Implementation of a portable personal EKG signal monitoring system

Abstract

This research develops a portable personal EKG signal monitoring system to help patients monitor their EKG signals instantly to avoid the occurrence of tragedies. This system is built with two main units: signal processing unit and monitoring and evaluation unit. The first unit consists of EKG signal sensor, signal amplifier, digitalization circuit, and related control circuits. The second unit is a software tool developed on an embedded Linux platform (called CSA). Experimental result indicates that the proposed system has the practical potential for users in health monitoring. It is demonstrated to be more convenient and with greater portability than the conventional PC-based EKG signal monitoring systems. Furthermore, all the application units embedded in the system are built with open source codes, no licensed fee is required for operating systems and authorized applications. Thus, the building cost is much lower than the traditional systems. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.