Technical challenges and future directions in lead reconstruction for reduced-lead systems

Reduced-lead electrocardiographic systems are currently a widely accepted medical technology used in a number of applications. They provide increased patient comfort and superior performance in arrhythmia and ST monitoring. These systems have unique and compelling advantages over the traditional multichannel monitoring lead systems. However, the design and development of reduced-lead systems create numerous technical challenges. This article summarizes the major technical challenges commonly encountered in lead reconstruction for reduced-lead systems. We discuss the effects of basis lead and target lead selections, the differences between interpolated vs extrapolated leads, the database dependency of the coefficients, and the approaches in quantitative performance evaluation, and provide a comparison of different lead systems. In conclusion, existing reduced-lead systems differ significantly in regard to trade-offs from the technical, practical, and clinical points of view. Understanding the technical limitations, the strengths, and the trade-offs of these reduced-lead systems will hopefully guide future research. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.