阅读说明：本技术 用于分析心电图的用户界面 (User interface for analyzing electrocardiograms ) 是由 C.斯卡贝隆 C.高德弗罗伊 J.李 B.巴雷 于 2018-08-24 设计创作，主要内容包括：本发明涉及一种用于心电图分析的计算机实现的方法,该方法包括以下步骤：接收至少一个ECG信号；分析ECG信号以提供特征和/或识别至少一个发作和/或事件,其中发作是由开始时间、持续时间和在ECG信号的分析期间获得的标签所定义的ECG信号的片段,以及事件是由开始时间和在ECG的分析期间获得的标签所定义的预定义持续时间的ECG信号的条带；以及显示多场显示(1),其至少包括主图(42),该主图是第一时间窗口中ECG信号的图形表示的整体视图；第二时间窗口(51)中的ECG信号的图形表示的局部视图,其中第一时间窗口包括第二时间窗口；第三时间窗口(52)中的ECG信号的图形表示的中间视图,其中第三时间窗口包括第二时间窗口,并且具有在第一时间窗口的持续时间与第二时间窗口的持续时间之间的持续时间。(The invention relates to a computer-implemented method for electrocardiogram analysis, comprising the steps of: receiving at least one ECG signal; analyzing the ECG signal to provide features and/or to identify at least one episode and/or event, wherein an episode is a segment of the ECG signal defined by a start time, a duration and a label obtained during the analysis of the ECG signal and an event is a strip of the ECG signal of a predefined duration defined by a start time and a label obtained during the analysis of the ECG; and displaying a multi-field display (1) comprising at least a main map (42) which is an overall view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in the first time window; a partial view of a graphical representation of the ECG signal in a second time window (51), wherein the first time window comprises the second time window; an intermediate view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a third time window (52), wherein the third time window comprises the second time window and has a duration between the duration of the first time window and the duration of the second time window.)

1. A computer-implemented method for electrocardiography analysis, the method comprising the steps of:

-receiving at least one ECG signal;

-analyzing the ECG signal to provide features, and/or identifying at least one episode and/or event, wherein an episode is a segment of the ECG signal defined by a start time, a duration and a label obtained during the analysis of the ECG signal, and an event is a strip of the ECG signal of a predefined duration defined by a start time and a label obtained during the analysis of the ECG signal; and

-displaying a multi-field display (1); wherein the multi-field display (1) comprises at least:

a main map (42) which is a global view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a first time window;

a partial view of a graphical representation of the ECG signal in a second time window (51), wherein the first time window comprises the second time window;

an intermediate view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a third time window (52), wherein the third time window comprises the second time window and has a duration comprised between the duration of the first time window and the duration of the second time window; and

-at least one interactive feature, being a cursor (43), able to select a reference time on the main graph (42) by sliding on a time bar (41), said time bar (41) comprising a visual feature highlighted on the time bar (41), a time period corresponding to the episode and/or event.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the graphical representation of the ECG signal in the main, partial, and intermediate views is a plot of strips of the ECG signal or features associated with the ECG signal as a function of time.

3. The computer-implemented method of any of claims 1 or 2, wherein the multi-field display (1) includes directly editable information for analysis of an electrocardiogram.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 3, further comprising: at least one interactive component configured to select at least one strip of ECG signals and/or at least one piece of directly editable information.

5. The computer-implemented method of any of claims 1-4, wherein the interactive component is further configured to perform at least one of the following actions:

i. enlarging and reducing the main map (42);

defining a new episode by selecting a time window on the main map (42); and

highlighting the presence of an event and/or episode associated with the at least one tag on the main map (42).

6. The computer-implemented method of any of claims 1 to 5, wherein at least one ECG strip (32) associated with one episode and/or at least one ECG segment associated with one event (32) is further displayed in the multi-field display (1).

7. The computer-implemented method of any of claims 1 to 6, wherein the analyzing step comprises: a step of delineating the ECG signal, and a step of classifying the ECG segment based on the result of the delineating step in order to identify the episode and/or event.

8. The computer-implemented method of any of claims 1 to 7, wherein the features provided from the analysis of the ECG signal include any measurements derived from the ECG signal during the analyzing step, and the indicia associated with the ECG segment or strip by the classifying step are associated with an abnormality in the ECG signal corresponding to a clinical condition or signal noise.

9. The computer-implemented method of any of claims 1 to 8, wherein at least one ECG signal is a dynamic electrocardiogram.

