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IOT BASED VITAL SIGNS MONITORING SYSTEM FOR
HUMAN BEINGS
Kavipriya Sundaravadivel
UG Student, Department of Biomedical Engineering,
Sethu Institute of technology, Kariapatti, Virudhunagar-626115, Tamilnadu, (India).
E-mail: kavipriya882002@gmail.com
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4215-3318
Priyadharshini Malaiyarasan
UG Student, Department of Biomedical Engineering,
Sethu Institute of technology, Kariapatti, Virudhunagar-626115, Tamilnadu, (India).
E-mail: dharshinimalaiyarasan@gmail.com
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7050-0663
Hemalatha Karuppiah
Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering,
Sethu Institute of technology, Kariapatti, Virudhunagar-626115, Tamilnadu, (India).
E-mail: hemaa75@gmail.com
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4356-9905
Nageshwari Raja
Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering,
Sethu Institute of technology, Kariapatti, Virudhunagar-626115, Tamilnadu, (India).
E-mail: nageshwari.raja@gmail.com
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9717-3714
Recepción:
29/11/2019
Aceptación:
02/09/2020
Publicación:
30/11/2021
Citación sugerida:
Sundaravadivel, K., Malaiyarasan, P., Karuppiah, H., y Raja, N. (2021). IoT based vital signs
monitoring system for human beings. 3C Tecnología. Glosas de innovación aplicadas a la pyme, Edición
Especial, (noviembre, 2021), 611-621. https://doi.org/10.17993/3ctecno.2021.specialissue8.611-621
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Noviembre 2021
ABSTRACT
Evolution of human lifestyle paves the way for number of chronic health issues such as
diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and others in worldwide. Scientic community devices
modern technology devices to proactive health management. The internet of things (IoT)
is an emerging technology that is expected to propagate in all aspects of our day-to-day life.
Vital signs are essential indications for diagnosing and treating life threatening disease in an
early stage. It includes body temperature, muscular activity, pulse rate, blood pressure and
respiratory rate. Routine measurement of these physical signs witnesses the healthy human
status and to certify health of the human. The aim of the present study was to develop IoT
based vital signs monitoring system to assess, improve and assist the health of human beings
who are hospitalized or at home in a real-time manner. IoT based healthcare monitoring
system displays these measured data in mobile application using internet connectivity. This
system helps both the physician and patient to access the healthcare related information
anytime and anywhere in a real time manner and mainly consist of sensors namely,
DS18B20 temperature sensor, pulse sensor, and EMG V3 sensor and node MCU which
is used as a microcontroller. The patient’s temperature, pulse rate and muscular activity
are assessed, displayed and stored by the systems and sent to the physician mobile phone
directly. Thus, this IOT based vital signs monitoring system eectively provide an accurate
detection of disease in an early manner and monitor the patient’s health status continuously
and remotely.
KEYWORDS
Health monitoring, IoT, Vital parameters, Visualization.
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1. INTRODUCTION
Now-a-days, vital signs monitoring plays a major role in healthcare. Vital signs are the
basic indicators of the human’s health status. Continuous vital signs monitoring becomes
inexpensive by wide ranges wearable sensors. There are number of reasons for measuring
vital signs which provides information like (1) existence of an acute medical problems. (2)
Quantifying the illness of the body occurred due to physiological stress (3) can be used as
a diagnostic marker for chronic diseases such as hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular
diseases (Castledine, 2006).
Vital signs are an important element for deducing the progress of the treatment especially
in heart diseases and also for determining the type of treatment protocol to be followed
for treating the patient. To address the quality health status, the number of prototypes and
commercial products has been used in healthcare monitoring system that has the advantage
of managing and monitoring chronic diseases of elderly people and post-operative patients
(Pantelopoulos & Bourbakis, 2010).
Normally vital signs changes with age, sex, height and state of physical activity. Body
temperature is the measure of the body’s sensitivity to heat or cold. The normal body
temperature of an individual is 98.6 F. Pulse rate is the measure of number of heart beats
for one minute which is normally measured in bpm (beats per minute).
The normal heartbeat about 60 to 80 times a minute. Blood pressure is the force of blood
against the arterial wall. The normal blood pressure of the human is 120/80 mmHg.
Breathing is the process of movement of air in and out of the lungs. For a healthy human,
the typical respiratory rate at the rest would be 12-18 breaths per minute.
