A Smart Textile Band Achieves High-Quality Electrocardiograms in Unrestrained Horses.
Authors: McCrae Persephone, Spong Hannah, Rutherford Ashley-Ann, Osborne Vern, Mahnam Amin, Pearson Wendy
Journal: Animals : an open access journal from MDPI
Summary
Electrocardiography remains fundamental to equine health and performance assessment, yet conventional adhesive electrodes present practical limitations including cost, durability issues, and progressive signal degradation during monitoring. McCrae and colleagues evaluated whether a smart textile girth band incorporating silver and carbon yarns could match the diagnostic quality of standard Ag/AgCl adhesive electrodes by recording simultaneous three-lead ECGs from 22 unrestrained horses in stalls and comparing signal integrity using kurtosis values, kurtosis signal quality indices (kSQI), motion artifact percentages, peak amplitude, and heart rate measurements. Both systems demonstrated excellent signal fidelity—the textile band achieved mean kurtosis of 21.8 ± 6.1 with median kSQI of 0.98, virtually identical to Ag/AgCl readings (21.2 ± 7.6 and 0.99 respectively)—with motion artefacts affecting less than 0.5% of recording time for either method, suggesting signal quality equivalent to standard electrodes. These findings are particularly significant for field practitioners and researchers requiring reliable, non-invasive cardiac monitoring without the adhesive irritation, cost accumulation, and attachment failures that compromise practical usability. Smart textile technology represents a genuine advancement for routine ECG screening in clinical and performance contexts where durability, repeatability, and user convenience are paramount considerations.
Read the full abstract on PubMed
Practical Takeaways
- •Smart textile girth bands offer reliable ECG recording in loose-housed horses without the need for adhesive electrodes, reducing setup time and electrode replacement costs
- •The textile band approach maintains high signal quality comparable to standard electrodes while avoiding the problem of adhesive electrodes becoming detached during monitoring
- •This technology could improve feasibility of ECG monitoring in field settings and during routine stable management without compromising data quality
Key Findings
- •Smart textile bands with silver and carbon yarns produced ECG quality equivalent to standard Ag/AgCl adhesive electrodes in unrestrained horses (no significant differences in kurtosis, kSQI, or motion artifacts)
- •Both methods demonstrated excellent signal quality with kSQI median values ≥0.92 and <0.5% motion artifact corruption
- •Smart textile electrodes provide a practical alternative to adhesive electrodes, eliminating detachment issues and associated quality degradation over time