Key result
IR-UWB radar accurately measured heart rate variability in a noncontact fashion, showing high agreement with ECG for the LF/HF ratio at rest (ICC 0.807) and during fatigue and recovery.
Why the study?
Physical fatigue can be assessed using heart rate variability (HRV), prompting evaluation of whether noncontact impulse-radio ultra wideband (IR-UWB) radar measurements are reliable and valid compared with electrocardiography (ECG).
Does noncontact IR-UWB radar accurately measure HRV to assess physical fatigue compared to standard ECG in healthy volunteers?
Observational (n=15)
No
Does noncontact IR-UWB radar accurately measure HRV to assess physical fatigue compared to standard ECG in healthy volunteers?
Effect estimate: ICC 0.807 (95% CI 0.527-0.930)
p-value: p=0.002
IR-UWB radar provides a reliable, noncontact method for measuring HRV to assess physical fatigue and recovery, demonstrating high agreement with standard ECG.
Radar supports noncontact HRV monitoring for fatigue; leaves open validation in clinical populations before adoption.
Physical fatigue can be assessed using heart rate variability (HRV). We measured HRV at rest and in a fatigued state using impulse-radio ultra wideband (IR-UWB) radar in a noncontact fashion and compared the measurements with those obtained using electrocardiography (ECG) to assess the reliability and validity of the radar measurements. HRV was measured in 15 subjects using radar and ECG simultaneously before (rest for 10 min before exercise) and after a 20-min exercise session (fatigue level 1 for 0–9 min; fatigue level 2 for 10–19 min; recovery for ≥ 20 min after exercise). HRV was analysed in the frequency domain, including the low-frequency component (LF), high-frequency component (HF) and LF/HF ratio. The LF/HF ratio measured using radar highly agreed with that measured using ECG during rest (ICC = 0.807), fatigue-1 (ICC = 0.712), fatigue-2 (ICC = 0.741) and recovery (ICC = 0.764) in analyses using intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs). The change pattern in the LH/HF ratios during the experiment was similar between radar and ECG. The subject’s body fat percentage was linearly associated with the time to recovery from physical fatigue (R2 = 0.96, p < 0.001). Our results demonstrated that fatigue and rest states can be distinguished accurately based on HRV measurements using IR-UWB radar in a noncontact fashion.
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Ahmed et al. (2022) conducted an observational in Physical fatigue (n=15). IR-UWB radar vs. Electrocardiography (ECG) was evaluated on Agreement of LF/HF ratio between IR-UWB radar and ECG at rest (ICC 0.807, 95% CI 0.527-0.930, p=0.002). IR-UWB radar accurately measured heart rate variability in a noncontact fashion, showing high agreement with ECG for the LF/HF ratio at rest (ICC 0.807) and during fatigue and recovery.
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