Browsing by Author "Godoy Sánchez, Eduardo Javier"

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    Can a smartphone be used for ‘tele-auscultation’?
    (2023) Godoy Sánchez, Eduardo Javier; Echenique, María Belén; Cádiz, Rodrigo F.; Andia, Marcelo E.
    Introduction: Telemedicine has become an important way to provide healthcare. However, it lacks a traditional physical examination. This study aims to validate the use of a smartphone as an auscultation device as compared to a digital stethoscope. Methods: Lung and heart sounds were obtained from 50 volunteers. Recordings were made with a smartphone and a commercial digital stethoscope simultaneously, capturing the same respiratory and heart cycles. Sounds were captured by the smartphone using an application of our own, then stored in the cloud and processed in the Julia Language. Clinical validation was performed by ten clinicians in an online survey by comparing the quality of 40 paired recordings against each other, using conventional headphones and without knowing the device used to capture the audios. The recordings included both normal and abnormal lung and heart sounds. Results: Overall, all subjects indicated that the quality of the samples recorded by a smartphone was of equal or superior quality to that of the stethoscope. In our sample of normal lung and heart sounds, the probability to obtain a favourable response for the smartphone was 66% (95%CI 58.9%–72.5%), while in our sample of abnormal sounds, that probability was 87% (95%CI 81.5%–91.3%). Discussion: Our findings suggest that a smartphone is capable of recording lung and heart sounds with enough quality to be interpreted by clinicians by using only its built-in microphone. This, and given their capability to access the internet, would allow for the use of smartphones as tele-auscultation devices.
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    Enhancement of cardiac and respiratory sounds for cellphone reproduction by means of digital sound processing methods
    (2024) Echenique Soto, María Belén; Godoy Sánchez, Eduardo Javier; Cádiz Cádiz, Rodrigo Fernando; Andia Kohnenkampf, Marcelo Edgardo
    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.