Tuning a new ECG and breath monitoring system through cardiopulmonary exercise test comparison: The case of IUTA athletes

Heart Rate (HR) and Breath Rate (BR) are important parameters that define the physiological state of the athlete and evaluate his training the performances during a race or a match. In particular for runners, these are two indexes that can be easily monitored during the performance for the athlete to understand their physical state as well as for the trainer or the coach to improve the athlete deep knowledge and better design the subject specific training. The HR can be typically acquired by lots of different technologies. In this paper, a simple and fast fitting new device for ECG and BR acquisition is presented. This device is a first optimized prototype that use a reduced number of electrodes on the torso to acquire both the ECG waveform and a BR signal. In order to evaluate the reliability and precision of this device we have defined an experimental campaign. Two IUTA athletes (a man and a woman) have been selected to wear the device during a Cardio Pulmonary Exercise Test (CPET). The BR track and ECG waveform acquired by the CPET are compared to the ones acquired with the new device to confirm the reliability and precision of the system.