MEMS sensors and wireless transmission of sensor signals for phonocardiology applications

Scope and Method of Study. Develop the new portable wireless sensor system.Findings and Conclusions. The traditional phonocardiology monitoring can be improved using a wireless sensor based approach.This thesis presents the heart monitoring system using a wireless sensor based approach to monitor heart signals. The sensors used in this system consist of an electronic stethoscope (model ds32a from Thinklabs), and an accelerometer sensor (model LIS3L02AQ from STMicroelectronics) that uses Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems Technology (MEMS). The hypothesis test results show that there is no significant difference between the traditional and the new monitoring system signals. In this thesis, heart signal is characterized using Fast Fourier Transform (FFT), Wavelet Transform (WT) and Phase Space Analysis. The frequency spectrum shows that heart sound signal has a varied frequency content. Wavelet analysis is used to remove undesirable background noise from original signal. Phase space analysis is also used to represent different properties of the heart signals. The present work can lead to the development of a heart monitoring system to assist physicians, caregivers or patients to diagnose heart failure without incurring the disadvantages of the traditional ECGs and stethoscopes.