Individually tailored exercise training and rehabilitation technique: medical personal trainer

1. An exercise session training and/or rehabilitation method, comprising:

providing a heart beats measuring means for and connected to each individual i belonging to a set Σ of I individuals, with I denoting an integer greater than 1 and with the heart beats measuring means being able to provide a time-sequence of impulses corresponding to each heart beat, wherefrom heart rate HR and heart rate variability HRV are calculated;

providing each individual i of the set Σ with: a training/rehabilitation device comprising heart rate (HR) control configured to tune an effort load provided by the training/rehabilitation device for the individual i; and

providing each training/rehabilitation device with microcontroller for controlling said HR control, said microcontroller being connected to said HR control;

wherein the following steps are executed by a respective said microcontroller for each individual i:

subdividing an exercise session of total duration T, depending on each individual, into N subsequent session phases at a constant HR reference value, wherein N is a positive integer and where the session phases start at correspondingly subsequent time instants T 0 , T 1 , . . . T N−1 ;

assigning to each of said session phases, a respective pre-defined HR reference value from a sequence of HR reference values: HR 1,i *<HR 2,i *< . . . <HR N,i * with HR 1,i *>HR rest,i and HR N,i *<HR maximal,i ; and

modifying, for each session phase [T l , T l+1 ], l=1, 2, . . . , N−1, the pre-defined HR reference value of said sequence of HR reference values to γ l HR l+1,i *, renamed HR l+1,i * after the modification;

wherein the HR control is concurrently configured to maintain a HR profile of each individual within 5% of said modified sequence of HR reference values HR 1,i *<HR 2,i *< . . . <HR N,i * wherein

HR rest,i is a pre-determined HR at rest for the individual i,

HR maximal,i is a pre-defined maximal HR for the individual i,

γ l is a real positive number that is determined, for l=1, 2, . . . , N−1, on the basis of:

a HRV index HRVi(T l ) for the individual i, as calculated on the basis of the heart beats time-sequence during a last portion of a preceding session phase [T l−1 , T l ]; and

an individualized TRainingIMPulse value termed TRIMPi or TRainingIMPulse value termed TRIMP for the individual i, as calculated on the basis of:

the aforementioned pre-defined HR reference values;

durations V l =T l+1 −T l of all the session phases [T l , T l+1 ], l=0, 1, 2, . . . , N−1,

the HR at rest HR rest,i for the individual i, and

the maximal HR HR maximal,i for the individual i.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein each phase duration V l , l=0, 1, 2, . . . , N−1, is equal to 4 minutes.

3. The method according to claim 2 , wherein the last portion of each phase [T l−1 , T l ], l=1, 2, . . . , N−1—that is used to compute the HRV index HRVi—is at least 3-minutes-long.

4. The method according to claim 1 , wherein said pre-defined HR reference values HR 1,i *<HR 2,i *< . . . <HR N,i * is TRIMP- or TRIMPi-compatible, namely

∑

k

=

1

N

⁢

TRIMPi

⁡

(

T

k

)

≤

S

Σ

,

TRIMPi

with S Σ,TRIMPi denoting a pre-defined individual or set-uniform threshold for a cumulative TRIMPi or TRIMP value.

5. The method according to claim 1 , wherein, if the HRV index HRVi(T l )≤S Σ,HRV , then γ l <1, otherwise γ l ≥1, wherein S Σ,HRV is a pre-defined individual or set-uniform threshold so that the HRV index HRVi(T l ) larger than S Σ,HRV identifies admissible exercises and the HRV index HRVi(T l ) smaller than or equal to S Σ,HRV identifies non-admissible exercises.

6. The method according to claim 1 , wherein γ l is determined as follows:

γ

l

=

max

⁢

{

1

+

α

γ

⁢

⁢

if

⁢

⁢

𝒜

1

+

β

γ

⁢

⁢

if

⁢

⁢

ℬ

1

⁢

⁢

otherwise

}

wherein:

α γ , β γ are pre-defined user-defined gains with α γ >β γ >0 and

HR l,i *≥(1+α γ )HR l−1,i *, l= 2, . . . , N

is the double condition:

HRVi( T l )≥α HRV S Σ,HRV

in which α HRV is a user-defined gain, and

∑

k

=

1

,

k

≠

l

+

1

N

⁢

TRIMPi

⁡

(

T

k

)

+

V

l

⁡

[

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

⁢

(

1

+

α

γ

)

