Heart and Respiration Function Related to Age and Gender

Abstract

In the human body, all the organs are interconnected and interdependent. In this work we consider the heart and the lungs. Changes in the functionality of one can affect the other. The heart controls blood flow and the lungs controls respiration.

In the thesis we investigate if heart rate variability (HRV) and respiratory rate variability (RSV) to can give a more accurate prognosis of the state of the body. Previous research has focused on HRV. As a first step we see if both HRV and RSV can predict gender and age of a person more accurately than HRV or RSV alone. In this work we looked at healthy people.

We analyzed the data of healthy people from the PhysioNet database [14]. Our results show that Gender influences Heart Rate and Breathing Rate. Consider both together rather than individually give a better prediction of gender. The only feature that is related to age is the standard deviation of respiration rate.