DIY ECG Detected an Irregular Heartbeat
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Am I going to die? It’s unlikely. Upon analyzing ~20 minutes of heartbeat data (some of which is depicted in the previous entry) I found a peculiarity. Technically this could be some kind of noise (a ‘pop’ in the microphone signal due to the shuffling of wires or a momentary disconnect from the electrodes or perhaps even a static shock to my body from something), but because this peculiarity happened only once in 20 minutes I’m not ruling out the possibility that this is the first irregular heartbeat I captured with my DIY ECG. Note that single-beat irregularities are common, and that this does not alarm me so much as fascinates me. Below is the section of the data which contains this irregular beat.
In the spirit of improvement I wonder how much more interesting this project would be if I were to combine the already-designed ECG machine with a sensor to detect the physical effect of the heart’s beating on my vasculature. in other words, can I combine my electrical traces with physical traces? (Blood pressure or blood flow) I found an interesting site that shows how someone built a DIY blood flow meter using a piezo film pulse sensor. Pretty clever I must say… but I think I draw my limit at what I’ve done. Although blood flow would be interesting to analyze (does the murmur depicted above produce an alteration in normal blood flow?), it’s not worth the time, hassle or expense of building.