Brief Reports

Use of telemonitoring to decrease the rate of hospitalization in patients with severe congestive heart failure

Cardiovascular disease has become an increasingly serious threat to human health. Holter monitoring is essential in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease. When combined with a variety of sensors, a traditional Holter becomes a mobile health device. Based on Holter data and sensor data, this paper proposes a supplementary diagnosis and treatment program. The solution consists of three main steps: I. Perform segmentation of ECG (Electrocardiography) data and conduct feature extraction. Build the personalized ECG templates, apply factor graph and max-sum algorithm for precise template matching, and realize the feature extraction and representation of ECG data. II. Use the action sensor data for action classification and identification. As an important factor of health monitoring, body movements are categorized as resting, walking, going upstairs and downstairs, flipping and sudden change. The improved classification algorithm achieves high accuracy identification. III. Combine ECG data and action data for clustering analysis. The proposed solution improves the affinity propagation algorithm and allow doctors to supervise the clustering procedure. A knowledge matrix is introduced accordingly, thus achieving an iterable clustering optimization. With the help of these components, the innovative approach is able to integrate the Holter data and sensor data, meanwhile, doctors are encouraged to participate in the process of clustering algorithm. Our system is capable of not only assisting doctors in quickly determining the most valuable information, but also of building a personalized private repository for patients. The experimental results indicate that the proposed system is an efficient, accurate, and interactive auxiliary diagnostic and a therapeutic support tool.

Desde una visión generalista, se ofrece al cardiólogo las novedades en cardiología clínica que pueden influir a corto plazo en el trabajo de cada día con sus pacientes. Nuevas formas de relacionarse con la atención primaria, los últimos datos en telemonitorización de enfermedades crónicas y las últimas publicaciones sobre fármacos de uso cotidiano. Un resumen de la actividad de la Sección de Cardiología Clínica durante el último año finaliza el artículo.

This article provides cardiologists with a broad overview of recent advances in clinical cardiology that could affect their daily practice in the near future. It discusses new ways of interacting with primary care physicians, the most recent findings on the remote monitoring of chronic disease, and the latest publications on the drugs used in routine clinical practice. The article ends with a summary of the work carried out by the Clinical Cardiology Section of the Spanish Society of Cardiology during the last year.

Heart failure (HF) is a syndrome characterized by high mortality, frequent hospitalization, reduced quality of life, and a complex therapeutic regimen. Knowledge about HF is accumulating so rapidly that individual clinicians may be unable to readily and adequately synthesize new information into effective strategies of care for patients with this syndrome. Trial data, though valuable, often do not give direction for individual patient management. These characteristics make HF an ideal candidate for practice guidelines. The 2010 Heart Failure Society of America comprehensive practice guideline addresses the full range of evaluation, care, and management of patients with HF.