Performance of Digital filters for noise removal from ECG signals in Time domain

Abstract: Electrocardiogram (ECG) is the cheapest and noninvasive method of depicting the heart activity and abnormalities. It provides valuable information about the functional aspects of the heart and cardiovascular system. It is the record of variation of bioelectric potential with respect to time as the human heart beats. The classification of ECG signals is an important application since the early detection of heart diseases/abnormalities can prolong life and enhance the quality of living through appropriate treatment. Since the ECG signals, while recording are contaminated by several noises it is necessary to preprocess the signals prior to classification. The ECG signal can be processed in time domain as well as in frequency domain. Digital filters are used to remove noise from the signal. The present paper shows the performance of removal of noise like baseline wander and power line interference from the signal using Band Pass filter and Notch filter. The performance is tested on the Arrhythmia signals from MIT-BIH and Myocardial infarction signals from PTB Diagnostic database.

Keywords: ECG, Band pass filter, Notch filter, SNR