A NEUROLOGICAL WORKSTATION

THE OBJECT OF THIS PROJECT IS TO DEVELOP AND IMPLEMENT THE CONCEPT OF A COMPUTER WORKSTATION FOR NEUROLOGY. THE SYSTEM WILL HAVE ALL THE PRESENT FUNCTIONALITY OF THE EEG MACHINE, BUT WILL BE ENHANCED WITH CHARACTERISTICS INTRINSICTO THE COMPUTER. THE POSSIBILITIES OF THE INSTRUMENT FOR THE CLINICAL ENVIRONMENT WILL BE STRESSED: MAKE PRECISE MEASUREMENTS IN THE EEG (MICROVOLT ACCURACY AND MILLISECOND RESOLUTION); RECEIVE AND SEND EEG RECORDS THROUGH DATA NETWORKS (REAL-TIME TELECONFERENCING); INTEGRATE THE EEG SIGNAL WITH THE PATIENT CLINICAL HISTORY IN THE DATABASE WHERE IMAGES CAN ALSO BE STORED (CAT SCANNERS); UPGRADE THE SYSTEM WITH EXISTING AUTOMATED SIGNAL DETECTION MODULES (EPILEPSY, SLEEP, ETC.); CREATE REPORTS; AND INTERFACE WITH THE HOSPITAL INFORMATION SYSTEM. IT IS PLANNED TO DEVELOP A MULTIPROCESSOR SYSTEM BASED ON A WORKSTATION AND A SPECIAL-PURPOSE FRONT-END PROCESSOR. THIS PROCESSOR WILL BE COMPOSED OF A MICROCONTROLLER FOR DATA ACQUISITION AND FLOW CONTROL, INTERFACED WITH A FLOATING-POINT DSP PROCESSOR FOR FAST ARITHMETIC OPERATION. ALGORITHMS TO IMPLEMENT THE FUNCTIONS DISCUSSED ABOVE WILL BE TESTED USING SIMULATORS AND THEN TRANSLATED INTO ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE.