Smart Heart

BACKGROUND: Smart Heart is a necklace to replace the cardiac holter monitor. It addresses the physical and emotional discomfort experienced by people who require electrocardiogram monitoring. It is aimed at patients who have recently suffered a heart attack or who are experiencing heart rhythm problems, focusing on longer term monitoring in a non-invasive way. Composed of a soft textile neckband that integrates wiring and electrodes and jewel structures that conceal the central processing unit and battery power, its aesthetic design is intentionally non-medical. CONTRIBUTION: Smart Heart was a collaboration between RMIT researchers, St. Vincent's Hospital Melbourne and the Nossal Institute for Global Health. Evolving through deep collaboration between design, engineering, and weaving, the outcome is a precious necklace with diagnostic capabilities. In order to create this human-centred technology researcher Leah Heiss spent time with people in aged care environments to understand how they felt about medical technologies and jewellery. Smart Heart draws on design and health research, the preciousness of jewellery and provides the technical functionality of a sensing technology. SIGNIFICANCE: In 2014, Gandel Philanthropy provided funding for the Smart Heart project through its Comunitybuild grant scheme. This enabled RMIT researchers to coalesce a working group of engineers, weavers and designers to address this complex issue. The necklace is at functioning prototype stage and has been part of two invited exhibitions: Handle with Care at Reciprocity: Design Leige in Belgium, the Triennale of Design and Social Innovation. It was also selected for the Humanise exhibition at Warrnambool Art Gallery. Smart Heart has received significant press; it was featured in ABC TV's Design Shots - The Innovator, an ABC Splash micro-documentary; The Age and Sydney Morning Herald; and Austrade's Australia Unlimited magazine, distributed to 100,000 readers across Europe.