10. An interactive electrocardiogram analysis system comprising a remote server having access to a medical database comprising at least one ECG signal record of a patient and enabling analysis and interactive display of the ECG signal record; and at least one computer device capable of communicating, at least temporarily, with a remote server to exchange ECG data and displayable information, wherein the remote server comprises:

-a processor;

-a memory;

-a data exchange module;

-an analysis module configured to analyze the ECG signal to provide features and/or to identify at least one episode and/or event in the ECG signal;

-a graphical representation module configured to generate a graphical representation of the ECG signal;

-a window generation module configured to generate a plurality of consecutive display windows for interactively visualizing a multi-field display (1) on a display screen, the multi-field display (1) comprising at least:

a main map (42) which is a global view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a first time window;

a partial view of a graphical representation of the ECG signal in a second time window (51), wherein the first time window comprises the second time window;

an intermediate view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a third time window (52), wherein the third time window comprises the second time window and has a duration comprised between the duration of the first time window and the duration of the second time window; and

-at least one interactive component, which is a cursor (43) configured to select a reference time on a main graph (42) by sliding on a time bar (41), said time bar (41) comprising a visual component highlighted on the time bar (41), a time period corresponding to an episode and/or event;

-an interactive module configured to control an interactive component enabling interactive visualization of a display window of the multi-field display (1) to explore along the time of graphical representations of ECG signals in the main (42), local and intermediate views;

and wherein the at least one computer device comprises a display screen, a microprocessor, a memory, and a data exchange module.

11. The interactive electrocardiography analysis system of claim 10 further comprising: an editing module configured to edit a report including at least one selected ECG strip and/or ECG segment.

12. The interactive electrocardiography system of any one of claims 10 or 11 wherein the graphical representation of the ECG signal is a plot of strips of or features associated with the ECG signal as a function of time.

13. A computer program comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the steps of the method according to any one of claims 1 to 9.

14. A computer-readable medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the steps of the method according to any one of claims 1 to 9.

Technical Field

The present invention relates to the field of cardiology. In particular, the present invention relates to analysis of electrocardiographic data using a graphical user interface.

Background

A cardiac electrocardiogram monitoring device, often referred to simply as a dynamic electrocardiogram (Holter), is a portable electrocardiogram device for cardiac monitoring (monitoring of the electrical activity of the cardiovascular system) for a long time lapse, ranging from minutes to weeks. The data recorded by these devices is analyzed by a practitioner for diagnosing heart activity abnormalities, including cardiac arrhythmias, such as atrial fibrillation. Extensive analysis of the large amount of available data is required to ensure accurate diagnosis. The purpose of the long-time Electrocardiogram (ECG) recording interface is to improve the efficiency of the analysis and to reduce the time consumption of such tasks. In standard ambulatory use, the amount of data collected by the Holter device is large, and the classical analysis performed by the clinician having to visually analyze the entire duration of an Electrocardiogram (ECG) recording is inefficient and time consuming.

More recently, clinicians have been able to use several platforms to facilitate this otherwise time consuming task. The platform allows for easier visualization of ECG signals and sometimes also for easier detection and visualization of ECG signals having certain clinically relevant ECG patterns. The platform may further allow the clinician to browse the ECG signal and represent multiple graphs simultaneously.

However, in order to allow physicians to greatly reduce the work time and improve the quality of the ECG analysis and the reports generated thereby, it is desirable to develop a platform with an upgraded interactive solution. To further improve the efficiency of interactive platforms, it is also desirable to provide a graph that can more fully and comprehensively summarize signal characteristics.

Furthermore, these types of platforms typically require high computational power, which is impractical, and the analysis results are only available locally on the platform that generated the analysis.

Definition of

In the present invention, the following terms have the following meanings:

"ECG" refers to the process of recording the electrical activity of the heart over a period of time using electrodes placed on the skin.

- "ECG signal": refers to the signals resulting from the recording of electrical conduction in the heart. The cardiac signal may be, for example, an Electrocardiogram (ECG). Such signals may have one or more channels called lines (leads). It can be short-term (10 seconds in standard ECG) or long-term (days in Holters).

- "Main graph": refers to a graph representing a simplified view of the entire signal, corresponding to any kind of measure that can be calculated from the ECG signal (R-R graph, average heart rate graph, etc.) over time (x-axis is time).

- "R-R spacing": refers to the interval between two QRS waves (more simply referred to as R waves) which are considered to be the most prominent part of the heartbeat.

- "R-R diagram": refers to a plot of the R-R interval of an ECG signal over time, where the R-R interval is the time interval between two consecutive heartbeats.

- "vernier": refers to a display element that is used to select a particular point in time of a signal.

- "tag": refers to any specification of a signal, which should be a cardiac abnormality (atrial fibrillation, premature ventricular contraction, etc.), a cardiac description (normal sinus rhythm), or a description of the signal itself (presence of noise) or a patient event (e.g., pressing a button during an examination).

- "attack (epicode)": refers to the segment of the ECG signal included in the time period associated with the tag. The episode is characterized by a starting time point representing the beginning of the episode, an offset time point representing the end of the episode, and a label. The same label may appear in several episodes on the ECG signal.

- "banding": refers to the displayed excerpt of the signal of predefined fixed duration and is defined by the point in time associated with the start of the strip. The strip may show one or several signal lines at a time.

- "burden": refers to the ratio of the duration of a given abnormality to the duration of the entire signal, or the number of times a given abnormality occurs, in the ECG signal.

- "report": refers to a document or web page that summarizes the information that the user wants to keep as a record about the electrocardiogram. This typically includes selection of anomalous loads and stripes.

