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Enhancement of cardiac and respiratory sounds for cellphone reproduction by means of digital sound processing methods

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Abstract

Telemedicine’s rising popularity, driven by its convenience and accessibility, faces a challenge in remote physical auscultation, particularly for assessing lung and heart sounds. We propose a smartphone-based tele-auscultation approach for capturing lung and heart sounds, based on pitch-shifting customized for smartphone listening, overcoming the technical obstacle found in the limited accuracy of smartphone speakers for reproducing low-frequency sounds, such as heart sounds. We created a database of heart and lung sounds captured with a smartphone, and then we conducted two evaluations, one with sounds from open-source databases and one with sounds from an in-house database. Pitch-shifting algorithms from PaulStretch and SoundTouch libraries were applied, and validated against original recordings through a web survey, initially using conventional headphones, as a first step towards delivering them through loudspeakers. In the open-source database experiment, 71.6% and 80% of 40 final-year medical students indicated preserved clinical information in respiratory and heart sounds, respectively. In the in-house database experiment, 14 physicians and final-year medical students validated the processed audio samples, revealing that 76.5% and 71% of respiratory and heart sounds, respectively, maintained clinical information. These results suggest the potential use of pitch-shifted sounds in tele-auscultation devices like smartphones. However, further research is essential to understand smartphones’ playback capabilities in a clinical setting.

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Data availability

The datasets generated during the current study are not publicly available because the ethical approval was obtained only for analysis but not for public release.

Notes

  1. SurveyMonkey is an online survey platform (https://www.surveymonkey.com/) that enables users to create, distribute, and analyze surveys for diverse purposes such as market research and feedback collection.

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Funding

This work was funded by ANID - Millennium Science Initiative Program - ICN2021_004, ANID - Fondecyt grant #1161328, and supported by ANID - Millennium Science Initiative Program ICS2019_024.

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Author notes

  1. Eduardo J. Godoy, Rodrigo F. Cádiz, and Marcelo E. Andia contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical Engineering, School of Engineering, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile

    Maria Belen Echenique & Rodrigo F. Cádiz

  2. Department of Radiology, School of Medicine, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile

    Eduardo J. Godoy & Marcelo E. Andia

  3. Millennium Institute for Intelligent Healthcare Engineering-iHEALTH, Santiago, Chile

    Rodrigo F. Cádiz & Marcelo E. Andia

  4. Music Institute, Faculty of Arts, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile

    Rodrigo F. Cádiz

  5. Biomedical Imaging Center, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile

    Marcelo E. Andia

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  1. Maria Belen Echenique
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Correspondence to Maria Belen Echenique.

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Echenique, M.B., Godoy, E.J., Cádiz, R.F. et al. Enhancement of cardiac and respiratory sounds for cellphone reproduction by means of digital sound processing methods. Pers Ubiquit Comput 28, 845–856 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00779-024-01833-5

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