MCU-based Temperature and Pulse Rate Monitoring

There are two things to consider if you want to know if a person is still alive, the pulse rate and the temperature. So we come up of an idea to create an MCU-based device that will monitor these two things. Our objective is to apply a microcontroller to medical purposes. This project uses an ultra-bright infrared (IR) LED and a phototransistor to detect the pulse in your finger. It then flashes a red LED in time with your pulse. The pulse monitor works as follows: Shine the bright LED onto one side of your finger while the phototransistor on the other side of your finger picks up the amount of transmitted light. The resistance of the phototransistor will vary slightly as the blood pulses through your finger. For the temperature, we will use an LCD screen and a thermistor temperature sensor to both display the current temperature and the set temperature. It uses a rotary encoder to allow the set temperature to be changed. The rotary encoders button also acts as an override switch.