- "Holter": refers to a type of dynamic electrocardiographic device, a portable device, for cardiac monitoring (monitoring of the electrical activity of the cardiovascular system) for at least a 24 hour period (usually for two weeks at a time).

- "multi-field display": refers to a set comprising at least two different graphs.

- "event": refers to a point in time corresponding to a characteristic change on the ECG signal, such as the start of a waveform.

"sorting" refers to the task of sorting objects into a set of lists. Such tasks include, for example, identifying animals from the picture (the group list is then a list of animals) or identifying whether the ECG is normal or abnormal. It may be a multi-label classification such that an object may be part of one or several groups in a given group list. For an ECG, an example of multi-label classification is to classify a portion of the ECG signal as normal, or as one of several possible abnormalities.

"delineation" refers to the identification of the temporal location of each wave of cardiac signals. The delineation may also optionally provide a more accurate characterization of each wave.

"real-time" means a process that gives an output within a time delay that is considered to be less than the time delay required to fully perform the underlying modulation task. Thus, for self-tuning modulation, real-time refers to a process that is implemented in less than 700 milliseconds, preferably less than 500 milliseconds, more preferably less than 400 milliseconds, even more preferably less than 250 milliseconds.

Disclosure of Invention

The invention relates to a computer-implemented method for electrocardiogram analysis, comprising the steps of:

-receiving at least one ECG signal;

-analyzing the ECG signal to provide features, and/or identifying at least one episode and/or event, wherein an episode is a segment of the ECG signal defined by a start time, a duration and a label obtained during the analysis of the ECG signal, and an event is a strip of the ECG signal of a predefined duration defined by a start time and a label obtained during the analysis of the ECG signal; and

-displaying a multi-field display.

The multi-field display includes at least:

-a main graph being an overall view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a first time window;

-a partial view of a graphical representation of the ECG signal in a second time window, wherein the first time window comprises the second time window;

-an intermediate view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a third time window, wherein the third time window comprises the second time window and has a duration comprised between the duration of the first time window and the duration of the second time window; and

at least one interactive feature, which is a cursor, which is able to select a reference time on the main map by sliding on a time bar comprising a visual feature highlighted on the time bar, a time period corresponding to the episode and/or event.

Such a multi-field display advantageously presents the ECG data to the physician in a format that includes a relevant local view and a global view that together provide contextual information that improves the accuracy of the diagnosis. This has, in particular, the following advantages: providing at least three representations of the ECG signal at different time scales in the user's field of view allows the user to access global information in a longer time window in the main map and simultaneously access detailed information about the ECG signal in second and third time windows of shorter duration.

The short term view provides a classical view of the ECG at conventional recording speeds in a manner known to physicians. The global view or intermediate view provides an intermediate/lower resolution view. This combination of different time scale maps allows the user to interpret the ECG signal more easily and faster. Advantageously, the events and episodes of interest detected during the analysis step provide valuable information that is visualized with a highlighting component on the time bar. These visual landmarks on the time bar allow the user to simultaneously adjust the graphical representation of the ECG signal in the global view, the intermediate view, and the local view by sliding a cursor over the time bar to position the desired time period.

According to one embodiment, the graphical representation of the ECG signal in the main, partial and intermediate views is a plot of strips of the ECG signal or features associated with the ECG signal as a function of time.

According to one embodiment, the multi-field display includes directly editable information for analysis of an electrocardiogram.

According to one embodiment, a multi-field display includes: at least one interactive component configured to select at least one strip of ECG signals and/or at least one piece of directly editable information.

Such interactive means advantageously allow the user to select the editable information he chooses to generate a clinical report including the most relevant information about the patient.

According to one embodiment, the interactive component is further configured to perform at least one of the following actions:

-zooming in and out of the main map;

-defining new episodes by selecting a time window on the main plot; and

-highlighting the presence of an event and/or episode associated with at least one tag on the main map.

Highlighting events and episodes of interest on the main graph (i.e., on a multi-day representation of the ECG signal) is advantageous for guiding the user, allowing for easier and more efficient navigation through the graphical representation of the ECG signal. By selecting one of the events and episodes highlighted in the main graph, the associated graphical representation of the ECG signal in the intermediate view and the partial view will be automatically displayed. This advantageously provides a detailed view of the ECG signal associated with the global mode selected by the user on the main graph in the form of a click, as a result of the highlighted guidance of the events and episodes.

According to one embodiment, at least one ECG strip associated with an episode and/or at least one ECG segment associated with an event is further displayed in the multi-field display.

According to one embodiment, the analyzing step comprises: a step of delineating the ECG signal, and a step of classifying the ECG segment based on the result of the delineating step in order to identify the episode and/or event.

The delineating step and the classifying step provide useful information to a user (e.g., a physician) allowing a better assessment of the patient's health.

According to one embodiment, the features provided from the analysis of the ECG signal include any measurements derived from the ECG signal during the analyzing step, and the indicia associated with the ECG segment or strip by the classifying step is associated with an abnormality in the ECG signal corresponding to a clinical condition or signal noise.

According to one embodiment, the at least one ECG signal is a dynamic electrocardiogram.

According to another aspect, the invention relates to an interactive electrocardiogram analysis system comprising a remote server having access to a medical database comprising at least one ECG signal recording of a patient and enabling analysis and interactive display of said ECG signal recording, and at least one computer device capable of communicating at least temporarily with the remote server for exchanging ECG data and displayable information, wherein the remote server comprises:

-a processor;

-a memory;

-a data exchange module; and

-an analysis module configured to analyze the ECG signal to provide features and/or to identify at least one episode and/or event in the ECG signal;

-a graphical representation module configured to generate a graphical representation of the ECG signal;

-a window generation module configured to be formatted into a plurality of consecutive fixed display windows for interactively visualizing a multi-field display on a display screen; the multi-field display includes at least:

a main graph, which is a global view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a first time window;

a partial view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a second time window, wherein the first time window comprises the second time window;

an intermediate view of the graphical representation of the ECG signal in a third time window, wherein the third time window comprises the second time window and has a duration comprised between the duration of the first time window and the duration of the second time window; and

at least one interactive feature, which is a cursor, configured to select a reference time on the main graph by sliding on a time bar comprising a visual feature highlighted on the time bar, a time period corresponding to the episode and/or event;

-an interactive module configured to control an interactive component enabling interactive visualization of a display window of a multi-field display to explore along the time of graphical representations of ECG signals in main, local and intermediate views;

and wherein the at least one computer device comprises a display screen, a microprocessor, a memory, and a data exchange module.

According to one embodiment, the system further comprises: an editing module configured to edit a report including at least one selected ECG strip and/or ECG segment.

According to another aspect, the invention relates to a computer program comprising instructions for execution by a computer, the instructions causing the computer to perform the steps of the method according to any one of the above embodiments.

According to yet another aspect, the invention relates to a computer-readable medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the steps of the method according to any one of the above embodiments.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a screen shot of an interface in which signal segments corresponding to atrial fibrillation are highlighted in the main graph by selecting the tab button "Afib" and the plot on the right shows the bands associated with those highlighted episodes of atrial fibrillation.

Fig. 2 is a screen shot of this interface, in which, in addition to the button "Afib", the button "athersvt" is activated to show the seizure pattern included in the seizures of supraventricular tachycardia, and the corresponding signal segment is highlighted in the main graph, which is an R-R graph.

FIG. 3 includes two screen shots of a graphical interface, where the main graph of FIG. 3B is a zoom of the main graph of FIG. 3A to allow for better visualization of the highlighted portions of the signal.

FIG. 4 includes two screen shots of a graphical interface showing a main graph in which a cursor used to select a reference time has been interactively moved from an initial orientation (FIG. 4A) to a new orientation (FIG. 4B), thus modifying the band represented in its histogram.

Fig. 5 and 6 are examples of first and second pages of a report compiled in accordance with the method and system of the present invention.

Fig. 7 is an enlarged view of a first graphical window of the interface screenshot represented in fig. 1.

FIG. 8 is an enlarged view of a first side of a multi-field display during an act of defining a new event.

FIG. 9 is a screenshot of a multi-field display including a plurality of alarm splitting components according to one embodiment of the invention.

Detailed Description

The following detailed description will be better understood when read in conjunction with the appended drawings. For purposes of illustration, the method is shown in a preferred embodiment. It should be understood, however, that the application is not limited to the precise arrangements, structures, features, embodiments, and aspects shown.

The present invention relates to a computer-implemented method for electrocardiogram analysis. Such analysis is intended to explain in detail and accurately the abnormalities found in the analyzed ECG. Thus, the method provides a way to find, select, and save anomalies and collect them in reports.

According to one embodiment, to assist the user in the analysis, the method comprises the steps of:

-receiving at least one ECG signal;

-carrying out an automatic analysis of the ECG signal using at least one algorithm to provide features and/or descriptors associated with the ECG signal portions, which are presented to the user in a next step;

-displaying the ECG signal and/or at least one feature of the ECG signal and/or at least one strip and/or at least one graphical representation of at least one descriptor in an interactive manner in a multi-field display, so that the user can modify and save the analysis provided by the second step of the method.

According to one embodiment, the displaying step comprises: an interactive component configured to interactively display the ECG signal and/or features of the ECG signal and/or the graphical representation of the strip(s) and/or descriptor(s) associated with the portion of the ECG signal in a multi-field display.

According to one embodiment, the interactive component comprises: means for selecting a stripe containing relevant information.

According to one embodiment, the displaying comprises: directly editable related information for electrocardiographic analysis, including a preselected strip associated with the episode where the tag is present.

According to one embodiment, the at least one ECG signal is a dynamic electrocardiogram.

According to one embodiment, the analyzing step comprises: a first phase of the ECG signal is depicted, and a second phase of classifying the ECG segment based on the results of the depicting step, in order to identify the episode and/or event. The depicted steps enable calculation of heartbeat level features such as RR intervals, heart rate, maximum heart rate, and so forth. Such beat level features are then used in the aggregated representation displayed in the main graph.

