EPhone: Embedded Cardiac Care Device in Mobile Phone

A novel device, named EPhone, developed for rural doctor diagnosing and/or patient monitoring is presented. This device is embedded in a mobile phone and includes amplifier circuit, filter circuit, a microcontroller, a data management, etc. The heart rate, the ST segment deviation and the premature ventricular beats rate are computed insided phone and a normality limit is set for each one. When one of these limits is reached, an ECG strip is transmitted to the Three-level Healthcare Network in Rural China (THNRC) via 2G mobile phones and the device waits to display the receiving answer. The methods used to analyze the ECG were tested with real ECGs and all the QRS complexes were detected. Since many of the users are rural doctors and technically skilled, and it is of paramount importance that the device is very convenient to carry. This has been achieved by providing embeded device and displaying unambiguous messages on a screen of mobile phone. When the communication process was tested, a remarkable difference between the transmitting and receiving signals was not observed.