Muscular activity accounts for much of a body’s energy consumption. Normally muscular
activity is measured in the range of 50μV to 30mV using EMG (Hong et al., 2011). Vital
signs are an important element for deducing the progress of the treatment especially in
heart diseases and for determining the type of treatment protocol to be followed for treating
the patient.
Long term recording and management of vital signs parameters helps the doctors to
understand much better prognosis of health (Malhi et al., 2012). Long term recording
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and management of vital signs parameters helps the doctors to understand much better
prognosis of health (Hassanalieragh et al., 2015). Increased use of mobile devices that has
major advantages of recent technologies add benet to human health. Acquiring higher
standard of health is a fundamental right of an individual (Senthamilarasi et al., 2018).
Thus, our design provides conventional clinical setting that decrease cost of maintain
health. The present work focuses on the design and development of modern healthcare
system utilizing IoT technology to monitor vital physiological parameters.
2. MATERIALS AND METHODS
2.1. OVERVIEW
The main goal of the project is to measure the vital signs parameters whenever and wherever
necessary. Here three basic vital signs such as temperature, muscle activity and pulse rate
are measured by DS18B20 sensor, EMG v3 sensor and pulse sensor respectively.
Temperature
Sensor
Pulse
Sensor
EMG
Sensor
Node MCU
Serial
communication
Android Application
Raspberry pi
Figure 1. Block diagram of IoT based vital signs monitoring system.
Source: own elaboration.
Temperature
Sensor
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2.2. NODE MCU
Node MCU is a rmware on ESP8266. It is basically a SoC (System on Chip). Node MCU
includes a self-contained Wi-Fi networking solution oering as a bridge from existing
microcontroller to Wi-Fi and also capable of running an application. Operating voltage
is 3.3 volt. Node MCU is Wi-Fi trans-receiver chip. The baud rate of the Node MCU is
the number of symbols transmitted per second. The baud rate is 115200. The node MCU
has 4 MB internal ash memory. The stored data in the ESP8266 can be accessed to the
internet through local Wi-Fi connection using proper user ID and password.
2.3. TEMPERATURE SENSOR
The temperature sensor DS18B20 is a digital thermometer and provides 9-12 bit temperature
reading. Information is sent to / from DS18B20 over 1-wire interface hence only one wire
(and ground) needs to be connected from a central microprocessor to DS18B20. It can be
powered from data line. Power supply range is 3-5.5 volt.
2.4. PULSE SENSOR
The pulse sensor is a heart rate monitoring sensor and is easily programmed by Arduino
IDE software. Pulse sensor obtains the heart rate by non- invasive monitoring and has
inbuilt noise cancellation circuit for better output. The operating voltage is 3.3 volt.
2.5. EMG SENSOR
EMG sensor measures the electrical activity of the muscles at rest and during contraction.
Any movement in the muscular cells causes electrical signals. This signal propagates through
adjacent tissues and bones. Signals are incorporated through sensors in microvolt. Three
electrodes are xed to the surface of the body for measuring EMG. Sensor is connected to
9V batteries. The EMG sensor is also powered by external batteries.
2.6. RASPBERRY PI
Raspberry Pi is a single board computer that runs Linux and is powered using USB by
connecting it to the PC. The SD card is inserted to the Raspberry Pi which is used as
memory unit for loading the operating system. The Raspberry Pi doesn’t have any memory
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source. It also provides a set of GPIO pins that allows controlling electronic components for
exploring IoT and operating voltage is 5V.
2.7. IOT
IoT extends the internet connectivity to physical objects and the data transfer is made
between the connected devices. It can transfer the data without human to human or human
to computer interaction. The IoT is the real time data transfer system through gateway.
DS18B20
Pulse sensor
EMG V3
Sensor
Data Acquisition &
Sensing
NODE MCU
Data Transmission
Mobile App
Data Concentrator
Figure 2. Architecture of IOT based vital signs monitoring system.
Source: own elaboration.
Data Acquisition is performed by multiple sensors (DS18B20 temperature sensor, pulse
sensor and EMG V3 sensor) which measure the physiological changes of the body. The
sensors are connected to the network through data aggregators which is typically a mobile
app used by the subject.
