Determining cardiovascular intensity using heart rate data

Abstract

Embodiments provide physiological measurement systems, devices and methods for continuous health and fitness monitoring. A wearable strap may automatically and continually sense and collect data corresponding to the heart rate of a user, which may then be used to determine cardiovascular intensity experienced by the user. Specifically, the heart rate data may be transformed into a time series of heart rate reserve data which is then weighted according to a weighting scheme. The weighted heart rate reserve data may be the basis for programmatically generating an indicator of cardiovascular intensity experienced by the user, which is displayed for a user on the user interface of a display device.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A computer program product comprising non-transitory computer executable code embodied in a non-transitory computer readable medium that, when executing on one or more computing devices, performs the steps of:
 programmatically receiving, using a computer system, data corresponding to heart rate of a user during an exercise routine;   transforming the heart rate data to a time series of heart rate reserve data using a processing module of the computer system;   weighting the heart rate reserve data according to a weighting scheme using the processing module of the computer system;   programmatically generating, using the processing module of the computer system, an indicator of cardiovascular intensity based on the weighted heart rate reserve data; and   displaying, on a user interface rendered on a display device of the computer system, the indicator of cardiovascular intensity.   
     
     
         2 . The computer program product of  claim 1 , wherein the weighting scheme uses a trained machine learning system implementing a machine learning algorithm embodied on one or more non-transitory computer-readable media, the machine learning system trained to correlate heart rate data to cardiovascular intensities. 
     
     
         3 . The computer program product of  claim 2 , wherein the trained machine learning algorithm is retrained to adjust perceived difficulties of exercise routines as the user's fitness improves. 
     
     
         4 . The computer program product of  claim 1 , wherein the weighting scheme accounts for cardiovascular efficiencies at different intensity levels. 
     
     
         5 . The computer program product of  claim 1 , further comprising code that performs the step of:
 displaying qualitative information associated with the intensity score.   
     
     
         6 . The computer program product of  claim 5 , wherein the qualitative information comprises one or more of:
 an indication of whether the user exceeded the user's anaerobic threshold during the exercise routine;   an indication of whether the user is likely to experience muscle soreness;   an indication of a level of recovery required after the exercise routine; and   an indication of one or more future alterations to the exercise routine that is required based on one or more health-related goals of the user.   
     
     
         7 . The computer program product of  claim 1 , wherein the indicator corresponds to a perceived difficulty of the exercise routine by the user, the code further performing the step of:
 displaying, on the user interface, the perceived difficulty of the exercise routine.   
     
     
         8 . The computer program product of  claim 1 , further comprising code that performs the steps of:
 based on the indicator of the intensity of the exercise, automatically altering an exercise plan according to one or more health goals of the user; and   displaying, on the user interface, the altered exercise plan.   
     
     
         9 . The computer program product of  claim 1 , further comprising code that performs the steps of:
 programmatically receiving data corresponding to heart rate of a second user during an exercise routine;   transforming the heart rate data to a time series of heart rate reserve data;   weighting the heart rate reserve data according to a weighting scheme;   programmatically generating a second indicator of cardiovascular intensity based on the weighted heart rate reserve data; and   displaying, on the user interface rendered on the display device, the indicator corresponding to the user and the second indicator corresponding to the second user.   
     
     
         10 . The computer program product of  claim 9 , wherein the heart rate data of the user and the second user are obtained from different user-selected time periods. 
     
     
         11 . A wearable physiological measurement device comprising:
 a wearable strap couplable to an appendage of a user configured to monitor and determine a heart rate of the user, the wearable strap including a processing module configured to:
 programmatically receive data corresponding to the heart rate of a user during an exercise routine; 
 transform the heart rate data to a time series of heart rate reserve data; 
 weight the heart rate reserve data according to a weighting scheme; 
 programmatically generate an indicator of cardiovascular intensity based on the weighted heart rate reserve data; and 
 display, on a user interface rendered on a display device, the indicator of cardiovascular intensity. 
   
     
     
         12 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 11 , wherein the weighting scheme uses a trained machine learning system implementing a machine learning algorithm embodied on one or more non-transitory computer-readable media, the machine learning system trained to correlate heart rate data to cardiovascular intensities. 
     
     
         13 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 12 , wherein the trained machine learning algorithm is retrained to adjust perceived difficulties of exercise routines as the user's fitness improves. 
     
     
         14 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 11 , wherein the weighting scheme accounts for cardiovascular efficiencies at different intensity levels. 
     
     
         15 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 11 , wherein the processing module is further configured to:
 display qualitative information associated with the intensity score.   
     
     
         16 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 15 , wherein the qualitative information comprises one or more of:
 an indication of whether the user exceeded the user's anaerobic threshold during the exercise routine;   an indication of whether the user is likely to experience muscle soreness;   an indication of a level of recovery required after the exercise routine; and   an indication of one or more future alterations to the exercise routine that is required based on one or more health-related goals of the user.   
     
     
         17 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 11 , wherein the indicator corresponds to a perceived difficulty of the exercise routine by the user, and wherein the processing module is further configured to:
 display, on the user interface, the perceived difficulty of the exercise routine.   
     
     
         18 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 11 , wherein the processing module is further configured to:
 based on the indicator of the intensity of the exercise, automatically alter an exercise plan according to one or more health goals of the user; and   display, on the user interface, the altered exercise plan.   
     
     
         19 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 11 , wherein the processing module is further configured to:
 programmatically receive data corresponding to heart rate of a second user during an exercise routine;   transform the heart rate data to a time series of heart rate reserve data;   weight the heart rate reserve data according to a weighting scheme;   programmatically generate a second indicator of cardiovascular intensity based on the weighted heart rate reserve data; and   display, on the user interface rendered on the display device, the indicator corresponding to the user and the second indicator corresponding to the second user.   
     
     
         20 . The wearable physiological measurement device of  claim 19 , wherein the heart rate data of the user and the second user are obtained from different user-selected time periods.