May 9, 2000

SMU ENGINEERING STUDENTS DESIGN WIRELESS HEART MONITOR USING NEW FCC FREQUENCY

DALLAS (SMU) — As part of their senior design class, a group of Southern Methodist University engineering students have designed a wireless heart monitor that will better ensure a signal free of interference from new digital television broadcasts and other wireless technology transmissions.

The students will demonstrate their prototype before a panel of health care professionals assembled by the Kent Waldrep National Paralysis Foundation May 10. Each year the Waldrep Foundation and the United Service Association For Health Care Foundation gives $15,000 to the senior design class at SMU’s School of Engineering and Applied Science in order for the students to work on devices that help the physically disabled.

The students designed their prototype, named "Casper," to transmit in a frequency range between 608-614 MHz (megahertz) whereas most electrocardiogram (EKG) models transmit at 450-470 MHz. The lower, more common frequency is shared by TV broadcasting stations, many of which are beginning to send digital signals, also known as High Definition Digital Television (HDTV). Because of the current crowded spectrum, hospitals across the nation have experienced interference and even temporary failures in their medical telemetry systems. Last year at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas the EKG monitors for 12 heart patients suddenly lost contact after a local television station began testing its new digital signal over a previously vacant channel frequency, which it had a license to use.

Last year the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) allocated a new spectrum specifically for medical telemetry systems to ensure that life-critical services operate without interruption. Examples of medical telemetry systems include heart, blood pressure and respiration monitors. Wireless systems allow patients to move around early in their recovery while still being monitored for adverse symptoms. With such systems, one health care worker can monitor several patients remotely, thus decreasing health care costs.

Peter Bastawros, an SMU senior majoring in mechanical engineering with a specialization in biomedical engineering, came up with the idea of the wireless EKG using the new FCC frequency after taking a biomedical engineering class and learning about the problem and the FCC’s response. He then met with a cardiologist at Parkland Memorial Hospital, where a majority of the inpatients are monitored using wireless systems.

"Casper promises to be one of the first EKG devices to use the new FCC frequency range. We really think we have something that will meet industry standards of care, and which will help cardiac centers, coronary intensive care units and trauma units run as efficiently as possible," said Bastawros.
He teamed up with SMU engineering students Brent Smith, Bo Fishback and Paige Lockett to research, design and build Casper for their senior design class in SMU mechanical engineering professor Paul Packman’s design class.

Others devices to be demonstrated this year at the Waldrep Foundation include a voice-activated system for opening outside doors, a modified wheelchair in which the user can push the chair with the handles rather than the rims of the chair, and a remote-operated system for deploying a rain shield for drivers of wheel chair-accessible automobiles.

Note to Editor: Media interested in a private demonstration of any of these devices may call
the SMU Office of News and Information at 214-768-7650.