Dynamic Threshold Analysis of Daily Oxygen Saturation for Improved Management of COPD Patients

IEEE J Biomed Health Inform. 2016 Sep;20(5):1352-60. doi: 10.1109/JBHI.2015.2464275. Epub 2015 Aug 4.

Abstract

This study presents a novel dynamic threshold algorithm that is applied to daily self-measured SpO2 data for management of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients in remote patient monitoring to improve accuracy of detection of exacerbation. Conventional approaches based on a fixed threshold applied to a single SpO 2 reading to detect deterioration in patient condition are known to have poor accuracy and result in high false alarm rates. This study develops and evaluates use of a dynamic threshold algorithm to reduce false alarm rates. Daily data from four COPD patients with a record of clinical interventions during the period were selected for analysis. We model the SpO2 time-series data as a combination of a trend and a stochastic component (residual). We estimate the long-term trend using a locally weighed least-squares (low-pass) filter over a long-term processing window. Results show that the time evolution of the long-term trend indicated exacerbation with improved accuracy compared to a fixed threshold in our study population. Deterioration in the condition of a patient also resulted in an increase in the standard deviation of the residual (σres ), from 2% or less when the patient is in a healthy condition to 4% or more when condition deteriorates. Statistical analysis of the residuals showed they had a normal distribution when the condition of the patient was stable but had a long tail on the lower side during deterioration.

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms*
  • Humans
  • Models, Statistical
  • Oxygen / blood*
  • Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive* / diagnosis
  • Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive* / physiopathology
  • Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive* / therapy
  • Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted*
  • Telemedicine / methods
  • Telemetry / methods*

Substances

  • Oxygen