Abstract: A fetal heart monitor device includes a channel to receive a first signal representative of acoustic energy principally from a maternal heartbeat and a second signal representative of acoustic energy including a fetal heart beat. The device includes a computing device including a processor, a memory operatively coupled to the processor and non-volatile storage operatively coupled to the processor, the non-volatile storage storing a computer program including instructions to cause the processor to process the first and second electrical signals into an electrical signal representative of the acoustic energy emitted by the fetal heart.

Abstract: An apparatus for detecting a fetal heartbeat includes circuitry to convert acoustic energy representative principally of a maternal heartbeat into a first electrical signal and circuitry to convert acoustic energy representative of a maternal heartbeat and a fetal heartbeat into a second electrical signal. The apparatus also includes circuitry to process the first and second electrical to provide an electrical signal principally representative of the fetal heartbeat and circuitry to determine pitch periods of the signal principally representative of the fetal heart beat.

Abstract: A method of acoustic monitoring includes transducing acoustic energy from a first acoustic transducer attached to a first location on a patient the acoustic energy from the first transducer, comprising desired acoustic energy to be monitored and interfering acoustic energy and transducing acoustic energy from a second acoustic transducer, attached to a second, different location on a patient, the acoustic energy from the second transducer, comprising desired acoustic energy to be monitored and interfering acoustic energy. The method also includes converting the acoustic energy sensed at the first and second locations into first and second electrical signals and processing the first and second electrical signals to digitally remove interfering acoustic energy present in the second signal to provide an electrical signal representative of the acoustic signal that is being monitored.

Abstract: A method of determining a pitch period includes determining a first primary peak of an input signal. The method also includes determining a second primary peak of the input signal by locating a maximum peak from a series of peaks centered a period of time, equal to a prior pitch period, from the first primary peak.

Abstract: A method of compressing speech data includes parsing an input waveform into pitch segments, determining principal components of at least one pitch segment and sending a subset of the determined principal components during an initial transmission period. The method also includes sending coefficients of the input waveform for each pitch segment during a period subsequent to the initial transmission period.