Innovation Stagnation in Pressure Biofeedback: A Proof-of-Concept Calling for Clinically Driven Re-engineering

This repository contains the open-source software toolkit developed to accompany the research article "Innovation Stagnation in Pressure Biofeedback: A Proof-of-Concept Calling for Clinically Driven Re-engineering." The provided R scripts serve as a functional Proof-of-Concept (PoC) interface for real-time data acquisition, signal processing, and dynamic visualization of dual-channel pressure biofeedback signals. The software is designed to communicate with the custom hardware (PIC16F1789 MCU + MP3V5050 Sensors) via Bluetooth/Serial connection, allowing for the simultaneous monitoring of spinal and transvaginal pressure. File Inventory & Functionality: 006eng_median_mad_filter.R (Primary Visualization Tool): The main graphical user interface (GUI) used in the study. It features a hybrid filtration pipeline combining a Hampel Filter (Median/MAD based outlier detection) and Exponential Moving Average (EMA) to ensure artifact-robust visualization. It plots synchronized Spinal (Blue) and Transvaginal (Red) pressure traces in real-time. 000_data_format.txt: Documentation of the custom ASCII serial protocol used by the firmware. Explains the data structure (e.g., s040.1 for spinal, ;v010.5 for vaginal) required for parsing. 005eng_simple_plot.R: A lightweight visualization script for basic real-time plotting without heavy filtration. Useful for testing raw sensor responsiveness. 004eng_converted_double_columb.R: Data logging script that captures the live stream and formats it into a synchronized two-column Data Frame (Spinal/Vaginal). Ideal for exporting session data to CSV for statistical analysis. 003_converted_data.R: A diagnostic script that reads the raw serial stream, parses the Regular Expression (Regex) tags, and prints the numerical values to the console for debugging purposes. 001_port_select.R: A utility script to list available serial ports (COM ports) and assist with connection establishment. System Requirements: Language: R (version 4.0 or higher recommended) Dependencies: Requires the serial package for RS-232/Bluetooth communication. Installation: install.packages("serial") Usage Instructions: Ensure the biofeedback hardware is paired via Bluetooth or connected via USB-Serial. Run 001_port_select.R to identify the correct COM port. Open 006eng_median_mad_filter.R, update the selected_port variable if necessary, and run the script to start the 20-second live visualization window. Licensing: This software is released under the MIT License to encourage further development and academic use.