Optimal ROI Determination for Obtaining PPG Signals from a Camera on a Smartphone

Abstract

Photoplethysmography (PPG) is a convenient method for monitoring a heart rhythm. In addition to specialized devices, smartphones can be used to obtain PPG signals. However, as smartphones are not intended for this purpose, optimization is required to efficiently obtain PPG signals. Determining the optimal region of interest (ROI) is one such optimization method. There are two significant advantages in employing an optimized ROI. One is that the computing load is decreased by reducing the image size used to extract the PPG signal. The other is that stronger and more reliable PPG signals are obtained by removing noisy regions. In this paper, we propose an optimal ROI determination method by recursively splitting regions to locate the region that produces the strongest PPG signal.