title: The influence of coincidence of fetal and maternal QRS complexes on fetal heart rate reliability.
abstract: Bioelectrical fetal heart activity being recorded from maternal abdominal surface contains more information than mechanical heart activity measurement based on the Doppler ultrasound signals. However, it requires extraction of fetal electrocardiogram from abdominal signals where the maternal electrocardiogram is dominant. The simplest technique for maternal component suppression is a blanking procedure, which relies upon the replacement of maternal QRS complexes by isoline values. Although, in case of coincidence of fetal and maternal QRS complexes, it causes a loss of information on fetal heart activity. Its influence on determination of fetal heart rate and the variability analysis depends on the sensitivity of the heart-beat detector used. The sensitivity is defined as an ability to detect the incomplete fetal QRS complex. The aim of this work was to evaluate the influence of the maternal electrocardiogram suppression method used on the reliability of FHR signal being calculated.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical Informatics, Institute of Medical Technology and Equipment, Zabrze, Poland.
authors.forename: Adam
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Matonia
authors.forename: Janusz
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jezewski
authors.forename: Tomasz
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kupka
authors.forename: Krzysztof
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Horoba
authors.forename: Janusz
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wrobel
authors.forename: Adam
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Gacek
mesh_terms: D004562:Electrocardiography / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D005323:Fetal Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D006340:Heart Rate, Fetal; D006801:Humans; D011247:Pregnancy; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted