Human Vital Signs Detection: A Concurrent Detection Approach

Abstract

The measurement of heartbeat rate and breathing rate for patients with sensitive skin, such as skin with burns, is very difficult to do, especially if the number of patients is large and medical personnel is limited. Therefore, this study seeks to propose a preliminary solution to this problem by proposing a device that can measure the vital signs of several people concurrently, especially the heartbeat rate and breathing rate, without attaching sensors to their skin. This is done using an FMCW (frequency-modulated continuous wave) radar that operates at 77–81 GHz. FMCW radar emits electromagnetic waves towards the chest of several targets and picks up the reflected waves. Then, using signal processing of these reflected waves, each target’s heartbeat rate and breathing rate can be obtained. Our experiment managed to perform concurrent detection for four targets. The experimental results are between 52 and 82 beats per minute for the heartbeat rates and between 10 and 35 breaths per minute for the breathing rates of four targets. These results are in accordance with normal heartbeat rate and normal breathing rate; thus, our research succeeded in proposing a preliminary solution to this problem.

Keywords

• concurrent detection approach
• frequency-modulated continuous wave radar
• vital signs
• signal processing