Methods for analyzing infant heart rate variability: A preliminary study

Heart rate (HR) and heart rate variability (HRV) reflect autonomic development in infants. To better understand the autonomic response in infants, reliable HRV recordings are vital, yet no protocol exists. The purpose of this paper is to present reliability of a common procedure for analysis from two different file types. In the procedure, continuous electrocardiograph recordings of 5-10 min are obtained at rest in infants at 1 month of age by using a Hexoskin Shirt-Junior's (Carre Technologies Inc., Montreal, QC, Canada). Electrocardiograph (ECG; .wav) and R-R interval (RRi; .csv) files are extracted. The RRi of the ECG signal is generated by VivoSense (Great Lakes NeuroTechnologies, Independence, OH). Two MATLAB (The MathWorks, Inc., Natick, MA) scripts converted files for analysis with Kubios HRV Premium (Kubios Oy, Kuopio, Finland). A comparison was made between RRi and ECG files for HR and HRV parameters, and then tested with t tests and correlations via SPSS. There are significant differences in root mean squared successive differences between recording types, with only HR and low-frequency measures significantly correlated together. Recording with Hexoskin and analysis with MATLAB and Kubios enable infant HRV analysis. Differences in outcomes exist between procedures, and standard methodology for infant HR analysis is needed.