Cardiio Rhythm: an app that checks for heart problems

Atrial fibrillation is one of the most common type of arrhythmia and is also one of the most common cause for strokes if left unchecked. It is usually detected by hooking up a patient to an ECG machine, but now we have an iPhone app that non-invasively do the same job.

Dubbed as Cardiio Rhythm, the app was developed by a team from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. The app uses the iPhone’s camera to analyze subtle changes in patient’s facial skin color, which indicate the fluctuations in their heart rate.

The app was tested on 85 patients, 25 of which were already suffering from atrial fibrillation via readings obtained from a 12-lead ECG – the app was able to able to detect the disorder with an accuracy rate of 92 per cent. The results weren’t perfect but the scientist believe that the app can be useful for large-scale community atrial fibrillation screenings

The team is still working on perfecting the app to get more accurate results. The research was also recently presented in New Orleans at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2016.