According to one embodiment, the label provides a specification of the characteristics of the ECG signal in a point in time or a time window. In particular, a time period of the signal may be labeled due to rhythm abnormalities associated with the time period, such as atrial fibrillation, ventricular tachycardia, sinus tachycardia. In one example, the tags may be obtained by automatically analyzing the ECG signal using a classification algorithm that allows, for example, distinguishing between different cardiac anomalies. In one example, a tag may be attributed to a point in time or a window in time when a calculated variable exceeds some predefined threshold. For example, if the signal-to-noise ratio exceeds a threshold, the time window may be marked as noise; if the heart rate exceeds a particular threshold, the time window may be flagged as sinus tachycardia. The tag may be associated with a string of characters that briefly describes the characteristics of the ECG signal with which it is associated.

According to one embodiment, the features include any measurements derived from the signal during the analyzing step. By way of non-limiting example, the features may be a number of heartbeats, a heart rate frequency, an R-R interval, and combinations thereof.

According to one embodiment, the descriptor includes a tag associated with the episode or event.

According to one embodiment, the receiving step further comprises receiving electronic medical record data. In one example, the medical record data is retrieved from a medical database or received in real-time from a dynamic electrocardiograph monitor worn by the user.

According to one embodiment, it is possible for the patient to mark a time window of a predefined duration in the ECG recording by interacting with the ECG monitoring device, thereby generating a definition of a new event marked as "patient alarm". Notably, the patient may interact with the ECG monitoring device, for example, by pressing an alarm button in the presence of a sensation of atypical behavior of the heart. In one example, the start of the event time window is chosen as the point in time before the moment the patient pressed the alarm button, in particular 10 minutes before the point in time until the patient pressed the alarm button.

According to one embodiment, the analysis includes a preliminary step of processing, for example for denoising the ECG signal or extracting a set of measurements from the ECG waveform.

According to one embodiment, the multi-field display comprises at least two display fields.

According to another embodiment, the multi-field display comprises at least one interactive graphical representation of the ECG signal in a time window of variable length. The length of the time window may vary from 1 second to several weeks, and preferably, the length of the time window may be 1 second, 2 seconds, 3 seconds, 4 seconds, 5 seconds, 6 seconds, 7 seconds, 8 seconds, 9 seconds, 10 seconds, 15 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, 30 seconds, 35 seconds, 40 seconds, 45 seconds, 50 seconds, 55 seconds, 60 seconds, 1.5 minutes, 2 minutes, 2.5 minutes, 3 minutes, 3.5 minutes, 4 minutes, 4.5 minutes, 5 minutes, 5.5 minutes, 6 minutes, 6.5 minutes, 7 minutes, 7.5 minutes, 8 minutes, 8.5 minutes, 9 minutes, 9.5 minutes, 10 minutes, 11 minutes, 12 minutes, 13 minutes, 14 minutes, 15 minutes, 16 minutes, 17 minutes, 18 minutes, 19 minutes, 20 minutes, 21 minutes, 22 minutes, 23 minutes, 24 minutes, 25 minutes, 26 minutes, 27 minutes, 28 minutes, 29 minutes, 30 minutes, 31 minutes, 32 minutes, 33 minutes, 34 minutes, 35 minutes, 36 minutes, 37 minutes, 38 minutes, 39 minutes, 40 minutes, 41 minutes, 42 minutes, 43 minutes, 44 minutes, 45 minutes, 46 minutes, 47 minutes, 48 minutes, 49 minutes, 50 minutes, 51 minutes, 52 minutes, 53 minutes, 54 minutes, 55 minutes, 56 minutes, 57 minutes, 58 minutes, 59 minutes, 1 hour, 6 hours, 12 hours, 18 hours, 24 hours, 30 hours, 36 hours, 42 hours, 48 hours, 54 hours, 60 hours, 66 hours, 72 hours, 78 hours, 84 hours, 90 hours, 96 hours, 102 hours, 108 hours, 114 hours, 120 hours, 126 hours, 132 hours, 138 hours, 144 hours, 150 hours, 156 hours, 162 hours, 168 hours, 174 hours, 180 hours, 186 hours, 192 hours, 198 hours, 204 hours, 210 hours, 216 hours, 222 hours, 228 hours, 24 hours, hours, 234 hours, 240 hours, 246 hours, 252 hours, 258 hours, 264 hours, 270 hours, 276 hours, 282 hours, 288 hours, 294 hours, 300 hours, 306 hours, 312 hours, 318 hours, 324 hours, 330 hours, 336 hours, 342 hours, 348 hours, 354 hours, 360 hours, 366 hours, 372 hours, 378 hours, 384 hours, 390 hours, 396 hours, 402 hours, 408 hours, 414 hours, 420 hours, 8 days, 9 days, 10 days, 11 days, 12 days, 13 days, 14 days, 15 days, 16 days, 17 days, 18 days, 19 days, 20 days, 21 days, 22 days, 23 days, 24 days, 25 days, 26 days, 27 days, 28 days, 29 days, or 30 days.

