In-Home Fall Risk Assessment and Detection Sensor System

Abstract

Falls are a major problem for older adults. A continuous, unobtrusive, environmentally mounted in-home monitoring system that automatically detects when falls have occurred or when the risk of falling is increasing could alert health care providers and family members so they could intervene to improve physical function or mange illnesses that are precipitating falls. Researchers at the University of Missouri (MU)Center for Eldercare and Rehabilitation Technology are testing such sensor systems for fall risk assessment and detection in older adults’ apartments in a senior living community. Initial results comparing ground truth fall risk assessment data and GAITRite gait parameters with gait parameters captured from Mircosoft Kinect and Pulse-Dopplar radar are reported.

Use of Functional Ambulation Performance Score as measurement of gait ability: Review

“…Negative correlations were also found between the FAPS and walking performance tests with a lower FAPS for longer times to achieve the test. Timed Up and Go test and FAPS were correlated with a Pearson coefficient of -0.80 (p < 0.001) in an elderly sample [7] and a Spearman rho (ρ) of -0.88 (p < 0.05) in a sample with multiple sclerosis [20]. Comparable results were found between the FAPS and the timed 25 ft walk test (ρ = -0.82, p < 0.05) [20].…”

“…Base of support and asymmetrical SL only make up a maximum of 16 points. This explains the strong correlation between the FAPS and the Timed Up and Go Test [7] and the timed 25 ft walk [20] but leads to question if using the FAPS has any advantage over simply measuring gait velocity [20]. Lastly, the design of the FAPS can also result in a floor effect because the maximum deduction of 22 points each for left and right functions yields a score of 56.…”

“…Indeed, some studies have used the FAPS to quantify gait variability [4], and the score has been used as an indication of stride to stride variability [5] despite the fact that the FAPS does not quantify variability. This is therefore a problem when the FAPS is used as an outcome measure for a protocol [6], as a "ground truth for fall risk assessment" [7], or to determine the concurrent validity of a clinical gait and balance scale [8]. It seems that there is a need for some clarification about the history of the score, what it measures, calculation, validity, and possible limitations.…”

A supervised approach to automatically extract a set of rules to support fall detection in an mHealth system

“…[4], whereas the second makes reference to systems composed of ambient sensors, i.e. sensors embedded within the environment, see for example [5]. A third group is based on the use of wearable sensors such as e.g.…”

Recognizing specific errors in human physical exercise performance with Microsoft Kinect

“…Rantz developed a continuous, unobtrusive, and environmentally mounted in-home fall risk assessment and detection system using the Kinect [Rantz, 2013]. There are also a number of Kinect-based virtual trainer games for the XBox platforms.…”