Ubiquitous House and Unconstrained Monitoring Devices for Home Healthcare System

Abstract

This paper suggests a healthcare monitoring system using unconstrained measurement devices with ubiquitous techniques. These measurement devices are developed into built-in type and sensor type. The first devices are built-in the households (bed, sofa and toilet seat) and measure the patient's heart and respiration activity and estimate a blood pressure. The second devices are placed in a kitchen, front door and every room and detect the patient's movements and activities. All digitized raw signals are transmitted to a main PC using Bluetooth wireless network from all ubiquitous devices and sent to hospital laboratory after an analyzing process. This paper suggest ubiquitous healthcare house (u-House) for a practical models of home healthcare system. And it can monitor the patient's daily health condition and activity in an unconstrained manner.

Evaluation of Unconstrained Monitoring Technology Used in the Smart Bed for u-Health Environment

“…15 In this study, the smart bed is used to measure the BCG of subjects. By the definition, the ECG is an electrical signal from the heart and can be normally recorded in the range of 0.05-35 Hz on the skin surface using Ag/AgCl or dry electrodes.…”

“…15 The u-Bed measures BCG during sleep using a load cell sensor. The u-Couch with a capacitive electrode measures ECG out of the subject's clothes.…”

Flexible home care automation - adapting to the personal and evolving needs and situations of the patient

“…These challenges can be technological, such as: memory space limitations [3] (For the long-term recording of health-related information -24/7 monitoring-a huge memory space will be required. ), identity establishment [3] (In family situations, it should always be possible to distinguish between the individual members of the family.…”

“…These challenges can be technological, such as: memory space limitations [3] (For the long-term recording of health-related information -24/7 monitoring-a huge memory space will be required. ), identity establishment [3] (In family situations, it should always be possible to distinguish between the individual members of the family. ), power consumption [4] (Battery-powered devices must have a useful lifetime and replacing or recharging batteries should be done routinely by service persons, if not automatically.…”

“…The system must have appropriate mechanisms in place to control who can access which personal and healthrelated information. ), non-intrusiveness [2,3] (People prefer to have as much as possible a normal life at their home. ), ease of use [2] (Typical users of home healthcare systems have no or limited technical skills.…”