According to one embodiment, the multi-field display includes at least: a global view of the ECG signal in a first time window and a graphical representation of a local view comprising relevant ECG data in a second time window, wherein the first time window comprises the second time window. This has the following advantages: providing two representations of the ECG signal at different time scales in the user's field of view allows the user to access global information in a larger time window in the main map and detailed information in a shorter time window in the first ECG strip.

According to one embodiment, a multi-field display includes a main map and at least one ECG strip on a first side of the display and at least one ECG strip on a second side of the display.

According to one embodiment, the primary graph is a graphical representation of the ECG signal. The main graph may be a heart rate trend graph representing the instantaneous Heart Rate (HR) as a function of time. The instantaneous heart rate is calculated as the average of the heart rate over a fixed duration of time, for example two, five or ten seconds. In this configuration, the HR trend graph plots a line that passes through instantaneous heart rate values calculated, for example, every two, five or ten seconds.

According to one embodiment, the main graph is an interactive graphical representation of the entire ECG signal, including a cursor capable of selecting a reference time on the time axis of the main graph.

According to one embodiment, the multi-field display comprises, on a first side of the display, a main graph, a first ECG strip in a first time window, the first ECG strip comprising a reference time selected by the cursor in the main graph, and a second ECG strip, the second time window of which is wider than the first ECG strip and comprises said first ECG strip. The use of this second ECG strip is to provide a small background window around the first ECG strip and to provide an intermediate view of the ECG signal. Advantageously, the intermediate view of the ECG signal, displayed simultaneously with the global view of the main graph, allows the physician to comparatively observe the heart rate background and behavioral patterns before and after a clinically meaningful event and/or episode (i.e., arrhythmia), patient attention, or other indicia, thereby enhancing the diagnostic specificity of the arrhythmia and providing a physiological background to improve diagnostic capabilities.

According to one embodiment, the second ECG strip comprises a second cursor, and the second ECG strip is used as a scroll bar for said second cursor. This provides an additional interactive feature to allow the user to choose a reference time to visualize in the main graph and in the local view. In this embodiment, moving the second cursor causes the cursor to shift over the time bar of the main graph.

According to one embodiment, the multi-field display comprises at least one interactive graphical object associated with a tag, the interactive graphical object being configured to activate the display of the graphical component on the main graph, the display indicating the presence of at least one episode or event marked with a tag associated with the interactive graphical object itself. The interactive graphic object may have the appearance of a button and will be referred to as a tab button in this specification. The multi-field display may include as many tab buttons as the number of tab types the computer-implemented method is configured to count. The labels activated by these buttons may be, but are not limited to, heart rhythm abnormalities, such as atrial fibrillation, atrioventricular conduction blocks, ventricular tachycardia, and premature beats, such as supraventricular and ventricular premature beats. In one example, the graphical component indicating the presence of a seizure may be a change in color of a segment of the main graph, in which case the seizure is indicated by a color bar extending over a time window associated with the seizure, or a change in color of a point in the time window associated with the seizure. In this example, the color is associated with a type of beat label, such as ventricular premature beats (PVCs) or supraventricular premature beats (PSVCs). Both the color bar and the dots may be hidden by clicking on the associated button in the legend displayed in the multi-field display. In a second example, the graphical component highlighting an event may be a color change at a point in time associated with the event. Highlighting events and episodes of interest by selecting desired tab buttons associated with specific characteristics of the ECG signal allows the user to advantageously easily and quickly identify several segments of the ECG in a multi-day representation of the ECG signal, invite the user to look closer (such as an episode of arrhythmia), and easily browse the background for both short and long episodes.

The foregoing method assists the cardiologist's diagnostic work by facilitating the presentation of ECG-based context information before and after the identified event.

According to one embodiment, at least one ECG strip extracted from at least one episode corresponding to the selected label is displayed on a second side of the display.

According to an embodiment, the interactive component is configured for exploring said multi-graph display field, wherein the exploring comprises at least one of:

1. selecting a reference time along the main graph time axis;

2. enlarging and reducing the main figure;

3. exploring a graphical representation of the EGC signal and/or ECG features along a time axis over a time interval corresponding to a full recording time;

4. defining new episodes by selecting a time window in the main graph; and/or

5. At least one tab button is selected to show the episode associated with the at least one descriptor.

According to one embodiment, the first ECG strip in the first side of the display further comprises: a second interactive component capable of moving the time window of the ECG strip and correspondingly moving the reference time on the main graph such that the reference time is included in the time window.

According to one embodiment, the at least one ECG strip in the second side of the display is a seizure graph representing an excerpt of the seizure. In addition to the main graph and the ECG strip graph, the advantage of displaying the development graph is that it provides multiple representations of the ECG signal at different time scales in the field of view of the user. This allows the user to access global information in the larger time window of the main map and detailed information in the shorter time window in the first ECG strip and in the seizure map. This combination of different time scale maps allows the user to more easily and quickly interpret the ECG signal because the user can navigate through the main graph at different points in time around the episode and analyze the corresponding signal on the histogram to confirm the diagnosis or comment on the episode.

