iStethoscope Pro iPhone app can monitor heartbeat

Here's an useful iPhone app for monitoring your health, iStethoscope Pro turns your iPhone into a stethoscope, allowing you to listen to your heatbeat and see your heart waveform, or listen to other quiet sounds around you. The professional version includes the ability to see and email a spectrogram of the audio, shows tips and information, and has no adverts.

Developed in collaboration with cardiologist researchers. Used by cardiologists for research on heart disease as described in the Journal of Medical Devices. For best results:
- Use good quality headphones (heart sounds are often too deep to hear using the white earphones).
- Press the microphone in the bottom of an iphone 3G or 4 to your chest. A good place is the apex of your heart (below your left nipple).
- Place the microphone directly against the skin, not through a shirt.
- Take the iphone out of its protective case if you use one.
With practise you should be able to find a wonderful clear sound. Shake the iphone to hear the last 8 seconds and see a phonocardiograph display and a spectrogram. Press the little envelope and you can email the audio and the spectrogram image to anyone you like! Go to Settings and modify every major setting, including sample rate, audio delay, audio filters, spectrogram scaling and accelerometer update frequency.

The developer notes that it takes time to learn how to listen to your heart. It takes physicians years to learn how to use stethoscopes correctly and the iphone microphone is smaller than a conventional stethoscope diaphragm. You cannot place the microphone randomly and expect to hear your heart - you must place it very accurately. To hear your heart you must learn where to listen.

iStethoscope Pro for iPhone is available for download $0.99 on the App Store in the Medical category.