Patent ID: 6289243
Filing Date: 2001-09-11
Classification: A61N

Abstract:
An external defibrillator that can be used to apply therapy to a patient, comprising:an electrode adapted to couple externally to the body of a patient;a sense circuit coupled to said electrode to sense a physiological signal of the patient indicative of intrinsic cardiac activity;a cardiac arrhythmia detector coupled to said sense circuit to detect a life threatening cardiac arrhythmia based on said physiological signal;a modulation domain function detector that analyzes said physiological signal to detect its frequency and amplitude and generates a parameter indicative of a cardiac condition of the patient dependent on said frequency and amplitude;wherein said cardiac arrhythmia detector is arranged and constructed to generates serially samples of said physiological signal and said modulation domain function detector includes a summer which adds a predetermined number of said samples to generate a sum and a comparator adapted to compare said sum to a predetermined threshold, wherein said summer is arranged and constructed to generate a parameter indicative of a duration of said physiological signal;a microprocessor-based controller adapted to generate automatically a command in the presence of said cardiac arrhythmia and in accordance with said parameter; anda therapy delivery circuit adapted to deliver electrical therapy pulses to said patient to correct said cardiac arrhythmia in response to said command.