Hybrid CNN-Fuzzy Approach for Automatic Identification of Ventricular Fibrillation and Tachycardia

Ventricular arrhythmias such as ventricular fibrillation (VF) and ventricular tachycardia (VT) are among the leading causes of sudden cardiac death worldwide, making their timely and accurate detection a critical task in modern cardiology. This study presents an advanced framework for the automatic detection of critical cardiac arrhythmias—specifically ventricular fibrillation (VF) and ventricular tachycardia (VT)—by integrating deep learning techniques with neuro-fuzzy systems. Electrocardiogram (ECG) signals from the MIT-BIH and AHA databases were preprocessed through denoising, alignment, and segmentation. Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) were employed for deep feature extraction, and the resulting features were used as input for various fuzzy classifiers, including Fuzzy ARTMAP and the Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS). Among these classifiers, ANFIS demonstrated the best overall performance. The combination of CNN-based feature extraction with ANFIS yielded the highest classification accuracy across multiple cardiac rhythm types. The classification performance metrics for each rhythm type were as follows: for Normal Sinus Rhythm, precision was 99.09%, sensitivity 98.70%, specificity 98.89%, and F1-score 98.89%. For VF, precision was 95.49%, sensitivity 96.69%, specificity 99.10%, and F1-score 96.09%. For VT, precision was 94.03%, sensitivity 94.26%, specificity 99.54%, and F1-score 94.14%. Finally, for Other Rhythms, precision was 97.74%, sensitivity 97.74%, specificity 99.40%, and F1-score 97.74%. These results demonstrate the strong generalization capability and precision of the proposed architecture, suggesting its potential applicability in real-time biomedical systems such as Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs), Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillators (ICDs), and advanced cardiac monitoring technologies.