No abstract

Abstract-Helping elderly people to live independently within their homes for as long as possible, before transitioning to higher levels of care, can significantly reduce healthcare expenditures. However, achieving this vision requires continuous monitoring of the condition of elderly adults within their homes. In particular, activity, gait velocity, movement, and location of elderly adults are critical biomarkers for healthy aging. We present a prototype integrating a wearable location-tracking sensor with back-end cloud-based data processing, thereby enabling real-time tracking and analysis of a large number of people simultaneously. The resulting vertically-integrated prototype provides a basic infrastructure for future work, including new products and services that offer real-time monitoring and early disease diagnosis to help elderly people live independently for as long as possible.

User‐led organisations are increasingly providing services themselves, but it is not always easy to overcome the barriers of bureaucracy and officialdom when you are inexperienced in project development. This is the story of the trials, tribulations and eventual success of a group of users in rural Dorset, who are keen to use their newly acquired experience for the benefit of others who may want to do the same.