⁢

B

i

⁢

e

C

i

⁢

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

,

(

1

+

α

γ

)

]

≤

S

Σ

,

TRIMPi

wherein B i and C i are pre-defined constants variable for each individual i in the TRIMPi, while they are equal for any individual in the case of TRIMP, subscript “n” stands for “normalized”, and HR n,i,l+1,(1+α γ ) is:

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

⁢

(

1

+

α

γ

)

=

(

1

+

α

γ

)

⁢

HR

l

+

1

,

i

*

-

HR

rest

,

i

HR

maximal

,

i

-

HR

rest

,

i

;

is the double condition:

HRVi( T l )≥β HRV S Σ,HRV

wherein β HRV is a further pre-defined gain with α HRV >β HRV >1, and

∑

k

=

1

,

k

≠

l

+

1

N

⁢

TRIMPi

⁡

(

T

k

)

+

V

l

⁡

[

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

⁢

(

1

+

β

γ

)

⁢

B

i

⁢

e

C

i

⁢

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

,

(

1

+

β

γ

)

]

≤

S

Σ

,

TRIMPi

in which HR n,i,l+1,(1+β γ ) is:

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

⁢

(

1

+

β

γ

)

=

(

1

+

β

γ

)

⁢

HR

l

+

1

,

i

*

-

HR

rest

,

i

HR

maximal

,

i

-

HR

rest

,

i

;

the above determination of γ l holds true only if, at each T l , the condition:

HRVi( T l )≤ S Σ,HRV

does not hold; otherwise, a decrease of the HR reference to the previous value HR 1−1,i * is carried out, with HR 0,i *=HR rest,i .

7. The method according to claim 1 , wherein, with l=0, 1, . . . , N−1:

TRIMPi

⁡

(

T

l

+

1

)

=

V

l

⁡

[

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

,

(

1

)

⁢

B

i

⁢

e

C

i

⁢

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

,

(

1

)

]

and

⁢

:

HR

n

,

i

,

l

+

1

,

(

1

)

=

HR

l

+

1

,

i

*

-

HR

rest

,

i

HR

maximal

,

i

-

HR

rest

,

i

.

8. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the HR control is concurrently configured to maintain the HR profile of each individual within 3% of said modified sequence of HR reference values.

9. Individually tailored exercise session training and rehabilitation apparatus, comprising:

heart beats measuring means for measuring time-sequence of impulses corresponding to each heart beat of an individual i belonging to a set of I individuals, with I denoting an integer greater than 1;

a training/rehabilitation device for each individual of the aforementioned set of individuals,

wherein the training/rehabilitation device has:

HR control configured to tune an effort load provided by the training/rehabilitation device for the individual i; and

microcontroller for controlling said HR control, said microcontroller being connected to said HR control

and configured to execute the following steps:

subdividing an exercise session of total duration T, depending on each individual, into N subsequent session phases at a constant HR reference value, wherein N is a positive integer and where the session phases start at correspondingly subsequent time instants T 0 , T 1 , . . . T N−1 ;

assigning to each of said session phases, a respective pre-defined HR reference value from a sequence of HR reference values: HR 1,i *<HR 2,i *< . . . <HR N,i * with HR 1,i *>HR rest,i and HR N,i *<HR maximal,i ; and

modifying, for each session phase [T l , T l+1 ], l=1, 2, . . . , N−1, the pre-defined HR reference value of said sequence of HR reference values to γ l HR l+1,i *, renamed HR l+1,i * after the modification;

wherein the HR control is concurrently configured to maintain a HR profile of each individual within 5% of said modified sequence of HR reference values HR 1,i *<HR 2,i *< . . . <HR N,i *, wherein

HR rest,i is a pre-determined HR at rest for the individual i,

HR maximal,i is a pre-defined maximal HR for the individual i,

γ l is a real positive number that is determined, for l=1, 2, . . . , N−1, on the basis of:

a HRV index HRVi(T l ) for the individual i, as calculated on the basis of the heart beats time-sequence during a last portion of a preceding session phase [T l−1 , T l ]; and

an individualized TRainingIMPulse value termed TRIMPi or TRainingIMPulse value termed TRIMP for the individual i, as calculated on the basis of:

the aforementioned pre-defined HR reference values;

durations V l =T l+1 −T l of all the session phases [T l , T l+1 ], l=0, 1, 2, . . . , N−1,

the HR at rest HR rest,i for the individual i, and

the maximal HR HR maximal,i for the individual i.