ExECG: An Explainable AI Framework for ECG models
For researchers and clinicians using ECG deep learning models, ExECG addresses the lack of standardized XAI pipelines, enabling more consistent and reproducible explanations.
ExECG provides a unified Python framework for explainable AI in ECG models, standardizing access, explanation methods, and visualization to improve reproducibility and cross-method comparison.
Deep learning has enabled ECG diagnostic models with strong performance in tasks such as arrhythmia classification and abnormality detection. However, accuracy alone is insufficient for clinical deployment because it does not explain why a specific output was produced, limiting justification, error analysis, and trust. Although ECG XAI has been extensively investigated and steadily improved, practical pipelines and reporting conventions vary across studies, hindering reuse and reproducibility. To address these issues, we present Explainable AI framework for ECG models (ExECG), a Python framework that provides a three-stage pipeline: Wrapper standardizes access across heterogeneous ECG formats and intermediate representations, Explainer unifies diverse XAI methods under a shared execution protocol, and Visualizer supports consistent cross-method comparison within a unified interface. We demonstrate end-to-end usage with concise examples and two case studies, highlighting interoperable and reproducible ECG explainability.