Wearable and Nearable Biosensors and Systems for Healthcare

Biosensors and systems in the form of wearables and “nearables” (i.e., everyday sensorized objects with transmitting capabilities such as smartphones) are rapidly evolving for use in healthcare. Unlike conventional approaches, these technologies can enable seamless or on-demand physiological monitoring, anytime and anywhere. Such monitoring can help transform healthcare from the current reactive, one-size-fits-all, hospital-centered approach into a future proactive, personalized, decentralized structure. Wearable and nearable biosensors and systems have been made possible through integrated innovations in sensor design, electronics, data transmission, power management, and signal processing. Although much progress has been made in this field, many open challenges for the scientific community remain, especially for those applications requiring high accuracy. This book contains the 12 papers that constituted a recent Special Issue of Sensors sharing the same title. The aim of the initiative was to provide a collection of state-of-the-art investigations on wearables and nearables, in order to stimulate technological advances and the use of the technology to benefit healthcare. The topics covered by the book offer both depth and breadth pertaining to wearable and nearable technology. They include new biosensors and data transmission techniques, studies on accelerometers, signal processing, and cardiovascular monitoring, clinical applications, and validation of commercial devices

An automated approach: from physiological signals classification to signal processing and analysis

By increased and widespread usage of wearable monitoring devices a huge volume of data is generated which requires various automated methods for analyzing and processing them and also extracting useful information from them. Since it is almost impossible for physicians and nurses to monitor physical activities of their patients for a long time, there is a need for automated data analysis techniques that abstract the information and highlight the significant events for clinicians and healthcare experts. The main objective of this thesis work was towards an automatic digital signal processing approach from physiological signal classification to processing and analyzing the two most vital physiological signals in long-term healthcare monitoring (ECG and IP). At the first stage, an automated generic physiological signal classifier for detecting an unknown recorded signal was introduced and then different algorithms for processing and analyzing the ECG and IP signals were developed and evaluated. This master thesis was a part of DISSE project which its aim was to design a new health-care system with the aim of providing medical expertise more accessible, affordable, and convenient. In this work, different publicly available databases such as MIT-BIH arrhythmia and CEBS were used in the development and evaluation phases. The proposed novel generic physiological signal classifier has the ability to distinguish five types of physiological signals (ECG, Resp, SCG, EMG and PPG) from each other with 100 % accuracy. Although the proposed classifier was not very successful in distinguishing lead I and II of ECG signal from each other (error of 27% was reported) which means that the general purpose features were enough discriminating to recognize different physiological signals from each other but not enough for classifying different ECG leads. For ECG processing and analysis section, three QRS detection methods were implemented which modified Pan-Tompkins gave the best performance with 97% sensitivity and 96,45% precision. The morphological based ectopic detection method resulted in sensitivity of 85,74% and specificity of 84,34%. Furthermore, for the first PVC detection algorithm (sum of trough) the optimal threshold and range were studied according to the AUC of ROC plot which the highest sensitivity and specificity were obtained with threshold of −5 and range of 11 : 25 that were equal to 87% and 82%, respectively. For the second PVC detection method (R-peak with minimum) the best performance was achieved with threshold of −0.7 that resulted in sensitivity of 68% and specificity of 72%. In the IP analysis section, an ACF approach was implemented for respiratory rate estimation. The estimated respira- tion rate obtained from IP signal and oronasal mask were compared and the total MAE and RMSE errors were computed that were equal to 0.40 cpm and 1.20 cpm, respectively. The implemented signal processing techniques and algorithms can be tested and improved with measured data from wearable devices for ambulatory applications

The 2023 wearable photoplethysmography roadmap

Photoplethysmography is a key sensing technology which is used in wearable devices such as smartwatches and fitness trackers. Currently, photoplethysmography sensors are used to monitor physiological parameters including heart rate and heart rhythm, and to track activities like sleep and exercise. Yet, wearable photoplethysmography has potential to provide much more information on health and wellbeing, which could inform clinical decision making. This Roadmap outlines directions for research and development to realise the full potential of wearable photoplethysmography. Experts discuss key topics within the areas of sensor design, signal processing, clinical applications, and research directions. Their perspectives provide valuable guidance to researchers developing wearable photoplethysmography technology

Intelligent Biosignal Processing in Wearable and Implantable Sensors

This reprint provides a collection of papers illustrating the state-of-the-art of smart processing of data coming from wearable, implantable or portable sensors. Each paper presents the design, databases used, methodological background, obtained results, and their interpretation for biomedical applications. Revealing examples are brain–machine interfaces for medical rehabilitation, the evaluation of sympathetic nerve activity, a novel automated diagnostic tool based on ECG data to diagnose COVID-19, machine learning-based hypertension risk assessment by means of photoplethysmography and electrocardiography signals, Parkinsonian gait assessment using machine learning tools, thorough analysis of compressive sensing of ECG signals, development of a nanotechnology application for decoding vagus-nerve activity, detection of liver dysfunction using a wearable electronic nose system, prosthetic hand control using surface electromyography, epileptic seizure detection using a CNN, and premature ventricular contraction detection using deep metric learning. Thus, this reprint presents significant clinical applications as well as valuable new research issues, providing current illustrations of this new field of research by addressing the promises, challenges, and hurdles associated with the synergy of biosignal processing and AI through 16 different pertinent studies. Covering a wide range of research and application areas, this book is an excellent resource for researchers, physicians, academics, and PhD or master students working on (bio)signal and image processing, AI, biomaterials, biomechanics, and biotechnology with applications in medicine

The 2023 wearable photoplethysmography roadmap

Photoplethysmography is a key sensing technology which is used in wearable devices such as smartwatches and fitness trackers. Currently, photoplethysmography sensors are used to monitor physiological parameters including heart rate and heart rhythm, and to track activities like sleep and exercise. Yet, wearable photoplethysmography has potential to provide much more information on health and wellbeing, which could inform clinical decision making. This Roadmap outlines directions for research and development to realise the full potential of wearable photoplethysmography. Experts discuss key topics within the areas of sensor design, signal processing, clinical applications, and research directions. Their perspectives provide valuable guidance to researchers developing wearable photoplethysmography technology

WOFEX 2021 : 19th annual workshop, Ostrava, 1th September 2021 : proceedings of papers

The workshop WOFEX 2021 (PhD workshop of Faculty of Electrical Engineer-ing and Computer Science) was held on September 1st September 2021 at the VSB – Technical University of Ostrava. The workshop offers an opportunity for students to meet and share their research experiences, to discover commonalities in research and studentship, and to foster a collaborative environment for joint problem solving. PhD students are encouraged to attend in order to ensure a broad, unconfined discussion. In that view, this workshop is intended for students and researchers of this faculty offering opportunities to meet new colleagues.Ostrav