Safe Beacon: A Bluetooth Based Solution to Monitor Egress of Dementia Sufferers within a Residential Setting

Abstract

The global population is ageing, as a consequence of this there will be a greater incidence of ageing related illnesses which cause cognitive impairment–such as Alzheimer’s disease. Within residential care homes, such cognitive impairment can lead to wandering of individuals beyond the boundaries of safety provided. This wandering, particularly in urban areas can be life threatening. This study introduces a novel solution to detect, and alert caregivers of, egress of at-risk inhabitants of a care home. This solution operates through a combination of wearable Bluetooth beacons and beam-formed listening devices. In an evaluation process involving 275 egress events, this solution proved to offer accurate operation with no incidence of false positives. Notably, this solution has been deployed within a real residential care home environment for over 12 months. Proposed future work discusses improvements to this solution.