Cardiac interference reduction in diaphragmatic MMG signals during a Maintained Inspiratory Pressure Test

A recursive least square (RLS) adaptive filtering algorithm for reduction of cardiac interference in diaphragmatic mecanomyographic (MMGdi) signals is addressed in this paper. MMGdi signals were acquired with a capacitive accelerometer placed between 7th and 8th intercostal spaces, on the right anterior axillary line, during a maintained inspiratory pressure test. Subjects were asked to maintain a constant inspiratory pressure with a mouthpiece connected to a closed tube (without breathing). This maneuver was repeated at five different contraction efforts: apnea (no effort), 20 cmH2O, 40 cmH2O, 60 cmH2O and maximum voluntary contraction. An adaptive noise canceller (ANC) using the RLS algorithm was applied on the MMGdi signals. To evaluate the behavior of the ANC, the MMGdi signals were analyzed in two segments: with and without cardiac interference (WCI and NCI, respectively). In both segments it was analyzed the power spectral density (PSD), and the ARV and RMS amplitude parameters for each contraction effort. With the proposed ANC algorithm the amplitude parameters of the WCI segments were reduced to a level similar to the one of the NCI segments. The obtained results showed that ANC using the RLS algorithm allows to significantly reduce the cardiac interference in MMGdi signals.