Arrhythmia-detection criteria process for a cardioverter/defibrillator

An improved arrhythmia-detection criteria process for detecting a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia in a human patient by a cardioverter defibrillator device connected to at least two implanted electrodes located in the human patient that can selectively deliver cardioversion/defibrillation cardiac arrhythmia-correcting electrical intervention therapy comprised of one or more electrical pulses of greater than about 0.1 Joules, the process including the device-implemented steps of:

• (a) continually receiving a plurality of cardiac variables representing sensed values in the human patient, (b) evaluating the plurality of cardiac variables to determine whether a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia is present, and (c) if such an arrhythmia is present, determining an appropriate therapy to be delivered to treat the arrhythmia, the improvement comprising the device-implemented sub-steps as follows:
• (b1) selecting an explicit and well-defined threshold intervention criteria which is at least a threshold curve defined by one or more mathematical algebraic functions relating two or more of the cardiac variables;
• (b2) using the threshold curve to define a boundary above which a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia is deemed to be present by permitting individual cardiac variables to vary within wide limits at threshold conditions, depending upon the values of companion variables.

An improved arrhythmia-detection criteria process for detecting a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia in a human patient by a cardioverter defibrillator device connected to at least two implanted electrodes located in the human patient that can selectively deliver cardioversion/defibrillation cardiac arrhythmia-correcting electrical intervention therapy comprised of one or more electrical pulses of greater than about 0.1 Joules, the process including the device-implemented steps of:

• (a) continually receiving a plurality of cardiac variables representing sensed values in the human patient, (b) evaluating the plurality of cardiac variables to determine whether a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia is present, and (c) if such an arrhythmia is present, determining an appropriate therapy to be delivered to treat the arrhythmia, the improvement comprising the device-implemented sub-steps as follows:
• (b1) using two or more functions, each function relating two or more of the cardiac variables, to generate a threshold criterion;
• and
• (b2) combining the threshold criterion generated in step (b1) by using a mathematical algebraic function that relates the threshold criterion in terms of inputs to a neural-network, an output of which defines a boundary above which a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia is deemed to be present.

An improved arrhythmia-detection criteria process for detecting a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia in a human patient by a cardioverter defibrillator device connected to at least two implanted electrodes located in the human patient that can selectively delivery cardioversion/defibrillation cardiac arrhythmia-correcting electrical intervention therapy comprised of one or more electrical pulses of greater than about 0.1 Joules, the process including the device-implemented steps of:

• (a) continually receiving a plurality of cardiac variables representing senses values in the human patient, (b) evaluating the plurality of cardiac variables to determine whether a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia is present, and (c) if such an arrhythmia is present, determining an appropriate therapy to be delivered to treat the arrhythmia, the improvement comprising the device-implemented sub-steps as follows:
• (b1) using one or more mathematical algebraic functions, each function relating two or more of the cardiac variables and being implemented as a neural network, to generate at least a threshold curve;
• and
• (b2) using the threshold curve to define a boundary above which a tachycardia/fibrillation cardiac arrhythmia is deemed to be present.