Aid to diagnosis of foetal bradicardias using the autocorrelation function

Early diagnosis of intense foetal hypoxia, symtoms of which include changes in the foetal heart rate, may constitute a useful tool for the prevention of irreversible damage to the foetus. In the paper three automatic diagnostic methods are described, all based on analysis of the waveform of the autocorrelation function of the sum of signals representing the foetal heart rate and the uterine pressure. The three methods are compared and tested using records taken from a number of patients.