According to the World Health Organization, cardiovascular disease claims nearly 20 million lives each year and remains the leading cause of death worldwide. Although they are most often associated with heart attacks and strokes, serious complications do not always start suddenly, and in some cases, their onset is much more subtle.
This poses a difficult problem for doctors: how can they document something that is not happening during an exam? A standard electrocardiogram (ECG) only shows the heart’s activity at a specific moment, but even long-term monitoring does not always match when heart rhythm disturbances occur infrequently. As a result, some arrhythmias, especially short-term atrial fibrillation, may go unnoticed until they cause more serious health problems.
This diagnostic gap is becoming more pronounced as society ages and the prevalence of chronic diseases increases. Patients require monitoring not only in medical settings but also in their daily lives. It is important for doctors to understand not only whether abnormal heart rhythms occur during a particular examination, but also how often such episodes occur, how long they last, under what circumstances they occur, and whether their occurrence increases over time.
A system developed by Kaunas University of Technology (KTU) and other Lithuanian researchers aims to address this problem, and its solution is applied in Teltonika Telemedic’s TeltoHeart medical wristband. The system allows for continuous heart rhythm monitoring, allowing for more detailed ECG recording using the same device, and transmitting that data to a physician remotely.
Particularly important for post-stroke patients
Professor Vaidotas Marosas, Director of KTU’s Institute of Biomedical Engineering, emphasizes that the system was initially developed with patients in mind, where undetected heart rhythm disturbances can have particularly serious consequences. One such group is people who have suffered a stroke.
Because atrial fibrillation is short-lived and often asymptomatic, the researchers decided to focus on patients after a stroke. As a result, standard testing methods such as an EKG in the doctor’s office or a Holter monitor, in which the patient wears a device that records their heart rhythm for a day or several days, often fail to detect such episodes. ”
Professor Vaidotas Marosas, Director of KTU Institute of Biomedical Engineering
According to Professor KTU, heart rhythm disorders, particularly atrial fibrillation, are directly linked to an increased risk of ischemic stroke. If the arrhythmia goes undetected, the patient may not receive appropriate treatment and the stroke is more likely to occur again.
The technology, developed and continuously improved by KTU researchers and Teltonika Telemedic, allows continuous heart rhythm monitoring. When a suspicious episode is detected, the system alerts the patient through an on-screen notification or vibration. This allows you to capture events exactly as they occur, rather than during the office visit days or weeks later.
No adhesive electrodes or additional wires are required. Users simply touch the electrodes built into the device. Within about a minute, a more detailed ECG recording showing the heart’s electrical activity from different directions is created and the data is sent to your doctor.
Furthermore, the system does not only analyze the fact that an arrhythmia has occurred. It uses arrhythmia aggregation parameters to indicate how episodes of dysrhythmia are distributed over time, i.e., whether they occur evenly throughout the monitoring period or cluster into groups of short episodes.
“For physicians, this type of information provides much more value than the mere fact that an arrhythmia has been detected,” Marozas says.
According to the KTU professor, such evaluations make it possible to monitor the progression of the disease and assess the increased risk of complications at an early stage.
Patent marks a step towards broader applications
Special signal processing algorithms are also integrated into the system to ensure data reliability in real-world situations. Since movement, changes in body position, or physical activity can distort the signal, the system first evaluates the signal quality and then sends the appropriate segments for more detailed analysis.
“This system uses a multi-step signal analysis process to distinguish between noise caused by daily activities and dangerous arrhythmias,” Marozas says.
The patent granted to this system confirms its technical novelty and is an important step towards further clinical trials and wider application. According to Marozas, the patent covers not only the wrist-worn device itself, but also arrhythmia analysis algorithms, arrhythmia aggregation, and other new evaluation parameters.
“The granted patents are an important recognition of years of interdisciplinary research and the novelty of the technology, but the primary motivation remains to advance medicine in a way that saves patients’ lives, improves quality of life, and benefits society,” Marozas says.
A large interdisciplinary team contributed to the patent application and technology development, including KTU researcher Andrius Petrenas, cardiologist Justinas Basevicius of the Vilnius University Hospital Santaros Clinic, KTU researchers Andrius Soroshenko, Saulius Daukantas and Monika Butkviene, as well as KTU doctoral students, engineers and residents from the Vilnius University Hospital Santaros Clinic. For patients, the ‘TeltoHeart’ device primarily means an easier route to seeing a doctor. If you’re recovering at home after surgery or a serious illness, you don’t necessarily need to go to a medical facility for testing, Ilgevicius said.
The solution is currently available for implementation in most healthcare institutions across Lithuania. Patients can use the solution in conjunction with a doctor’s visit, and telemedicine services are already available in some outpatient clinics through a project funded by the European Union.
Nevertheless, broader reimbursement of such solutions for at-risk patients, such as those who have suffered a stroke, remains a future goal. The technology’s developers say reimbursement policies may ultimately determine whether advanced remote monitoring solutions are widely available to patients who need them most.
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Kaunas University of Technology (KTU)