According to one embodiment, the episode map selected by the tag button comprises strips of ECG extracted from at least a portion of the ECG signal classified as episodes with the tag.

According to one embodiment, the second display side comprises: a third interactive component to select at least one representative development and delete at least one non-representative development.

According to an alternative embodiment, the second display side comprises in each seizure graph: a third interactive component to select a episode associated with the episode graph to be added to the editable report; and a fourth interactive feature to delete episodes of the action graph from the second display side.

According to one embodiment, the method further comprises: an interactive component configured to generate a onset graph upon defining a new onset and to display the onset graph, preferably in the second display side.

According to one embodiment, the third interactive feature is further configured to automatically move the cursor on the main graph to a relevant point in time associated with the seizure graph. By way of a limited example, the relevant episode can be the beginning of the episode or the end of the episode.

The development map in the second side of the multi-field display is used to simultaneously represent one or more ECG strips that may have variable duration. To allow easy and uniform representation of the ECG strips in the development graph, all the episode maps with ECG strips having a duration exceeding a predefined threshold (e.g. 10 seconds) may be displayed on segments of the ECG strips in a predefined time window. According to one embodiment, the seizure map representing ECG strips registered over a time interval greater than 10 seconds or tens of seconds further comprises: an interactive component configured to represent in a seizure graph segments of an ECG strip in a predefined time window, the predefined time window beginning from a start time of the seizure. The predefined time window may, for example, last 10 to 60 seconds.

According to one embodiment, the method of the invention further comprises the step of calculating a time burden, which is the ratio between the sum of all time segments associated with the same tag and the total time of the ECG signal acquisition.

According to one embodiment, the method of the present invention further comprises the steps of: a count burden is calculated for events such as, for example, ventricular premature beats and atrial premature beats, the count burden being the ratio between the count associated with the event type and the total heart beat measured in the entire ECG signal. According to an alternative embodiment, the count burden may be calculated directly as the number of event counts, such as for example ventricular premature beats and atrial premature beats.

According to one embodiment, the method of the present invention further comprises the steps of: a report is compiled that includes at least one of the development graph, the selection of information extracted from the electronic medical record data, and the burden.

According to one embodiment, at least one field of the multi-field display is an R-R map.

The invention also relates to an interactive electrocardiogram analysis system for implementing the method for ECG analysis according to the embodiments described herein above. The system enables analysis and interactive display of the ECG signal recordings.

According to one embodiment, an interactive electrocardiography analysis system comprises: a remote server and at least one computer device. The remote server may access a medical database comprising at least ECG signal recordings of patients. The at least one computer device is capable of communicating, at least temporarily, with a remote server to exchange ECG data and displayable information.

According to one embodiment, a remote server includes:

-at least one processor;

-at least one working memory;

-a data exchange module; and

an analysis module to analyze the ECG signal to provide features and/or descriptors associated with the ECG signal portions.

According to one embodiment, at least one computer device comprises:

-a display screen;

-at least one microprocessor;

-at least one working memory;

-a data exchange module;

-a display window generation module enabling graphical representations of ECG signals, features and/or descriptors to be formatted into a plurality of successive fixed display windows comprising at least a portion of the graphical representations and displayed on a display screen;

-an interaction module controlling the interactive component to enable interactive visualization of the display window and to allow a user to select a display window comprising the representative build; and

-an editing module editing a report comprising at least one selected development graph.

According to one embodiment, the visualization of the new display window is performed in real-time.

According to one embodiment, the remote server further comprises: a graphical representation module that generates a graphical representation of the ECG signal, the ECG features, and/or the descriptors for communication to the computer device.

A second aspect of the invention relates to a computer-implemented method for electrocardiogram analysis, the method comprising:

-receiving at least one ECG signal;

-analyzing the ECG signal at least by delineating and classifying in order to define an episode in the ECG signal by associating a time slot with a label; and

-interactively displaying a representation of the ECG signal in the form of at least three different display fields.

According to one embodiment, a method of interactive display includes:

-at least one primary graph comprising a graphical representation of the ECG signal or of at least one feature derived from the ECG signal as a function of time, and a first interactive component configured for navigating the graphical representation, wherein navigating comprises:

selecting a reference time along the master graph timeline;

enlargement and reduction of the main map;

exploring the graphical representation along the time axis over a time interval corresponding to the complete recording time;

selecting at least one tag button for showing an episode associated with at least one tag;

-at least one ECG strip chart comprising:

-strips of the ECG signal as a function of time and/or at least a graphical representation of features derived from the ECG signal, wherein the graphical representation of ECG strips is displayed for a fixed time window comprising a reference time selected on a main graph;

a second interactive component able to move the time window of the band graphic representation and, correspondingly, the reference time on the main graph, so as to be included in the time window;

-at least one action graph selected by a label button and comprising a strip of ECG extracted from at least a portion of the ECG signal classified as an episode with the label.

