User manual
2. Principles and applications of electrocardiographs
To understand the principle of functioning of the actual electrocardiograph, it is
necessary to understand the electrophysiological essence of the actual biosignal’s origin. The
necessary introduction can be found in the chapters below.
Anatomically‐physiologicalintroduction
The heart is a hollow organ, divided via a
vertical partition into the right and the left part;
these parts are then further divided via valves into
atriums and ventricles, see Fig. 2.1. The muscles of
the heart are called the myocardium. It is formed by
two layers in the atriums and three layers in the
ventricles - the surface layer (common for both the
atriums, mostly consisting of crossways running
columns of heart cells), the middle layer (separate
for each atrium, mostly consisting of circular
columns of hearth cells), and the internal layer
(intergrowing with the endocardium - the epithelium
of the heart cavity, forming papillary muscles and
trabecules), see Fig. 2.2. The whole heart is then set in
a fibrous sack - the pericardium. In the area where the blood vessels are, the pericardium
curls inside and forms the second layer, called the epicardium. Between them, there is the so
called pericardial cavity with a small amount of fluid [2.4], [2.5].
Fig. 2.2: Anatomic structure of the heart [2.6].
Obr. 2.1: Muscles of the atriums’
myocardium [2.6].
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