QRS complex detection in ECG signal for wearable devices

This paper presents QRS complex detection algorithm based on dual slope technique, which is suitable for wearable electrocardiogram (ECG) applications. For cardiac patients of different arrhythmias, ECG signals are needed to be monitored over an extensive period of time. Thus, the wearable heart monitoring system needs computationally efficient QRS detection technique with good accuracy. In this paper, a method of QRS detection based on two slopes on both sides of an R peak is presented which is computationally efficient. Based on the slopes, first, a variable measuring steepness is developed, then by introducing an adjustable R-R interval based window and adaptive thresholding techniques, depending on the number of peaks detected in such window, R peaks are detected. The algorithm was evaluated against MIT/BIH arrhythmia database and achieved 99.16% detection rate with sensitivity of 0.9935 and positive predictivity of 0.9981. The method was compared with two widely used R peaks detection algorithms.