“Hey Alexa, Are My Heart Rhythms Normal?”
Scientists train smart speakers to pick up the faint sounds of heartbeats.
Smart speakers-devices such as Amazon’s Echo and the Google Home-lend a helping hand around the house, telling us the weather, turning on lights, and giving us the latest news headlines. Now, scientists say they could also keep track of our heart rhythms, alerting us to the presence of possibly life-threatening irregularities.
Heart rhythms describe the pattern of heartbeats over time and are an important measure of heart health.
“ Heart rhythm disorders are actually more common than some other well-known heart conditions,” explained professor of cardiology, Arun Sridhar. “Cardiac arrhythmias can cause major morbidities such as strokes, but can be highly unpredictable in occurrence, and thus difficult to diagnose.”
“Availability of a low-cost test that can be performed frequently and at the convenience of home can be a game-changer for certain patients in terms of early diagnosis and management.”
The new smart speaker system can pick up individual heartbeats by sending out a series of sounds from the speaker that can not be detected by the human ear. These bounce off people in the room and are reflected back to the speaker where heart rhythms are assessed for signs of irregularities.
