Development of a prototype for a mobile application to monitor hypertension from ECG data

Abstract

Today, the use of personal digital assistants is increasing, especially due to the development of mobile devices. Especially at the medical level, their applications have grown a lot. Health cannot be left behind in this new digital age in using these new technologies. Given that the heart is the main organ of the cardiovascular system and is responsible for pumping blood throughout the body, it is not surprising that heart disease is the leading cause of death in Asian and Arabic countries, according to international health organizations operating under the World Health Organization. The average individual has no access to a device for home use and must rely on going to the doctor for a consultation and having to undergo the necessary procedure using pricy, specialized equipment. In this project, hardware and software were designed to produce a prototype device that can be purchased for a reasonable price, weighs little, and can be handled easily, enabling people to monitor their heart’s activity from the comfort of their homes. The core of the prototype is an AD8232 integrated circuit mounted on a SparkFun single-lead heart rate monitor-AD8232 card. When used with an Arduino card, serial communication with a computer, or Bluetooth with a smart device, this integrated circuit displays the graph and the person’s heart rate in beats per minute. The Android Studio platform was used to create the mobile app as well as the graphical personal computer version. 19 randomly chosen test volunteers’ heart rates and graphs were compared to the relevant ages listed in the literature.