Now, app that acts as medical monitor for heart and lung patients

Researchers have developed a smartphone app which monitors chronic heart and lung patients by analyzing the way they walk.

GaitTrack, an app developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the U. of I. at Chicago, turns a smartphone into a sophisticated medical device.

Unlike other apps that merely count steps, GaitTrack uses eight motion parameters to perform a detailed analysis of a person's gait, or walking pattern, which can tell physicians much about a patient's cardiopulmonary, muscular and neurological health.

The team was bed by Bruce Schatz, the head of medical information science and a professor of computer science at the U. of I.

According to Schatz, gait is sometimes called the "sixth vital sign" - after temperature, blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate and blood oxygen level.

Gait speed involves several systems of the body working together in coordination, so changes in gait can be a sign of trouble in one or more systems.

The findings are published in the journal Telemedicine and e-Health.