Fetal heart rate monitoring

A system for processing a composite ECG signal to produce an output representative of one signal component of said composite ECG signal, comprising:

• means for receiving said composite ECG signal originating from a plurality of sources;
• a signal processing unit having an input coupled to receive a representation of said composite ECG signal;
• a peak detection data processing unit arranged to identify significant peaks in waveform complexes in said composite ECG signal;
• a template buffer to store a signal template derived from said composite ECG signal, said signal template representing a QRS complex of said one signal component;
• a correlation data processing unit arranged to calculate a statistical correlation coefficient between said signal template and all waveform complexes of said composite ECG signal associated with said identified peaks, in order to identify those components of said composite ECG signal which correlate with said signal template;
• and
• an output unit to produce an output signal representative of only said one signal component.

A system for processing a composite ECG signal to produce an output representative of one signal component of said composite ECG signal, comprising:

• a probe to generate a composite ECG signal;
• a signal processing unit having an input coupled to receive a representation of said composite ECG signal;
• a peak detection data processing unit arranged to identify significant peaks in waveform complexes in said composite ECG signal;
• a template buffer for storing a signal template derived from said composite ECG signal, said signal template representing a QRS complex of said one signal component;
• a correlation data processing unit arranged to calculate a statistical correlation coefficient between said signal template and all waveform complexes of said composite ECG signal associated with said identified peaks, in order to identify those components of said composite ECG signal which correlate with said signal template;
• and
• an output unit to produce an output signal representative of only said one signal component.

A system for processing a composite ECG signal to produce an output representative of one signal component of said composite ECG signal, comprising:

• probe means for generating a composite ECG signal;
• signal processing means for receiving a representation of said composite ECG signal;
• peak detection data processing means for identifying significant peaks in waveform complexes in said composite ECG signal;
• template buffer means for storing a signal template derived from said composite ECG signal, said signal template representing a QRS complex of said one signal component;
• correlation data processing means for calculating a statistical correlation coefficient between said signal template and all waveform complexes of said composite ECG signal associated with said identified peaks, and for identifying those components of said composite ECG signal which correlate with said signal template;
• and
• output means for producing an output signal representative of only said one signal component.