Study of heart rate variability due to reflexological stimulation

Abstract

The electrocardiogram is a representative signal containing information about the condition of the heart. The shape and size of the P-QRS-T wave, the time intervals between its various peaks, etc., may contain useful information about the nature of disease afflicting the heart. However, the human observer cannot directly monitor these subtle details. Besides, since bio-signals are highly subjective, the symptoms may appear at random in the time scale. Therefore, the heart rate variability signal parameters, extracted and analyzed using computers, are highly useful in diagnostics. Analysis of heart rate variation (HRV) has become a popular non-invasive tool for assessing the activities of the autonomic nervous system. HRV analysis is based on the concept that fast fluctuations may specifically reflect changes of sympathetic and vagal activity. It shows that the structure generating the signal is not simply linear, but also involves nonlinear contributions. This work is an attempt made to do a quantitative study on the effect of reflexology on the HRV during reflexologic stimulation. The nonlinear parameters are evaluated for this study and the results obtained for 20 subjects are tabulated.