The components of the data transmission system are responsible for the transfer of the
data from the subject. The sensor acquisition platform is equipped with node MCU which
is used in transmission of sensor data. Sensors in the data acquisition part forms an IoT
based architecture as each individual sensor’s data can be accessed through the internet.
Data sensing is achieved by the sensors which are the foundation of vital signs monitoring
system and responsible for the collection of data for measuring various physiological
parameters.
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Data concentrator is used for concentrating the sensed and collected data to the android
mobile app which is specically designed for displaying the sensed output.
2.8. IMPLEMENTATION
This system mainly consists of temperature sensor, EMG sensor, the easily available and
low-cost pulse sensor. The pulse sensor is noninvasively placed on the skin of the heart
where the walls of the arteries are supercial, and the EMG sensor is placed on the arm
muscles whereas the temperature sensor is placed near the tip of the nger. The readings
are collected from the sensors and output is obtained through serial communication.
The 4.7 KΩ resistor is connected between the signal and Vcc pin of DS18B20 sensor to
ensure the correct output. The gnd pin of DS18B20 and pulse sensor is connected to the
respective gnd pin of node MCU. The main purpose of using node MCU is to establish
the Wi-Fi connection. The signal pin of the DS18B20 sensor is connected to D2 pin of the
node MCU. The Vcc pins of DS18B20 and pulse sensor are connected separately in 3.3 v
pin of node MCU.
The signal pin of the pulse sensor and DS18B20 sensor is connected to digital pins of the
node MCU according to the requirement. The EMG sensor has 2 ground pins; one is
connected to the node MCU and another one is connected to the batteries. The signal pin
of the EMG sensor is connected to the A0 pin of the node MCU.
A controller node MCU is used to process the collected data and is an advanced Arduino
Wi-Fi chip. The sensor data are obtained by serial communication with a Wi-Fi connection.
When the Wi-Fi connection is established correctly without any interruption the output is
obtained in serial monitor.
There are two modes of powering the circuit. i.e. USB and battery. The temperature sensor,
pulse sensor, node MCU and raspberry pi are powered through the USB and the EMG
sensor is powered by the battery.
The android app is created through which the output can be viewed. In android app,
the data’s can be viewed by connecting to same Wi-Fi which is given to node MCU. By
connecting the same Wi-Fi, the output from the serial monitor is obtained in the android
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app. The android app is specially programmed to obtain the sensor data in real time.
Using independent mobile application, user can login to IoT cloud and acquire vital signs
monitoring data.
3. RESULTS
The normal ranges of the parameters observed clinically in this system are as follows:
Figure 3. Interfacing of sensors with Node MCU.
Source: own elaboration.
Temperature sensor: 36.5 degree Celsius to 37.5 degree Celsius Pulse sensor: 60-80 bpm.
EMG: 50μV to 30 mV
Figure 3 represents the interfacing of dierent types of sensors with Node MCU in
this system. The accuracy of our design is approximately more or less equal to clinical
observation. The accuracy uctuation may occur due to voltage supply and presence of
noise during communication.
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200
150
100
50
0
Heart Beat and temperature Real Time Analysis
0 5 10 15 20
200
150
100
50
0
Heart Beat and temperature Real Time Analysis
0 5 10 15 20
Figure 4. The graphs of sensor recorded from two persons using android app. In this gure grey line (-)
represents temperature in Celsius and red line (-) represents pulse in bpm.
Source: own elaboration.
4. CONCLUSIONS
The existing healthcare monitoring system can provide vital parameters remotely using
various technologies; the present work has multitudinous advantages for monitoring vital
signs such as temperature, pulse rate and EMG of human health using easily available and
low-cost sensors in a real-time manner. Thus, our system of health monitoring system can be
used in case of emergency to be maintained and stored data regularly. It helps the medical
professionals and patient to view their vital sign recording at the time of requirement. Thus,
our design eectively measures even slight changes in the human body and transfers the
medical output in the form of serial communication with condentiality and integrity.
In future this device can be combined with cloud computing technology to store high
number of data for longer period.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
We would like to thank the management of Kalasalingam Academy of Research and
Education for providing Summer Student Visiting Internship Program and We also
express our sincere thanks and gratitude to Dr. SESHADHRI SRINIVASAN and Dr. B.
SUBATHRA for their guidance and constant moral support throughout the completion of
this project.
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