A web service for conformance testing of ECG records to the SPC-ECG standard

The OpenECG network promotes interoperability and open standards in computerized electro cardiography. Since 2002, the OpenECG portal and its world-wide community have advocated open data formats for ECGs, facilitated the creation of vendor- and device-independent ECG databases, and stimulated the development of open source processing, analysis, and visualization tools. OpenECG offered the first on-line service for conformance testing of ECG records in the SCP-ECG format. This paper presents the design and evaluation of a Web service providing SCP-ECG conformance testing to ECG tools. Two ECG viewers were modified to support this Web service. The collection of ECGs submitted online for conformance testing was used to validate the Web service and the viewers. Test results led not only to improvements in the stability and functionality of the viewers, but also to significant insight on strengths and limitations of the testing tools