According to the invention, there is provided a system for the detection of impending acute cardiopulmonary medical events that, left untreated, would with a reasonable likelihood result in either severe injury or death comprising: an electro-cardiogram (ECG) module including a plurality of electrodes for sensing a patient's ECG and having an ECG output； a sensor for sensing a patient's physiologic parameter other than ECG； a first input for receiving the ECG output； a second input for receiving signals from the sensor for sensing a patient's physiologic parameter other than ECG； a third input constructed and arranged to receive: parametric information describing at least one element of a patient's demographic information； and parametric information describing a patient's medical history； a digitizing unit for digitizing the ECG and the physiologic signal other than ECG； a housing containing a memory unit and processing unit, for storing and processing, respectively, the ECG, the physiologic signal other than ECG, patient demographic information and medical history； and a user communication unit； wherein the processing unit calculates at least one measure of heart rate variability (HRV), combines that at least one measure of HRV with at least one parameter each of patient demographic information and medical history, and calculates a statistical probability of an ACP event within 72 hours of the calculation.
