Boosting CCA Pulse Accuracy: How ICA Enhances Reliability in Wearable Accelerometer Devices

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Cardiovascular Physiology
• Signal Processing

Background:

• Accurate common carotid artery (CCA) pulse assessment is vital for cardiovascular health monitoring.
• Wearable devices struggle with interference from the internal jugular vein (IJV) pulsations.
• Existing methods for wearable pulse monitoring require improvement in accuracy and reliability.

Purpose of the Study:

• To apply Independent Component Analysis (ICA) to skin Acceleration Plethysmogram (APG) signals from wearable accelerometers.
• To isolate the CCA pulse component and mitigate IJV interference in wearable-based signals.
• To evaluate the effectiveness of ICA in improving the accuracy of CCA pulse measurements.

Main Methods:

• An in-vivo study involving 20 participants was conducted.
• Skin APG signals were recorded using a wearable accelerometer.
• ICA was applied to isolate CCA signals, and results were compared to A-mode ultrasound reference measurements before and after ICA processing.

Main Results:

• Post-ICA analysis showed a significant reduction in %RMSE (40.6% for CCA-APG, 46.7% for CCA-pulse) and improvement in correlation (64.1% for CCA-APG, 62.6% for CCA-pulse) compared to ultrasound.
• Statistical analysis (p < 0.05) confirmed significant improvements in measurement accuracy and reliability.
• ICA effectively reduced IJV interference, enhancing the quality of wearable-based CCA pulse signals.

Conclusions:

• ICA is an effective technique for enhancing the accuracy of wearable accelerometer-based CCA pulse monitoring.
• This method shows potential for non-invasive, continuous cardiovascular health assessment.
• Reducing IJV interference via ICA significantly improves the reliability of wearable pulse monitoring devices.