Visual and auditory analysis of respiratory sound signals promises improved detection of certain types of lung diseases. LabVIEW software was used to design a system that monitors the respiratory activity of the patient. The program developed calculates the respiratory rate, displays the time expanded waveform of the lung sound, and computes the fast Fourier transform and short-time Fourier transform to present the power spectrum and spectrogram respectively. These parameters are transmitted synchronously to the remote station using the Internet for online monitoring of the patient.
Keywords: lung sounds, power spectrum, spectrogram, monitoring, remote, LabVIEW
Lung sounds provide vital information about respiratory health and disease. Lung sounds can be classified as normal sounds or adventitious sounds. The presence of adventitious sounds usually indicates a pulmonary disorder. The adventitious sounds are of two types: continuous and discontinuous. Continuous adventitious sounds are wheezes and rhonchi. Wheezes have dominant frequency, usually >100 Hz, and a duration >100 milliseconds. Wheezes are due to airways obstruction in the lungs.
For diagnosis of respiratory diseases physicians largely rely on their auditory skills for interpretation of the sounds acquired using the stethoscope. The success of this practice depends on the experience and training of the doctor. With the advancement in computer applications various new techniques are available for lung sound analysis which can assist the doctor in faster and more accurate diagnosis of these diseases while minimizing human error.
In certain cases of patients suffering from chronic diseases such as asthma, continuous monitoring is required even when the patient is discharged from the hospital for prevention of failure of out-patient therapy and timely recognition of symptoms. To address these issues treatment needs to be monitored remotely and quickly adapted to a change in health status. Read More..
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