According to one embodiment, the at least one ECG signal is Holter.

According to one embodiment, the receiving step further comprises receiving electronic medical record data.

According to an embodiment of the second aspect of the invention, the analysis comprises a preliminary step of processing, for example for denoising or extracting a set of measurements of the ECG waveform.

According to one embodiment, the features include any measurements derived from the signal during the analyzing step. By way of non-limiting example, the features may be the number of heartbeats, heart rate, RR interval, heart rate frequency, and combinations thereof.

According to one embodiment, the tags are associated with abnormalities in the ECG signal that correspond to clinical conditions or signal noise.

According to one embodiment, the analyzing step comprises a calculation of a noise estimate for all strips comprised in the signal.

According to one embodiment, the first interactive feature further comprises selecting a time interval in the main map and defining the time interval as a new episode.

According to one embodiment, the method according to the second aspect of the present invention further comprises a third interactive component to select at least one representative development and delete at least one non-representative development.

According to one embodiment, the method according to the second aspect of the invention further comprises the steps of: the computational burden is the ratio between the sum of all time segments associated with the same label and the total time of ECG signal acquisition.

According to one embodiment, the method according to the second aspect of the invention further comprises the step of compiling a report comprising the selected representative development chart, some electronic medical record data, a description of the general characteristics of the signal and the burden.

According to one embodiment, at least one of the multi-field displays is an R-R graph or an average heart rate graph.

According to one embodiment, the first interactive component allows for selection of a tab button and visualization of all episodes corresponding to the tab on the main graph, and simultaneous display of at least one onset graph corresponding to each marked episode, and sorting of the episode graphs by duration, start time, heart rate, or relevance criteria.

The invention also relates to an interactive electrocardiographic analysis system for implementing a method according to embodiments herein above related to the second aspect of the invention. The system is capable of analyzing and interactively displaying the ECG signal recording.

The interactive electrocardiography system includes a remote server and at least one computer device. The remote server has access to a medical database comprising at least ECG signal recordings of patients. The at least one computer device is capable of communicating, at least temporarily, with a remote server to exchange ECG data and displayable information.

According to one embodiment, a remote server includes:

-at least one processor;

-at least one working memory;

-a data exchange module; and

an analysis module to analyze the ECG signal to provide features and/or descriptors associated with the ECG signal portions.

According to one embodiment, at least one computer device comprises:

-a display screen;

-at least one microprocessor;

-at least one working memory;

-a data exchange module;

-a display window generation module enabling graphical representations of ECG signals, features and/or descriptors to be formatted into a plurality of successive fixed display windows comprising at least a portion of the graphical representations and displayed on a display screen;

-an interaction module controlling the interactive component to enable interactive visualization of the display window and to allow a user to select a display window comprising the representative build; and

-an editing module editing a report comprising at least one selected development graph.

According to one embodiment, the visualization of the new display window is real-time.

According to one embodiment, the remote server further comprises: a graphical representation module that generates a graphical representation of the ECG signal, the ECG features, and/or the descriptors for communication to the computer device.

Another aspect of the invention relates to a computer program product for analyzing an ECG signal to produce an interactive representation of a plurality of graphs and to allow an editable report to be produced, comprising instructions which, when the program is executed by a computer, cause the computer to automatically perform the steps of the method according to any of the embodiments herein above.

Yet another aspect of the invention relates to a computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the steps of the computer-implemented method according to any of the embodiments herein above. According to one embodiment, the computer-readable storage medium is a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium.

Computer programs implementing the methods of the present embodiments may generally be distributed to users on distributed computer-readable storage media such as, but not limited to, SD cards, external storage devices, microchips, flash memory devices, and portable hard drives. The computer program may be copied from the distribution medium to a hard disk or similar intermediate storage medium. The computer program may be run by loading computer instructions from their distribution medium or their intermediate storage medium into the execution memory of the computer, thereby configuring the computer to operate according to the method of the present invention. All of these operations are well known to those skilled in the art of computer systems.

Examples of non-transitory computer-readable storage media include read-only memory (ROM), random-access memory (RAM), flash memory, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD + R, CD-RW, CD + RW, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD + R, DVD-RW, DVD + RW, DVD-RAM, BD-ROM, BD-R, BD-R L TH, BD-RE, magnetic tape, floppy disk, magneto-optical data storage, hard disk, solid state disk, and any device known to those of ordinary skill in the art that is capable of storing instructions or software and any associated data, data files, and data structures in a non-transitory manner and that provides the instructions or software and any associated data, data files, and data structures to a processor or computer such that the processor or computer can execute the instructions and execute the instructions, or data files, and data structures, and the data, data files, and data structures are distributed by the processor or computer such that the instructions and data, and data structures are distributed by the processor or computer.

While various embodiments have been described and illustrated, the detailed description is not to be construed as limited thereto. Various modifications may be made to the embodiments by those skilled in the art without departing from the true spirit and scope of the disclosure as defined by the claims.