a high degree of correlation between computer and manual calculations (r = 0.977). The experimental evaluation indicates that the system developed is highly accurate.