Expert System for Electrocardiography
Description and scope
Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the Western world, causing about 4.3 million deaths per year in Europe, with an economic impact amounting to more than 192 billion euros annually. In addition, the Spanish Society of Cardiology estimates the shortage of specialists to be 15%, a worrying fact when one considers that the majority of electrocardiograms are analysed by general practitioners in out-of-hospital environments. The technological model proposed in this project aims to have a direct impact on unnecessary visits to the cardiologist by effectively and efficiently decentralising decision-making by means of a powerful electrocardiographical solution geared towards effective interaction between patients, general practitioners and cardiologists. Multidisciplinary research carried out by a panel of experts from different fields of engineering and medicine, led by Dr. Antonio Bayes de Luna, aims to achieve a satisfactory solution to doctors' needs and to develop the current model via the implementation of new technologies.
Technological objectives
This is a research and development project that integrates novel concepts of the internet of the future in an advanced, collaborative platform that interoperates with a smart terminal, providing an ECG terminal that is capable of integrating the latest electronic advances with connectivity and mobility solutions. Simultaneously, the project is researching into the automatic interpretation of electrocardiograms.
Industrial and/or social benefits
The development of the concept of "transmitting information instead of transferring patients and professionals" contributes to improvements in healthcare by the healthcare professionals and improves the quality of patient diagnostics by reducing false positive and improving false negative diagnosis by virtually bringing the cardiologists to the location where the tests are performed.
In a context in which hospital services are over-exploited and affected by an acute lack of financial resources, this advance provides a clear improvement in the optimisation of available resources by avoiding the effects of imbalance in the availability of specialised personnel, thereby contributing to improvements in the quality of healthcare provided.
Project partners
- Masmovil
- ISoco
- De La Ribera University Hospital
- Ascamm Technological Centre
- University of Malaga (UMA)
- Consultores Bayés Vic
- Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV)
- Iavante Foundation
The project has been co-financed by the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Commerce under its National Plan for Scientific Research, Development and Technological Innovation 2008-2011 (Reference TSI-020302-2010-136) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).
