Device for the automatic classification of cardiac murmurs

摘要

An electronic stethoscope (ES) is used to supply a given periodic cardiac murmur in each case via a digital-analog converter (AD) as a data sequence (DD) to a program-controlled computer (DC) which outputs diagnostic data (DP) about the cardiac murmur on an output unit (AG) by means of an analytical program. The cardiac murmur is to be classified quantitatively as regards preselectable reference cardiac murmurs without any further aids. Maxima-related period sections are selected from an enveloping function of the data sequence (DD), standardized in time and segmented, whereupon segment characteristics are formed and averaged for several period sections which are classified according to the appropriately processed reference characteristics of the reference cardiac murmurs stored in the reference memory (MM). The classification output is ordered according to relevance with regard to predetermined reference designations. The segment characteristics and reference characteristics can be archived in compact form on a data carrier (DT). This results in objective cardiovascular diagnosis even by auxiliary staff or trainees. <IMAGE>