Remote Heart Rate Monitoring Using K-band Doppler Radar

The physiological signals typically used for health monitoring include vital indicators like the heart and respiration rates. Accurate measurement of these indicators is critical for human health monitoring. Continuous-wave Doppler radar technology provides a viable solution to monitor vital signs without contact with the patient. In this paper, a custom-made K-band Doppler radar operating at 24 GHz is proposed for noncontact monitoring of the heart rate. The performance of the proposed radar is compared to commercial Doppler radar working at 24 GHz and millimeter wave Frequency-Modulated Continuous-Wave (FMCW) radar operating in the frequency range from 76 GHz to 81 GHz. It is demonstrated herein that the proposed radar yields higher accuracy and allows sensing at a larger range compared to the commercial radars. It is shown that the proposed radar enables accurate measurement of the heart rate with a maximum error of 0.5%.