Abstract
Over the past 25 years, Heart rate variability (HRV) has become a non-invasive research and clinical tool for indirectly carrying out investigation of both cardiac and autonomic system function in both healthy and diseased. It provides valuable information about a wide range of cardiovascular disorders, pulmonary diseases, neurological diseases, etc. Its primary purpose is to access the functioning of the nervous system. The source of information for HRV analysis is the continuous beat to beat measurement of inter-beat intervals. The electrocardiography (ECG or EKG) is considered as the best way to measure inter-beat intervals. This paper proposes an open source Graphical User Interface (GUI): smRithm developed in MATLAB for HRV analysis that will apply effective techniques on the raw ECG signals to process and decompose it in a simpler manner to obtain more useful information out of signals that can be utilized for more powerful and efficient applications in the near future related to HRV.
Acknowledgements
We are extremely grateful to the Biomedical Department, DCRUST, Murthal, Haryana for allowing us to work in their lab. Acknowledgement would be incomplete without the mention of student volunteers who enthusiastically supported us by giving their ECG signals.
Declaration of interest
The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.