A Wearable Haptic System for the Health Monitoring of Elderly People in Smart Cities

Authors

  • Filippo Sanfilippo University College of Southeast Norway (USN) Faculty of Technology, Natural Sciences and Maritime Sciences Department of Science and Industry systems, Kongsberg, Norway https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1437-8368
  • Claudio Pacchierotti

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3991/ijoe.v14i08.8571

Keywords:

sensor fusion, wearable, health monitoring, elderly

Abstract


A sensor-fusion wearable health-monitoring system with integrated haptic feedback was previously introduced by our research group. The system's components are the following: a chest-worn device with an embedded controller board, an electrocardiogram (ECG) sensor, a temperature sensor, an accelerometer, a vibration motor, a colour-changing light-emitting diode (LED) and a push-button. This multi-sensor device makes possible to collect biometric and medical monitoring data from its wearer. The data provide a real-time indication of the wearer's health state and can also be further analysed later for medical diagnosis. The embedded vibration motor can actuate distinctive haptic feedback patterns according to the wearer's health state. The embedded colour-changing LED provides the wearer with an additional intuitive visual feedback of the current health state, and the wearer can report a potential emergency condition by using the push-button. In this paper, a conceptual case study is presented concerning possible applications for the health monitoring of elderly people in smart cities. The proposed system aims at reducing risk by assessing individual and overall potentially-harmful situations. A data collection and analysis are also presented to demonstrate that the system can provide compelling vibrotactile feedback.

Author Biography

Filippo Sanfilippo, University College of Southeast Norway (USN) Faculty of Technology, Natural Sciences and Maritime Sciences Department of Science and Industry systems, Kongsberg, Norway

Filippo Sanfilippo was awarded with a Ph.D. in Engineering Cybernetics from the NTNU in Trondheim, in 2015. He is currently an Associate Professor in Software Engineering at the Dept. of Science and Industry systems, Faculty of Technology, Natural Sciences and Maritime Sciences, University College of Southeast Norway (USN), 3603 Kongsberg, Norway. His research interests include control methods, robotics, artificial intelligence, modular robotic grasping and software engineering. He has authored several papers and is a reviewer for several international conferences and journals. He is currently the Membership Development Officer for the IEEE Norway Section.

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Published

2018-08-30

How to Cite

Sanfilippo, F., & Pacchierotti, C. (2018). A Wearable Haptic System for the Health Monitoring of Elderly People in Smart Cities. International Journal of Online and Biomedical Engineering (iJOE), 14(08), pp. 52–66. https://doi.org/10.3991/ijoe.v14i08.8571

Issue

Vol. 14 No. 08 (2018)

Section

Papers

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