Heart Rate Variability (HRV) is a measure for the variation in heart rate over time. The rate of change of the HRV can tell you what the cause of the change in variation is, while the variation itself is the marker for a change occurring. HRV a collective term for multiple analysis in the time, frequency and non-linear domain, where the exact analysis needs to be tailored to the hypothesis that is being tested.

Prior research has shown that HRV can be used as an early indicator for Sepsis in Neonates, allowing antibiotics to start up to a day earlier. The Neurosurgical department of the Erasmus MC hospital is interested in testing if HRV can be used to monitor intracranial pressure (ICP) in patients with brain tumors or brain trauma.

As part of the assignment, neurosurgical procedures need to be attended to annotate the procedure, and to generate additional data for testing. One of the challenges will be to how to deal with patient specific clinical variation, determine the influence of anesthetics on the HRV and filter out the other factors that can influence the HRV.

An interest in Matlab and R is necessary to complete the project successfully, prior knowledge is preferable but not mandatory.

When interested, please feel free to contact project coordinators

Ir. Tom G. Goos, Advisor Medical Technology and Researcher for Neonatology
T.Goos@erasmusmc.nl / T.G.Goos@tudelft.nl

Dr. A.J.P.E. Vincent, Neurosurgeon
a.vincent@erasmusmc.nl