Review of the Requirements for a Wearable, Low-Cost External Cardiac Loop Recorder with WBAN in Resource-Constrained...

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) has become the most serious health concern in India and globally. The cost of treatment for CVD is very high and in a country like India, where most of the population belongs to rural area, affording treatment is not possible. Diagnosis and treatment are further hampered due to shortage of medical expertise as well as the unavailability of the wearable device. This makes the condition worst in rural areas. As a result of delay in diagnosis, patients do not receive appropriate treatment on time, thus risking lives. Hence, early detection of physiological abnormalities in patients is the best solution to avoid sudden death. In India, the majority of ECG diagnosis is done using a standard ECG machine or Holter monitor, which are not adequate to detect transient or infrequent arrhythmia as the window of detection is 30 s or up to 48 h. So, for arrhythmia diagnosis or syncope and palpitation, external cardiac loop recorder (ECLR) is preferred. ECLR is a monitoring device which records cardiac activities and detects infrequent arrhythmias with syncope and palpitation of a subject for longer period continuously. Due to recent improvements in technology, such as flexible electronics and wireless body area network (WBAN), wearable medical devices are progressively assisting people to monitor their health status while doing their day-to-day activities and furnishing more information to clinicians for early diagnosis and treatment. Flexible electronics allows to develop an electronic circuit on a flexible substrate hence making the device bendable and stretchable. WBAN is a wireless communication between different nodes like sensors and processors that are located at different points on the body. By incorporating technologies such as miniaturization of electronics, making flexible electronics and WBAN concept in ECLR, the device can be made wearable so as to not interfere with the patient's day-to-day activities. This review paper discusses the limitations of existing standard ECG machines as well as how to make the existing ECLR devices more robust, more advanced, more comfortable and also affordable.